Did a burrito cost an American runner her Olympic dream?

According to her, a pork burrito is to blame

Years of training and preparation to reach the Tokyo Olympics are out the window for Shelby Houlihan, an American runner, because of a positive drug test.

She says a pork burrito is to blame.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld a four-year suspension that took effect Monday for Houlihan, who holds American records for 1,500- and 5,000-meter races and tested positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone. The court’s move finalized a decision that worked its way through track and field’s anti-doping system as Houlihan unsuccessfully argued that pork from a burrito she purchased at a food truck near her home in Beaverton, Oregon, led to her positive test in December.

“I feel completely devastated, lost, broken, angry, confused and betrayed by the very sport that I’ve loved and poured myself into just to see how good I was,” Houlihan, 28, said in an Instagram post that shared details about her suspension.

The suspension disqualifies Houlihan from the US Olympic trials in Eugene, Oregon, which are scheduled to begin Friday, and means she cannot earn a spot in the Tokyo Games beginning late July.

Houlihan said she was informed of her test result Jan. 14 by the Athletics Integrity Unit, which manages drug testing for World Athletics, the global governing body for track and field.

“When I got that email, I had to read it over about ten times and google what it was that I had just tested positive for,” she said in the post. “I had never even heard of nandrolone.”

She made a list of all the food she consumed the week of Dec. 15, when the drug test was done, and eventually concluded that the burrito — eaten about 10 hours before her sample was taken — led to the positive test.

“Pig organ meat (offal) has the highest levels of nandrolone,” she said, adding that her attempts to establish her innocence, including a polygraph test and having a sample of her hair tested by a toxicologist, were not successful.

Brett Clothier, head of the Athletics Integrity Unit, said Houlihan’s case was handled properly according to guidance from the World Anti-Doping Agency.

“After being charged by the AIU, Ms. Houlihan’s case was heard by a three-member panel at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which made its decision after hearing evidence and arguments from the athlete’s lawyers and the AIU,” Clothier said in an email. The Court of Arbitration for Sport, he added, informed his agency that it planned to share its grounds for upholding the suspension soon.

Houlihan made her first Olympic team in 2016, when she placed 11th in the women’s 5,000-meter final. In July 2020, during an intrasquad club meet, she improved her American record with a time of 14 minutes, 23.92 seconds in the 5,000 meters. At the 2019 world championships, she ran the 1,500 meters in 3:54.99, for fourth place and an American record.

Houlihan is not the first athlete to blame positive tests on things that are clearly not performance-enhancing drugs. Some athletes have tested positive for traces of banned substances in antidepressants, different types of meat and even from substances transmitted through sex.

In 2018, boxer Saul Álvarez, nicknamed Canelo, blamed tainted meat for his positive tests for clenbuterol, a drug that can be used to increase muscle mass and reduce body fat. He was suspended for six months, delaying a lucrative rematch with Gennady Golovkin.

For Houlihan, the four-year suspension disqualifies her from the 2022 world championships, which were scheduled near where she lives in Eugene. In her Instagram post, she said she wanted to clearly state that she had “never taken any performance enhancing substances.”

“I believe in the sport and pushing your body to the limit just to see where the limit is,” she added. “I’m not interested in cheating.”