World champion Madisyn Cox has filed a lawsuit against an affiliate of the Dallas-based Cooper Clinic for “producing and selling” the tainted multivitamin that led to her suspension by FINA last year, her lawyer announced Tuesday.
“At what might have been the height of her career, Madisyn paid a heavy price because she trusted a company she shouldn’t have,” said her attorney, Mark Lanier of The Lanier Law Firm in Houston. “The shock, pain and emotional trauma she has bravely faced are almost incalculable, and we will be doing everything possible to gain justice for Madisyn and her family. We also hope to force this company and this industry to do a better job in assuring the purity of their products and the proper labeling of each product’s ingredients.”
The case, Madisyn Cox v. Cooper Concepts Inc, et al, No. D-1-GN-19-002032, is filed in the 250th District Court in Travis County.
The suspension, originally set for two years but later reduced, began in March 2018 and was lifted in September, forcing Cox to sit out a number of major meets, including last summer’s 2018 Phillips 66 National Championships, which served as the qualifier for this year’s upcoming 2019 FINA World Championships.
Cox had to return grants and prize money from the U.S. Olympic Committee and USA Swimming. Additionally, she posted on Instagram Tuesday that she has been denied entry into the International Swimming League – created in part to help professional swimming become a financially viable option for athletes – which has a strict ban on anyone who has served a doping suspension.
Cox’s routine blood and urine tests in February 2018 found trace amounts of Trimetazidine in her system. The substance is used as a heart medication outside of the U.S. but is not approved for sale in the U.S. by the Food and Drug Administration – it also triggered Sun Yang‘s 2014 suspension. In a statement to SwimSwam at the time, Cox said that the positive test was for an “unfathomably low” amount, and that she had “never heard of this substance prior to receiving the test results.” She also said she thought the trace amounts of Trimetazidine may have come from drinking tap water in Austin, Texas.
In August, the Court of Arbitration for Sport agreed to reduce Cox’s sentence as the substance was traced by the Salt Lake City WADA-accredited lab back to the Cooper Complete Elite Athletic multivitamin that Cox, 23, said she has been taking for seven years, and that she had listed on doping control forms. There had never been a recorded case of Trimetazidine supplement contamination in the United States, according to Cox, which is why she didn’t immediately have the supplement tested.
Cooper Complete was founded in 1997 by Dr. Kenneth Cooper, a pioneer of the benefits of aerobic exercise. Their product line “was developed by a team of physicians and scientists from leading universities alongside Dr. Cooper to address weaknesses found in many supplements,” according to their website.
Over the last few months of 2018, Cooper repeatedly told SwimSwam that its internal investigation was ongoing, but stopped selling the Elite Athletic multivitamin in September.
“Although her suspension was reduced when the source of the banned drug was identified, and Ms. Cox was cleared to resume competing in September 2018, she still faces significant reputational, financial and emotional consequences. Ms. Cox was forced to miss several major events and to return fees, grants and prizes from the U.S. Olympic Committee and USA Swimming, and was unable to pursue lucrative corporate sponsorships,” the firm wrote.
“In addition to that lost income, Ms. Cox and her family incurred considerable expense in hiring several medical and legal experts to seek the source of the banned substance and a complete revocation of her suspension.”
Cox swam at The University of Texas from 2013-2017. At Worlds in 2017, she won a bronze medal in the 200 IM and a gold medal as a member of the U.S.’s 800 free relay team. So far in 2019, she’s posted the seventh-fastest 200 IM in the world, and is the fastest American woman, just ahead of Melanie Margalis and Kathleen Baker.
I mean she has Dean by her side, she could win.
That’s why you don’t take supplements. You run the risk of it being tainted, it’s not 100%. It sucks that it happened but that’s the risk.
Well taking a multivitamin is important. It helps reduce the risk of of getting sick, missing training, underperforming, missing major meets and teams, and missing out on a lot of possible money from completions. When you are an athlete and competing is how you make money you should do everything you can to keep your body healthy and a multivitamin is a great thing to take for that.
SHE’S A CHEATER!!!!!!!!
Note that promising swimmer Kicker Vencill garnered $500K from a very similar lawsuit 15 years ago.
Good for Cox. It’s unfortuante how much trouble the failed doping test caused- especially considering how small the amount.
That being said, I still don’t understand why she didn’t have the multivitamin tested immedialty. Supplements, but particularly multivitamins, are notorious for containing small amounts of unaccounted for substances.
I’m conflicted on the ISL’s positions on this I want her to be able to swim with them but I do believe in there firm position on doping. Thoughts?
Is she being excluded from the ISL?
article says she posted about being denied from ISL
Isl behind firm on doping is good, but what about athletes receiving suspensions for other things? In Cox’s case her’s wasn’t a legitimate doping suspension, even admitted by the WDA. Would the ISL keep someone like Phelps out for his DUIs? It’s a good question, if someone can prove the source of the doping or in a case like Madaline Groves where she missed too many tests is there a fine line instead of a hard one?
The isl has the right idea, but in a case like this there is clear evidence to support her not intentionally cheating. So why punish her for another person’s mistakes? Where’s the line supposed to be drawn?
It WAS a legitimate doping suspension, because athletes are ultimately responsible for what goes into their own bodies. It’s a very unfortunate situation, and I’m certain she had no knowledge that the vitamins were tainted, but allowing exceptions for ignorance completely undermine the concept of “zero tolerance.”
With that said, I hope her lawsuit is successful, and that the company pays a heavy price, which will hopefully encourage vitamin/supplement companies to take responsibility to ensure that their products are clean.
There was a summit recently about contamination and the huge problem it is becoming. It’s an issue that WADA is going to have to address. Other people’s mistakes are ruining people’s career. Some WADA labs are able to detect an unfathomably trace amount which while it has no performance enhancement it does trigger a positive test. At .1 nanogram it’s essentially .0000000001 grams. That’s what was detected in her system. I’m curious if NSF will guarantee and stand behind its ability to test to these levels. Testing negative for 20 times on the vitamin and suddenly testing positive suggest a contamination of a raw material that was not detected. So do you listen to your physicians directive and take iron… Read more »
USA swimming constantly tells swimmer, particularly national teamers, not to use any multi-vitamin or supplement. So she knew their advice because of this type of issue. Having said that, i have asked USA swimming why they don’t partner with a group like NSF out of Ann Arbor that is a testing company that puts their seal of approval on product purity. They have a free app that shows all the products that have passed their inspection. And they continue to test new lots as they are produced. They assess for prohibited substances and dangerous substances and is rquried by the NHL, MLB and CFL, and recommended by the NFL, PGA, LPGA and others.
BTW, nothing from Cooper Elite shows on the NSF Certified for Sport site.
What is the name of this app? Is it their Pharma Biotech app?
NSF for sport on App Store
And yet there are athletes from those sports who are still having positive test because of contamination.
Mark Lanier is the best