April 25, 2008 at 1:36 am | Steroid History, Steroid Law, Steroids and Baseball, Steroids and Cycling
- Posted by Millard Baker |
IRS Special Agent Jeff Novitsky has been transferred to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Office of Criminal Investigations as a special agent to give him greater freedom to focus on anabolic steroid-related investigations (“No Longer With I.R.S., Novitzky Joins F.D.A.,” April 23).
In regards to Novitzky’s new job, Dwight Sparlin, a retired I.R.S. manager who led the San Francisco office when the Balco case started nearly six years ago, said he had been hearing for two weeks that Novitzky was going to the F.D.A. to continue focusing on drug cases.
“I think it would give him more exposure to just doing that type of work,” Sparlin said by telephone Tuesday. He added: “For Jeff to go as far as he did in Balco was a stretch for the I.R.S., too. I think he was allowed to go a lot further than he would otherwise because of the impact.”
Jeff Novitsky has been involved in almost every aspect of the BALCO steroid scandal and steroids in baseball investigation.
(Hat tip to Steroid Nation for the story.)
April 22, 2008 at 10:41 am | Steroid History, Steroids and Track
- Posted by Millard Baker |
April 17, 2008 at 11:26 am | Steroid History, Steroids and Cycling, Steroids and Track
- Posted by Millard Baker |
The United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) has been conducting a formerly secret pilot program for longitudinal testing for anabolic steroids and other performance enhancing drugs. USADA recruited twelve U.S. athletes for voluntary participation in “Project Believe.” News of the anti-doping program was leaked when decathlon champion Brian Clay and runner Allyson Felix discussed it at a press conference possibly violating USADA’s code of secrecy on the program (“US sports stars try to dim doping fears with ‘Project Believe’,” April 17).
“I may get in trouble for talking about it but I want people to know I’m doing everything in my power to stay clean,” said Clay, who began having extra tests done before last month’s world indoor championships.
In spite of Clay’s concerns, it is unlikely that Clay or Felix will face any sanctions by USADA for revealing the existence of “Project Believe” prior to its official launch. Read the rest of this entry
February 28, 2008 at 10:33 am | Steroid Commentary, Steroid History, Steroids and Baseball, Steroids and Bodybuilding, Steroids and Cycling, Steroids and Football, Steroids in Sports
- Posted by Millard Baker |
Dr. Gary Gaffney from Steroid Nation posted an article on Huffington Post about the performance enhancing effects of human growth hormone. Gaffney responds to so-called experts who assert with certainty that growth hormone does not help performance in sports. As Lou Schuler stated in a recent post, the true effects of growth hormone on performance are not always empirically “knowable and measurable.”
Gaffney takes note of the lack of empirical research examining the performance enhancing effects of drugs that has historically resulted in mainstream medical organizations failing to recognize performance enhancing drugs. Given this along with results seen in “experiments of nature,” Gaffney feels it is reasonable to conclude that GH has performance enhancing effects:
Read the rest of this entry
January 28, 2008 at 11:41 pm | Steroid Commentary, Steroid History, Steroids in Sports
- Posted by Millard Baker |
Sylvester Stallone has apparently endorsed anti-steroid crusader John McCain for President. Sylvester Stallone has been using his Rambo promotional tour to advocate growth hormone and testosterone in age management medicine. Senator John McCain is well-known for his anti-steroid grandstanding in Congress. Nonetheless, Senator McCain’s positive reaction to the endorsement was priceless as seen on Fox & Friends stating “I’m going to Philadelphia and running up the steps.”
Senator McCain has expressed his disappointment with Roger Clemens’ alleged use of anabolic steroids and growth hormone, but that is probably only because Clemens has not endorsed him. Read the rest of this entry
January 11, 2008 at 9:50 pm | Steroid History, Steroids in Sports
- Posted by Millard Baker |
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is once again going to be confronted with his own admitted use of anabolic steroids as a former professional bodybuilder with his promotion of the 2008 Arnold Classic Bodybuilding contest in Columbus next month. This has become an annual ritual with the steroid-addicted media and it is sure to continue as long as Arnold is in politics and continues his involvement in the sport of professional bodybuilding.
But there may be further attention given to Schwarzenegger and his relationship, past and present, with anabolic steroids. Sources tell the Steroid Report that the steroid documentary “Bigger, Stronger, Faster”, premiering at the Sundance Film Festival this month, will be highly critical of his conflicted positions on anabolic steroids. Read the rest of this entry
December 18, 2007 at 1:52 am | Steroid History
- Posted by Millard Baker |
Google has made millions of dollars from companies selling steroids through Google’s contextual ad service. But Google was assisted by mainstream news outlets like NYTimes.com and CNN.com who displayed the ads offering “steroids for sale.”
Michael Arrington recently commented on this at TechCrunch:
The problem with automated advertising on news sites has always been the placing of inappropriate ads next to serious news issues.
Many news/media websites posted editorials complaining about the dangers of anabolic steroids and the role of the internet in facilitating steroid sales only to provide links for consumers to buy steroids (and receive payment from Google for displaying those links). Read the rest of this entry
December 13, 2007 at 2:11 am | Steroid Commentary, Steroid Health, Steroid History, Steroid Law, Steroids in Sports
- Posted by Millard Baker |
Several months ago, Bill Llewellyn and Rick Collins told me about an independent filmmaker that was interested in hearing their perspective on the “steroid issue”; Chris Bell patiently spent several hours with each of them for on camera interviews. They had a good feeling about the film he was making finally hoping to see a truthful examination of anabolic steroids in society appear on the big screen.
I had the opportunity to meet Chris Bell, the director and screenwriter of “Bigger, Stronger, Faster,” at the 2007 Ironman Pro Expo in Pasadena thanks to an introduction from my good friend Rehan Jalali. After talking with Chris, I could understand why so many people were excited by this film. Clearly, Chris was striving for an open and honest examination of steroids free of the hysteria that is so commonplace nowadays. The irony is that it is most likely this same hysteria that makes financing of such independent documentaries possible. Read the rest of this entry
