Like it or not, athletes have been looking for an advantage since the original Olympic games in Ancient Greece. Since the 1950s, one of those advantages has been steroids and the use of performance-enhancing drugs has been a part of the sports landscape ever since.

Of course, bodybuilding has been synonymous with steroids and the use of them has been a fairly obvious fact since the 1970s. Yes, there are ‘natural’ competitions, but for the most part you cannot gain the type of muscle mass needed to win without using steroids. Let’s not lose sight of that and also understand that the sport has gone to different heights because of it.

The Mr. Olympia contest went from a small show held at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1965 to an entire weekend full of everything Las Vegas has to offer. The competitors have gone from muscular to humongous and have graduated from only using steroids to implementing human growth hormone and insulin into their programs.

The late Ben Weider tried for years to get bodybuilding into the Olympics and even came close, but the International Olympic Committee because of the stringent drug testing consistently shot down the idea involved.

Instead of running away from the subject and looking foolish trying to deny it, bodybuilding has simply plodded along and doesn’t seem to be any worse for wear because of it.

All the while, baseball players have spent more time testifying in front of grand juries and Congress and speaking to investigators and the media about steroids than they have taking cuts during batting practice.

Getting back to the games is what the fans want to see instead of federal investigations. So far, it seems like bodybuilders are the only athletes not affected by all of this nonsense negative attention.

Who would have ever guessed that?

“In the early ’90s, the federal government came into pro wrestling and tried to put Vince McMahon in prison for steroid use of wrestlers,” Ventura told KUSA, a television network in Denver, Colorado. “My question is (that) they’ve now determined 104 baseball players failed their steroid test in 2003 – 104! They indicted Vince McMahon, why aren’t they indicting Bud Selig? He’s the head of baseball; it happened on his watch.”

In 1993, McMahon was indicted during the then-WWF’s steroid controversy and was accused of distribution. He was found not guilty following a 1994 trial.

Earth to Ventura: It’s noble of you to go to bat for Vince and a period of steroid use in wrestling that you were a part of. But you fail to realize the major difference between the two situations.

Baseball has the Player’s Association and certain steps that need to be taken for drug testing. Wrestling is an entertainment entity and McMahon is the end all of the rules governing it.

While Selig is definitely no angel in this and enjoyed the benefits from the offensive explosion fueled by performance-enhancing drugs, locking him up and throwing away the key is definitely not an option for punishment.

Even someone as thick-headed as Ventura should be able to see that.

The recent announcement by Lance Armstrong that he will be returning to professional cycling has once again opened the door to speculation that he cheated his way to seven Tour De France victories. Having previously sued journalists for publishing circumstantial evidence regarding his use of performance enhancing substances, Armstrong has now surrendered himself to an aggressive new screening program under the direction of renowned anti-doping scientist Don Catlin.

However, Catlin (who assisted in exposing the BALCO doping ring in 2003) admits that the tests offer no guarantees in terms of tracking an athletes drug use and, of course, will do little to remove the suspicion of Armstrong’s past use of performance enhancing substances. The tests themselves will be as accurate as technologically possible though and Catlin feels they will be very hard to beat and any athlete trying to do so will be very foolish indeed. The results of Armstrong’s blood and urine tests will be posted on line and the urine will be frozen and stored for future re-testing.

The fact that Armstrong will be paying Catlin for the work out of his own pocket has of course given rise to speculation that he may have an influence on the results. However, he has dismissed such claims by saying, “There’s not enough money anywhere to potentially buy out Don Catlin.” Referring anyone who questions the integrity of the tests to Catlin himself for reassurance.

In conclusion Armstrong has stated that although he has promised to compete in January’s Tour Down Under in Australia and the Leadville 100 (an endurance event in Colorado) his goal is not to win an eighth Tour De France. His main focus for 2009 will be to raise cancer awareness, using his celebrity and return to pro sports to draw attention to this illness from which he once suffered. The fact that he claims an eighth Tour win is not on the agenda also serves as a convenient escape route if he turns in a lack luster performance (oops, did I say that?).

Leigh Penman, in addition to be a staff writer at MuscleSport Mag, has been writing for bodybuilding magazines, websites and nutritional supplement companies since 1985. Whilst residing in the UK, she earned the reputation of being one of the top female writers in bodybuilding-related media. Her credits included being a contributing editor on all the magazines in production as well as filling the shoes of Ladies Editor and Showbiz Editor on two publications (the later being on Arnold’s sanctioned magazine, ‘Bodypower’). During this time she also competed successfully on four occasions (placing in the top four in all contests).

Leigh has been working out for close to thirty years so she is clearly a writer who ‘walks her talk.’
She can be contacted personally at zeal2heal@yahoo.com or you can also check her out at New York’s favorite metaphysical store www.stickstoneandbone.com.

Recently, MuscleSport Mag had the pleasure of doing a one-on-one interview with Gregg Valentino, who is a top staff writer in ‘Muscular Development’ magazine. His ‘Ramblin’ Freak’ column is just one of his contributions each month to the famous publication and is known throughout the industry as the type of writer that pulls no punches and tells it like it is – if it pisses off some people or not.

Here is one part in a continuing series from our session with Gregg.

Being shy about his own steroid use is not a trait for Gregg Valentino. Instead of being like someone who was born again and preaching the clean life, his experiences with the substances were not all bad and he’s been as open about that as the detrimental part of them.

Due to his being brutally frank about the subject, Valentino is sort of like that old television commercial for E.F. Hutton – when he talks, people listen. Picking his brain about the modern world of bodybuilding was as enlightening as it was interesting. With the ‘grand daddy’ of them all, Mr. Olympia, right around the corner, the topic of drug testing at that level is one that has been broached before, but remains cloudy.

“First of all, there is no testing,” Valentino said. “If you tested bodybuilding, the sport would die. Bodybuilding is not like baseball. Steroids are part of the sport. They’re a tool like the baseball bat is. If it weren’t for steroids, bodybuilding wouldn’t be the sport you know now.

“There is such thing as a natural show, but they’re looking for diuretics and stuff like that. Even when they do test, they make it so you have to be stupid to fail the test. They’ll go like, ‘Listen, March 23 you’re going to be tested.’ Long in advance. They give you enough time to clean out.”

Valentino also brought up the fact that many bodybuilders will switch to oral steroids when a test is near, because compared to injectibles – especially oil based – they will be less detectable in time.

“THE POWERS THAT BE”

Many bodybuilders feel that the sport of bodybuilding is being deliberately held down by the people in charge, to keep it as a sub-culture as not to draw attention to the obvious high usage of steroids. Valentino agrees, but does not hold the Weider brothers responsible.

“Joe and Ben Weider are two ambassadors of the sport,” he said. “They want the sport to be clean. Ben has been lobbying for bodybuilding for the Olympics for the longest time.”

Valentino brought up a valid point when he stated that the Weiders are “figureheads” for the sport now and in fact; don’t even own the Weider enterprise anymore. Whoever is guilty of keeping the sport from growing, it isn’t the Weiders.

“The ‘powers that be’ in bodybuilding, they are the ones that I believe are holding the sport down,” said Valentino. “It’s total greed.”

GENETICS, PLUS

When you use more than 4,000 milligrams of testosterone per week, it is safe to say that you are in a position to recognize a high dosage of steroid use. Valentino has never been shy to admit the large amounts that he used at one time in his life, and he wasn’t even competing at the time.

“I don’t know the dosages they took, but I know what I took,” he told us. “And if I took that, you can bet your sweet ass that they were doing the same thing.”

Valentino recognizes that genetics are also a major part of the top bodybuilders’ physiques. “Every Mr. Olympia is born with narrow hips, broad shoulders,” he said. “That’s part of it. As far as what they do…to be at the top of bodybuilding, you have to be willing to do whatever it takes.

“What they’re doing today, obviously they’re doing anabolic steroids, but they’re also doing other things. Insulin and IGF (Insulin-like Growth Factor) is what changed with bodybuilding from when Lee Haney was 255 pounds winning Mr. Olympia, and now the difference is insulin. It has made a major difference.”

In the next segment of our interview session with Gregg Valentino, he speaks openly about the changes a bodybuilder makes once turning pro, how selling steroids is not as uncommon for bodybuilders as you may think, and some of the everyday issues that become difficult to do when all that mass is packed on.

A Virginia research company may become the thorn in the side of athletes that have been using human growth hormone and getting away with it. Due to the heavy drug testing for performance-enhancing drugs, anabolic steroids have become virtually impossible to use. Many have turned to HGH, which was only detectable through a blood test.

The scientists “developed particles that can trap microscopic elements in fluid,” according to a report in the International Herald Tribune. It may take six months or more for baseline testing to be conducted until the test could be used.

The heads of the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB all agreed during congressional hearings in February that they preferred urinalysis over the more invasive blood tests for HGH, which can only detect the substance over a 24 to 48-hour period. The urine test in question will be able to detect after a much longer period of time.

Anti-doping expert Don Catlin was quoted in the report as saying, “The company is certainly legitimate. This is not a hoax. Their strategy, their idea, is a great one – if it works.’

Catlin, who has been studying HGH for 10 years, further stated that this “could be a quantam leap forward.”