Stephen Dank claims he gave former AFL star Nathan Bock banned peptide
Disgraced sports scientist Stephen Dank claims he supplied former Gold Coast Suns star Nathan Bock with the prohibited peptide CJC-1295. The allegations come just a week after Bock was cleared of doping by the Australian Anti-Doping Authority (Asada) and allowed to continue coaching NEAFL team Southport Sharks.
Dank told News Corp Australia he bought the drug at a Sydney compounding pharmacy in December 2010 and took it to the Gold Coast on a plane in a cooler bag packed with dry ice. He said he then gave the CJC-1295 to then Suns fitness boss Dean Robinson, who taught Bock how to self-administer it.
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Dank’s confession came as Asada insisted on Tuesday it was unable to establish whether the drug Bock used was actually CJC-1295. Robinson and Dank worked for the Suns in late 2010 when Bock, one the start-up club’s star signings, was being treated for an achilles injury.
The pair then reunited at Essendon in late 2011 and played key roles in establishing the Bombers pharmacologically experimental drugs program. An Asada spokesperson on Tuesday said: “To prove that an athlete has used a prohibited substance, it must be able to prove the substance used by that athlete.”
Dank, who was slapped with a lifetime ban by the AFL last year, said he was bewildered by Asada’s failure to confirm what drug he had given Bock. “I don’t know why they couldn’t establish that it was CJC-1295 when they think they’ve established that I gave (Essendon players) Thymosin beta-4, which they can’t,” Dank told The Herald Sun.