Drug testing returns ... with a twist

Drug tests are back this year for Iditarod mushers under updated drug rules that could disqualify mushers who smoke pot before – not just during – the race.

The Iditarod began testing for illegal drugs for the first time last year. Anchorage-based WorkSafe set up a makeshift drug-testing headquarters in a city supply room in White Mountain, the second-to-last checkpoint on the trail, where officials pulled mushers aside during their mandatory eight-hour stay in the village.

The top finishers all tested clean, the Iditarod reported.

That includes champion Lance Mackey, who believed jealous competitors called for the drug tests in hopes he’d test positive for marijuana.

"There goes all the finger-pointing and accusations and assumptions," Mackey told The Associated Press when the results arrived. "They just got laid to rest."

Two mushers toward the back of the pack, however, tested positive for THC, the psychoactive compound in marijuana. The Iditarod never publicly identified the mushers because the race rules were unclear, executive director Stan Hooley said.

The 2010 rules said mushers weren’t allowed to use drugs during the race, but the nature of the testing couldn’t prove whether the THC use took place before the Iditarod.

The board has amended the rules to say that merely testing positive can result in disqualification, meaning lingering drugs in your system could get you booted from the race.

Hooley wouldn’t say where the mushers will be tested this year.

Mushers can and do apply for “therapeutic use exemptions” to the drug rules. Hooley said the Iditarod Trail Committee is not told who asks for the drug exemptions.

“In general terms, we understand that a number of mushers did apply for the TUEs last year and again this year,” he said in an e-mail.

The list of banned drugs include:

-- Marijuana
-- Hashish
-- Cocaine
-- Amphetamine/Methamphetamine
-- Opiates (Codeine/Morphine)
-- Synthetic Opiates (Hydrocodone, Hydromorphone, Oxycodone, Oxymorphone)
-- Propoxyphene
-- Phencyclidine
-- Or any other narcotic or controlled substance as defined by federal or state law