[Ready4Freddy]

According to the press conference (article posted in #100), the threshold ratio was recently lowered to 4:1. Doesn't say how recently, though. Also says that mere mortals typically have a 1:1 ratio.

Two things are evident from this - one, that the anti-doping authorities obviously take into account the increased levels that a world-class athlete would naturally have, and two, there's a lot of 'art' here to go along with the science.

'Art', in that they use a threshold ratio of naturally-occurring subtances to impute use of a banned substance. Much like they use haematocrit levels to impute use of banned substance, EPO, for which they have yet to develop an accepted definitive test.

Really doesn't sound anything like DNA testing....

To detect the use of synthetic testosterone as a muscle-building anabolic steroid, anti-doping officials have declared that a ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone above 6 to 1 is evidence of drug use.

[RichardW]

My point about the DNA is that was my area of expertise. A lot of people want to denigrate these tests as being unreliable. They are grasping at straws.