USOC Calls Its Drug-Testing Successful

Of the 2,254 American athletes subjected to U.S. Olympic Committee drug tests in the year before the Los Angeles Games, 33 tested positive for the illicit use of stimulants and another 53 were found to be illegally using anabolic steroids or testosterone, a USOC report said Tuesday.

But the USOC, terming its 1984 drug-testing program a success, pointed out that not one of the 597 members of the American summer Olympic team had failed a drug test or been disqualified at the Games themselves.

In two cases, Dr. Kenneth Clarke, director of the USOC’s sports medicine division, said Tuesday, an athlete who had won a position on the American team during the Olympic trials was found in trials test analyses to be a drug user. In each case, without public disclosure at the time, the athlete was removed from the team.

Clarke and USOC spokesman Mike Moran would not identify the two athletes, saying it was against USOC policy to do so. Moran said that one of the athletes had been removed after a roster was released, but that no reporter had noticed the change.

The USOC’s drug control program was strengthened and testing was made mandatory after the 1983 Pan American Games in Caracas when two U.S. athletes were disqualified for drug violations and several others left the games before they could be tested.

According to Tuesday’s statement, 611 of the 2,254 athletes tested by the USOC were informed in advance that they would not be subject to any penalties if caught in a violation. The rest were subject to penalties.

F. Don Miller, the USOC’s outgoing executive director, said he will recommend that in the future all testing should be formal, carrying penalties.

“Our athletes have had over a year of education and information in this process and an awareness of our firm position against the use of drugs,” Miller said. “The second recommendation I will make is that we periodically test throughout the next four years to demonstrate to our athletes that we expect them to be drug-free while they train, as well as when they compete for spots on the Olympic team.

“At no time will an athlete be subjected to formal testing without advance knowledge and consent, however,” he said. “Likewise, at no time will an athlete be allowed to take part in, and benefit from, USOC-sponsored events like the National Sports Festival, the World University Games, or the Pan American Games, without first agreeing to be tested ahead of those competitions.”

The USOC statement also said that none of the American team members in the Winter Olympics at Sarajevo, Yugoslavia, had been disqualified for violations.