Thursday, December 09, 2004

Where are they now - Derrik Adkins

The former GT Track Star and Olympic medalist is an assistant coach at Columbia University for their track team, and Adkins is speaking out against steroids:

"As clean athletes, we're not supposed to say anything; we're not supposed to say our competitor was on drugs," he said. "The only proof we have is that we know them, we know their coaches, we know the people that they know, we know the suppliers that they're dealing with that have also tried to sell us drugs. We know but we can't give hard evidence to the media so therefore we have to be quiet and just let them win races and deal with it."


"A lot of the clean athletes are happy about what's happening right now in terms of baseball and track," he said. "Track athletes are getting thrown out of the sport and the clean athletes are pretty much rejoicing because we've had to hold information in, for some long more than a decade, and now justice is coming forth."


Most do not realize the dramatic extent of steroids' enhancement, he emphasized. Steroids can create up to a 10 percent difference in an athlete's performance, according to leading research.


"It's not just a little cheating," Adkins said. "A lot of spectators say, 'If they just need to get a little edge you shouldn't be so hard on them.' It's not just a little edge-its huge."