2. German runner Dieter Baumann, a former Olympic champ in the 5000 meters, tested positive for nandrolone. His two-year suspension cost him the 2000 Summer Olympics. Baumann voluntarily underwent further tests that showed fluctuating amounts of nandrolone in his system depending on the time of day. Baumann’s explanation: the nandrolone was in his toothpaste, which obviously had been spiked.
3. Tennis star Petr Korda tested positive at Wimbledon in 1998, claiming the nandrolone in his system came from a veal entree. Some experts estimated he would’ve had to eat 40 calves a day for 20 years to account for the levels of nandrolone in his system.
4. Five North Korean soccer players tested positive for steroids at the Women’s World Cup in 2011. The North Korean delegation claimed the steroids were unknowingly included with traditional Chinese medicines based on musk deer glands. The federation said the players needed them to recover from being struck by lightning during training.
5. Cyclist Alberto Contador was stripped of his 2010 Tour de France title after testing positive for clenbuterol. The Court of Arbitration upheld the test findings and banned him for two years. Contador claimed the positive test was caused by eating contaminated meat on a 2010 Tour rest day.
6. Cuban high jumper Javier Sotomayor tested positive for cocaine at the 1999 Pan American Games and was stripped of his gold medal. Cuban dictator Fidel Castro defended him, blaming the sabotage on the “Cuban-American mafia.”
7. Fani Halkia, who won gold for Greece in the Olympic 400m hurdles in 2004, tested positive for methyltrienalone in Beijing and was banned from competition for two years. Her story? She blamed it on tampered diet supplements. Fifteen Greek athletes, including 11 members of the Olympic weightlifting team, were also suspended for methyltrienolone. That’s a lot of tampering.
8. Spanish cyclist Isabel Moreno disappeared two days before the Beijing Olympics after she allegedly failed a drug test. Moreno’s reason for disappearing from the scene? She didn’t admit to the positive test, saying instead on her website that she had an anxiety attack and needed to go home.
9. Bulgarian tennis star Sesil Karatancheva attributed one of her two positive tests for nandrolone to being pregnant despite the fact her urine samples showed no evidence of a pregnancy.
10. Ben Johnson (winning above), who famously tested positive for stanozolol at the Seoul Olympics in 1988 after defeating American Carl Lewis for the 100 meters gold medal, blamed his positive test that day on a spiked energy drink. He was banned for life in 1993 after another positive test.
11. Canadian snowboarder Ross Rebagliati tested positive for marijuana after winning gold in the giant slalom at the Nagano Olympics in 1998. He claimed second-hand smoke and was allowed to keep his medal.
12. Richard Gasquet, a French tennis player, tested positive for cocaine at a tournament in Florida a few years ago. He said he kissed a girl who had ingested cocaine at a nightclub. A tribunal cleared him to return to competition.
14. Baseball’s Manny Ramirez blamed his first positive test on a medication given to him by his doctors. The medication? A women’s fertility drug. Experts say the drug is commonly used by athletes to restart their bodies’ natural testosterone production as they come off a steroid cycle. Ramirez, suspended a second time, is serving 50 games of a 100-game suspension at the start of the 2012 season.
15. American track star Justin Gatlin said he didn’t know how high levels of testosterone got into his system at a 2006 track meet in Kansas. His coach, Trevor Graham, blamed a vengeful massage therapist for rubbing a cream containing the steroid into Gatlin’s legs without his knowledge.
1 comment:
Do not forget our own sean kelly who claimed that his cycle mehcanic took the test for him. Most people in Ireland are not even aware that Kelly tested positive twice.
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