Young Acknowledges Positive Steroid Test

U.S. sprinter Jerome Young acknowledged Thursday that he tested positive in 1999 for a banned steroid but competed at the 2000 Sydney Olympics after being cleared by U.S. track authorities even as the International Olympic Committee “strongly” urged U.S. Olympic and international track officials to investigate.

Young, 27, of Fort Worth, who won the 400 meters Tuesday in the world championships at Paris and was part of the gold-medal winning U.S. 1,600-meter relay team at Sydney, said in an interview with The Times, referring to the failed 1999 drug test, “It’s something that happened. It’s all past, and it’s something I don’t want to talk about. Not at all.”

The IOC on Thursday urged the U.S. Olympic Committee and track’s worldwide governing body, the International Assn. of Athletics Federations, to “pursue the matter,” and with World Anti-Doping Agency President Dick Pound calling for the IOC to strip the U.S. relay team of its gold medals because of Young’s failed 1999 test, Young said, “I’m still keeping my head up.

“Yes, it’s something that happened,” he continued, meaning the 1999 positive test for the steroid nandrolone. “But it’s something that I’ve ... I’ve moved on. It’s something I don’t want to talk about.”

He added, “It’s something that’s a closed door. I don’t even think about it now.

“I’m keeping focused,” he said. “I don’t let things distract me.”

Young’s comments, in conjunction with the call to action by the IOC, mark a significant upturn in the intensity of the matter -- setting the stage for what could be a close and emotionally charged review of the case, and of U.S. policies, by American, international and Olympic authorities.

At stake: the medals -- and likely the U.S.’s reputation.

There is expected to be an examination -- considered by many in other nations long overdue -- of whether U.S. officials finessed the rules to benefit American athletes and withheld or concealed information about positive doping tests.

“The matter is of extreme urgency,” IOC President Jacques Rogge said Thursday, while also indicating that the IOC stands ready to take “any measure or sanction against any person or party concerned depending upon the evolution of this case.”

John Coates, the president of the Australian Olympic Committee and a senior official in the organizing of the Sydney Games, told Australian Associated Press, “I fully support Dick Pound’s stance and await the outcome of any investigation that might be held.”

Like Pound, Coates is an IOC member and experienced attorney, and he said, “If what they’re alleging is true, then the athlete should not have been allowed to compete in Sydney.”

Michael Johnson, who anchored the winning 1,600-meter relay team in Sydney, told the French newspaper L’Equipe in a story published Thursday that authorities “ ... will never have my medal.” The newspaper said he made the comment in a joking manner.

Young ran legs in the first and semifinal rounds of the 1,600. Johnson anchored the winning final. Six Americans, including Young, won gold for the race.

It has long been known that a U.S. athlete tested positive before the Games but ran in Sydney after being cleared to compete by USA Track & Field.

Officials at USATF have maintained they were honorably upholding confidentiality rules in cases involving doping positive tests. Owing to that policy, they have declined comment since The Times on Wednesday identified Young as the athlete who competed in Sydney after testing positive in 1999.

USATF officials also maintain that a ruling earlier this year by the Swiss-based Court of Arbitration for Sport closed the book on the matter. The case had been included with those of 12 other U.S. doping-related matters from 1996 through 2000. IAAF had sought disclosure in the cases; USATF had declined.

The IAAF’s medical commission chairman, Arne Ljungqvist of Sweden, who holds the same position with the IOC, had said on Tuesday, “If the name comes out, if the name becomes known, if the athlete admits -- it may be a new situation. But this needs to be looked into by the legal people.”

Pound said Thursday that now that Young has been identified, authorities “are fully entitled to see the entire file, and in particular the extraordinary grounds on which the USATF appeals board made its decision that a positive test was not a positive test.”

Young tested negative after a meet on June 12, 1999; positive for nandrolone on June 26; and negative again on July 2. A three-member “doping hearing board” found a violation and USATF imposed a suspension in April 2000. But a three-person “doping appeals board” ruling in July 2000 reversed that finding and cleared Young to compete.

USATF did not release Young’s name because he won his appeal.

Because USATF did not reveal a name, IAAF officials were unable to conduct their own investigation before the Sydney Games.

In part because of such disputes, sports federations such as USATF no longer serve as the lead authority in U.S. doping matters; the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency has overseen drug-testing since October 2000. The IOC supervises doping protocol at the Games.

The U.S. Olympic Committee, meantime, had already been well into preparation of a report demanded in May by the IOC -- covering dozens of doping cases from the 1980s and 1990s. The USOC is due to make the report public in late September, at a meeting of the IOC’s policy-making executive board in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Insiders expect the USOC to detail dozens of cases that may have involved banned substances but were not punishable offenses under the rules in place at the time; any transgressions that went unpublished are not expected to be major.

Late Thursday, the USOC, referring to the Young case, said in a statement, “We consider this case to have already been adjudicated in accordance with the applicable rules of the time. Any attempt to reexamine this case using today’s rules rather than the rules that were in place at the time is impractical and does nothing to further the international anti-doping effort.

” ... It is our goal to continue to be an international leader in this effort, no matter the past or finger-pointing or recrimination of any kind.”

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Abrahamson reported from Los Angeles, Harvey from Paris.