A quick steroid bill update

Don't know if any of you all caught it, but in Sunday's paper we took a quick look at the legislature's attempt to implement a random steroid testing program in high school sports around the state.

http://www.sptimes.com/2007/05/27/Sports/Steroids_testing_hits.shtml

To catch you up to speed, the program would start in the 2007-08 school year and would test athletes in weightlifting, football and baseball. All indications are that Gov. Charlie Crist will sign the bill into law at some point in the near future.

On the surface, the program sounds like a good thing. After all, who wouldn't want to discourage steroid use amongst high school athletes? But there are plenty of people who think pouring $100,000 into a pilot program isn't the most effective way to do so.

A highly-publicized survey estimated that about two percent of high school athletes in the state had used steroids, but it's impossible to know how accurately that figure represents reality.

Just curious to know what all of you out there think. Are steroids a problem in our area? Is testing the best way to deal with it? Feel free to chime in.

--DAVID MURPHY

dmurphy@sptimes.com

Comments

this is such a hornet's nest...there is no way that you can single out three sports played by boys. If only 2% use steroids, it is a waste of money to spend on testing. I think that some testing company is behind this.....

I'm amazed that one of the sports they are not targetting is weightlifting.

If any sport leaves itself open to steroid abuse, this is it. My guess is they don't want to test weightlifting because they really don't want to catch anyone--they just want to look like they're doing something. It's kind of like how the only people randomly screened at airports are 90-year-old women with walkers.

If this passes, I see a bunch of kickers and 103-lb wrestlers screened.

[David Murphy]

Just to clear one thing up: weightlifting is one of the three sports that will be tested. Wrestling is not.

I would rather see them test for marijuana which we know far more than 2% of the student athletes are using illegally. Oh and then we could test some female sports teams too...

[djhorserider]

Hi

Very good stuff. They have been around a long time. - http://www.allsteroidsworld.com
What do you think?

See you

I'm happy to see the state take a stand against the steroid issue in high school. Being a previous state champion in weightlifting, the visible effects of illegal performance enhancing drugs were apparent especially at the state level. Even if the state only catches one person, that may be one more person that chooses not to use the drug.