when were steroids banned?

[oldvaulter]

Can anyone tell me exactly, or approximately, when anabolic steroids were banned for use by athletes in track and field competition?

[Guest]

I think it was 1972. Somewhere in the 70's a T&FN article refers to a shot mark as "by far the best-ever in a steroid controlled meet", meaning the best mark in a meet where drug tests were being administered.

It is worth noting that no throwing events have established world records since out-of-competition testing was instituted in 1991 (except the JT and women's HT, which either didn't exist or have had rule changes).

Trivia question: What's the "world record" for the shot since random out-of-competition testing began in 1991?

[MJD]

Toth's throw from last week-end-22.67?

[Guest]

Um, I guess so! I was in Boston for the last week and was out of the loop -- I thought it was Adam Nelson's best throw from last year.

If our current JT marks are considered the World Records, I'll take Toth's as a WR too. In both events, athletes are clearly competing under different rules than in the 80s.

[gh]

I know that the '72 Olympics was the first Games to have formal testing (I'm thinking there may have been some "informational sampling" done at Mexico in '68), although in a quick check of the Olympic Edition of
T&FN for Munich, we apparently didn't even deem it an important enough subject to mention (!).

We (Bob Hersh) did write this in the OT coverage a couple of months earlier, and it casts some light on the subject:

<<An unusual procedure, instituted for the first time in the U.S., involved urine testing ot competitors in order to ensure compliance with the IAAF "doping" rule which will govern the Olympics. Just how many were sampled was never announced, but it was far from 100%.

Nor were the results of the tests made public, although it should be safe to infer from the silence that no serious violaters were uncovered. Apparently the tests were not capable of detecting past use of drugs, including steroids of amphetamines.

One coach, whose weightmen routinely take steroids, said, "I believe that most of the throwers simply stopped taking them a few days before their event--that's what mine did. Going off them for a week shouldn't affect the athletes physically or psychologically."

A runner commented, "Some guys take uppers before some meets. But they just help mental stimulation. Nobody needs any extra psych for a meet as important as this." >>

gh

[gh]

Steroids are first mentioned by name in the IAAF's rulebook for the 1971-72 seasons. Indeed, prior to that, NO drugs were given by name; there was just a generalized "doping is illegal" kind of stricture.

gh

[oldvaulter]

I wondered about these dates because when I was at UCLA in the mid-sixties, many athletes on the track team were given prescriptions for Dianabol (Methandrostenolone), an anabolic steroid now illegal. I was one who was given such a prescription, though it came with so many dire warnings about possible negative side-effects that I was scared to take the drug and never did. Other athletes were definitely taking the drug and talked about it openly. I was under the impression that it was not illegal at the time.

However, the widespread use of anabolic steroids in the mid-sixties raises questions about those 1968 Mexico City sprints and jumps beyond the altitude issue, doesn't it?

[Guest]

I was at UCLA in the late 70's - early 80's and guys were juicing then. The talk was the ban hit in '72. A real hot-shot 400 guy for the Bruins from the mid 70's, an Olympian, was well known as a big time juicer, and carries on now like he's a foe of drugs.

I can also remember going to a doctor in W. Los Angeles with a friend of mine who was a power-lifer. The doctor was jailed for other offensed - by the way, he also gave steroids to AIDS patients, etc. before it was discovered to be beneficial. Anyway, this lifter would go there to get his 'prescription' - and on a couple of occasions, I remember some sprinters there that were supposedly sworn enemies of drugs and so on. Quite amusing.

No, I wasn't on drugs. Just one of those distance runners from the pre EPO days.

[Guest]

>However, the widespread use of anabolic
>steroids in the mid-sixties raises questions
>about those 1968 Mexico City sprints and jumps
>beyond the altitude issue, doesn't it?>>

Try Tokyo 64 for starters. But the "widespread use" of steroids in the sixties was nothing compared to the use in the 70's and 80's once the science was well understood and the dispersal of such drugs became national policy for many federations.