The Sidelines : German Track and Field Group to Discuss Steroid Allegations

The German track and field federation will meet Wednesday in an emergency session to discuss growing allegations that athletes from both East and West Germany for years took performance-enhancing drugs.

Meanwhile, Raik Hannemann, a swimmer from East Germany who won a silver medal in the 200-meter medley at the 1989 European Championships, admitted today that he took performance-enhancing drugs.

“We all took them (anabolic steroids),” Hannemann wrote in a bylined article in a Berlin newspaper.

The German Athletics Union, the governing body of track and field since the merger of the two nations, said today that the session will deal with allegations and study measures aimed at preventing doping.

The move comes after two major magazines published allegations that athletes from both former German states used anabolic steroids to improve their performances.

The latest allegations, raised by the newsmagazine Der Spiegel this weekend, accused several women sprinters from former West Germany of taking anabolic steroids.