Here's an interestong story on how athletes shy away from some supplements they'd otherwise be free to take because they can't be sure they won't trigger a positive dope test. Some folks are looking into helping nutraceutical firms and others make purer supplements. Be on the lookout for athletes to be taking more supplements in the future:

Like many elite athletes, she agonized over which pills and powders she could ingest without triggering a positive doping test.

Experts say government regulation of nutraceuticals -- vitamins, herbal remedies, dietary supplements and other natural health products -- is slowly improving but remains woefully inadequate for the needs of athletes.

That's why some members of the sporting community are hoping manufacturers will regulate themselves, to guarantee the purity and efficacy of their products.

Perhaps the first example of such self-regulation in Canada was unveiled at a news conference in Winnipeg yesterday, as the makers of Cold-fX announced a study showing their pills full of bitter-tasting ginseng extract don't contain any banned substances.

It was an unusual study in an industry notorious for shoddy science. Grant Pierce, a sports researcher at the University of Manitoba, conducted clinical trials at arm's length from the company, CV Technologies Inc. His team gave the cold remedy to 40 recreational athletes under controlled condition for a month and tested their urine according to International Olympic Committee rules.

The results, to be published in the August edition of the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism, showed the athletes tested negative for about 200 banned substances.

Pierce said he wasn't paid anything by the company, which spent "hundreds of thousands of dollars" on the project. He was also free to report his results if they were unfavourable.

"It provides an example for the nutraceutical industry that this is what they need to do make their compounds credible and show they're safe," Pierce said.