CZECH REPUBLIC/FILE: ATHLETICS: Documents show a systematic campaign of athlete doping in Czechoslovakia's former communist regime.

Record ID: 722498

  • Title: CZECH REPUBLIC/FILE: ATHLETICS: Documents show a systematic campaign of athlete doping in Czechoslovakia's former communist regime.
  • Date: 20th August 2006
  • Summary: PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC (AUGUST 18, 2006) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (Czech) DNES DAILY EDITOR IN CHIEF ROBERT CASENSKY (THSAA-TSEN-SKHEE) SAYING: "The documents showed quite clearly this was an action managed by the state, which is the most scandalous circumstance, because this was cheating organised by the state. In several cases, as in the case of Imrich Bugar, who is mentioned in these documents, people positively tested at least once for anabolic steroids." (SOUNDBITE) (Czech) FORMER CZECHOSLOVAK CHAMPION, DISC THROWER IMRICH BUGAR SAYING: "This is the Juliska stadium (Prague) and here from this circle I was throwing disc for 22 years. Here I was changing training with soccer teams, here I was throwing discus for thousand and thousand times, here I was running, jumping." (SOUNDBITE) (Czech) FORMER CZECHOSLOVAK CHAMPION, DISC THROWER IMRICH BUGAR SAYING: "And now some paper is coming out saying, that just three days after world championships someone writes that I was positive. During the world championships I was absolutely all right and also during whole the year. I was able to compete any time." VARIOUS OF DUKLA (TEAM) STADION JULISKA IN PRAGUE (SOUNDBITE) (Czech) FORMER CZECHOSLOVAK CHAMPION, DISC THROWER IMRICH BUGAR SAYING: "I competed abroad 22 times in the year, 17 times of it I was dope tested and I was clear, just nothing. And all of the sudden here is this paper. I don't know, I simply don't trust it. There is no evidence that there was something, because if it was positive they had to test my A sample and my B sample to confirm it. But here is just something that one functionary writes to other one, that Bugar was positive, it is absurd." (SOUNDBITE) (Czech) DNES DAILY EDITOR IN CHIEF ROBERT CASENSKY SAYING: "I don't assert he was doping. I can not. I can not assert he was taking some anabolic steroid, either through free will or enforced. The only thing we know for sure is, that in a document it is written that Imrich Bugar had a positive test." VARIOUS OF DOCUMENTS IMRICH BUGAR PHOTO IN THE NEWSPAPERS DNES DAILY NEWSPAPERS
  • Embargoed: 4th September 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Domestic Politics,Sports
  • Reuters ID: LVACBE9QU2A37NEQA70A1DMCZFFO
  • Story Text: Secret documents show communist Czechoslovakia systematically and officially administered steroids and other illegal substances to athletes, including former world champion discus thrower Imrich Bugar.
    The documents, copies of which were obtained by Reuters from the daily newspaper Mlada Fronta Dnes, which first uncovered them, show doctors supplied banned substances to athletes through the 1980s, when Czechoslovakia had some of its greatest sporting successes.
    Coaches and high-ranking sports and government officials also had knowledge of the programme, part of a Cold War campaign to show supremacy over the West, the documents showed.
    Drug names such as the steroid nandrolone, norandrosterone and stanozolol appear, along with dosages and dates to be administered. Athletes in weightlifting, athletics, hockey and skiing, among others, were included, as were juniors.
    Only a few doctors were informed of the programme. "The rational application of anabolic steroids will help contribute to the political promotion of sports in the communist state, and help strengthen the country's prestige," one of the documents addressed to the Czechoslovak Sports Association said.
    "The top sports for us today need new access, the same that are available to the rest of the world, mainly in the areas of endocrinology, dosages of anabolic steroids, biochemistry, and dosages of other supportive means," another document added.
    East Bloc states were often suspected of running official doping programmes.
    After Germany reunited in 1990, the government there set up a commission to look into the work of East German scientists and found that most top East German athletes had been forced to participate in doping programmes.
    Hundreds of German athletes suffered health problems as a result of their often unwitting use of drugs.
    Dnes editor in chief Robert Casensky said: "The documents showed quite clearly this was an action managed by the state, which is the most scandalous circumstance, because this was cheating organised by the state. In several cases, as in the case of Imrich Bugar, who is mentioned in these documents, people positively tested at least once for anabolic steroids."
    Bugar, who won the discus competition at the world championships in Helsinki in 1983 and an Olympic silver medal in 1980 in Moscow, was shocked to find his name on several of the documents obtained.
    "During the world championships I was absolutely all right and also during whole the year. I was able to compete any time. I competed abroad 22 times in the year, 17 times of it I was dope tested and I was clear, just nothing.
    "All of the sudden here is this paper. I don't know, I simply don't trust it. There is no evidence that there was something, because if it was positive they had to test my A sample and my B sample to confirm it. But here is just something that one functionary writes to other one, that Bugar was positive; it is absurd."
    Casensky conceded there was no proof against Bugar, saying: "I don't assert he was doping. I can not. I can not assert he was taking some anabolic steroid, either through free will or enforced. The only thing we know for sure is, that in a document it is written that Imrich Bugar had a positive test."
    Emil Brzoska, Zaremba's former trainer said he had never forced athletes into taking steroids.
    "I did never force anyone to take something. The era was as it was. I personally don't feel I was forcing anyone."
    Asked if he had threatened athletes they would be dropped from the team if they didn't take steroids, he said: "This is just talk. In reality, life was different."
    Jokingly he added: "Without doping the only sport you can do is to ride on a women's bicycle round a lake."
    The Czechoslovak documents show sports such as weightlifting and athletics were targeted for doping as early as prior to the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal.
    Under the system doctors and officials carried out secret urine tests of athletes ahead of major events overseas to see if they would test positive.
    Experts were charged with keeping doping under control to make sure no embarrassing incidents arose.
    Some athletes were kept in the dark over the programme in Czechoslovakia, while the documents show others were not only aware but sought extra doses of banned substances.
    Those who refused to join the programme often found themselves kicked out of their sport.
    One handwritten letter shows a weightlifter asking for help from the Communist authorities because his failing health was keeping him from earning enough money.
    In the letter he says a local doctor of internal medicine who examined him noted chronic liver and other problems were the result of taking anabolic steroids.
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