RACING Victoria Ltd yesterday denied that EPO charges against father-and-son training team Bevan and Richard Laming were about to be dropped, reports The Age.It says: Nearly 10 months after RVL stewards raided the Laming's Victorian stables at Cranbourne after two swab irregularities, no date has been set for the hearing but an RVL spokesman said last night that there was ''no truth in the rumour'' that the case was to be shelved.''Work is still progressing on the case but a date is still to be
RACING Victoria Ltd yesterday denied that EPO charges against father-and-son training team Bevan and Richard Laming were about to be dropped, reports The Age.
It says: Nearly 10 months after RVL stewards raided the Laming's Victorian stables at Cranbourne after two swab irregularities, no date has been set for the hearing but an RVL spokesman said last night that there was ''no truth in the rumour'' that the case was to be shelved.
''Work is still progressing on the case but a date is still to be fixed for it to be heard,'' the spokesman said.
On November 20 last year, the father-son combination were charged by stewards as a result of an investigation into their horses Benelli and War Dancer testing positive to the banned substance darbepoetin alfa, which is a synthetic form of erythropoietin (EPO). It was the first time the drug, which is banned under Australian Racing rule 177B (2), had been confirmed in a racing thoroughbred in this country.
Both horses, stewards alleged, were found to have EPO in their systems when randomly tested out of competition on June 11. Benelli tested positive a second time when tested out of competition on July 2. In October last year, RVL informed the Lamings that HFL Sports Science in Britain had completed its analysis of the referee blood sample and the sample was positive to EPO.