Frankly Speaking

By Frank Uryasz, President, Drug Free Sport™

In our offices in Kansas City, we have a collection of Sports Illustrated magazines displayed on one wall of our conference room. The collection includes the first issue from August 1954, which always makes me laugh because the back cover ad features a tennis player having a smoke. Times have changed.

Most of the SI issues we display have as their cover story an athlete involved in the use of drugs. I suppose it could be called our “Wall of Shame,” but for me it is a good reminder of the important work that we do. Recently, as I was walking through the room, I noticed an issue of SI that came out shortly after the NCAA tested for the first time in its history selected athletes from its 1986-87 football bowl games. The issue included a story about the 20-plus athletes who tested positive for anabolic steroids as a result of those tests. I was on the NCAA drug-testing staff at the time and we knew that steroid use was a growing problem, but no one knew for sure how many positives would come out of that initial season of testing.

Twenty-five years have now passed since the first collegiate athlete was tested by the NCAA for banned substances. Steroid use in college sports, while not eradicated, is significantly less common than it was in the late 1980s. We can thank continued education and testing for that. I believe strongly that if we were to abandon steroid education and testing, we would quickly return to the problems we saw 25 years ago. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.

One of the unfortunate outcomes of the economic downturn of the past few years is the slowdown of the implementation of steroid testing programs in high schools. While three states continue to operate statewide steroid testing programs, to my knowledge, no other state is considering programs to deter the use of anabolic steroids among high school athletes. I hope when the funding situation improves, we will see more states like Illinois, New Jersey and Texas implement programs to deter steroid use.
We are pleased to be the independent administrator of the steroid testing programs of the Big 12 and Big Ten Conferences. I believe sports organizations that sponsor championships have an obligation to the participants to provide a level playing field. Testing programs help do that. I hope more conferences follow the lead of the Big 12 and Big Ten and add education and testing programs for their athletes.

As we near the end of 2011, I want to thank our clients who support drug free sport and Drug Free Sport. We look forward to working with you in 2012.