Anabolic steroids: the gremlins of sport.

The fact that athletes are now hormonally manipulating themselves in order to enhance their athletic performance has aroused great concern among those who are close to athletics because it is feared that these athletes may be doing irreparable harm to themselves as well as to “sport.” As Peter Lawson of the Manchester Guardian put it, “Unless something is done soon, international sport will be a competition between circus freaks manipulated by international chemists.” 1 Even so, the history of drug use by athletes has receive little scholarly attention. Though there are now several popular treatments of the use of anabolic drugs by athletes, most notably Dr. Bob Goldman’s Death in the Locker Room and Dr. William Taylor’s Hormonal Manipulation, neither book contains much discussion of the chronology of this phenomenon or, sad to say, much documentation.* What follows is an attempt to provide a chronology and, perhaps, an insight into this baleful aspect of modern sport. Tam Thompson, a 27 year old graduate student in physical education, has competed in the sport of powerlifting since 1982 and admits having used anabolic steroids to improve her performance. Like many other athletes in an increasingly wide variety of sports, Tam felt that using anabolic steroids (synthetic derivatives of the male hormone, testosterone, which helps in the building of muscle size and strength) would give her a competitive edge. Before using steroids, Tam had never won a national title nor set any official records and she hoped steroids would allow her to catch the top women. In this quest she was ultimately unsuccessful. Two years ago, Tam decided to stop using drugs and the result was a significant drop in her level of strength. The following interview represents one of the few times a woman athlete has discussed her drug usage for the record. 3 Much of what Tam has to say may seem extraordinary to those who are removed from the world of competitive sports, but neither the amounts of drugs she took, her attitude toward those drugs, nor the side effects she experienced are atypical of what many observers