Casablanca – Soufiane Choubani is a young Moroccan whose interest in athletics led him to become the only Moroccan certified doping control officer. He is in charge of controlling the use of performance enhancing drugs among athletes.
In fact, the use of drugs to enhance performance is considered unethical by most international sports organizations.
Soufiane worked as an assistant for an American Certified Control Officer in Morocco. He benefited from training in doping control in Paris and got his own certification. He has tested on behalf of the IAAF, WKF & ATP federations in Morocco, Algeria, Senegal and Mauretania. During his mission as a DCO in Morocco, three athletes were caught doping and another is in the middle of appealing his case with the federation.
Soufiane received a letter of interest from the London 2012 Olympic Committee. Since then, he has been working his way to London 2012 with interviews and training courses. In November 2011, he had the final training where he passed with flying colors in Central London. Therefore, he will be testing players for FIFA in London and Newcastle at the Olympic Games. Soufiane remains the only Moroccan Doping Control Officers in the world who passed all the interviews and the final training.
Prior to becoming doping control career, Soufiane was an athlete whose interest to athletics emerges initially from his need to improve his endurance in soccer. He ran the 1600m and the 3200m on his High School Varsity Track Team, who was state champs, in the winter and spring seasons. He was ranked the 4th fastest freshmen in the 800m in the State of New Jersey in 2000. In 2002, he was selected for the Youth USA Track & Field Team but did not advance to the World Youth Olympics Championship due to a bad performance at the Eastern Coast Qualifications.
Soufiane was born in Casablanca but was raised and educated in New Jersey for 18 years. He holds a Master Degree in Education from Kean University in New Jersey. His degree allowed him to teach in the US as well as in Morocco. He just recently took a break from teaching to focus on testing athletes.
Currently, Soufiane works with a team of four with female and male assistants. His transfers are unpredictable since he never knows who or where he will be testing an athlete until he gets his mission request from a federation.
Soufiane will be the First Moroccan to work as a Doping Control Officer in the history of the Olympic Games in London 2012. He will begin his duties as a DCO in London/Newcastle on July 16th and finish on 10th of August.
