USOC Said to Plan Stiff Drug Testing Between This Summer and ’88 Games

U.S. Olympic officials are forming a plan to conduct drug tests on American athletes at every major competition between this summer and the 1988 Olympic Games, the New York Times reported in its Sunday editions.

It would be the first time that tests carrying penalties were conducted in non-Olympic years.

Under the plan, athletes found to have used any banned drugs would be barred from competition for one year. A second offense would carry a four-year suspension, meaning an athlete could miss an Olympics.

“Wherever the athletes compete, they’ll be tapped on the shoulder and told it’s time for the urine sample,” Dr. Kenneth Clark, director of sports medicine for the U.S. Olympic Committee, told the Times.

Dr. Robert Voy, the USOC’s chief medical officer, said, “We have to have a method of detection that guarantees that the athletes are competing to the best of their ability, not to the best that chemistry can buy.”