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Fitness First with Sale Sharks - week six

Steve Walsh
6/ 8/2008

SHOULD British sprinter Dwain Chambers be allowed to compete in sport even after serving a two-year ban for using drugs?

It is an issue that continues to cause controversy, most recently with speculation linking Chambers with the job of sprint coach at Harlequins, something the rugby union club has since vehemently denied.

Chambers had already lost his appeal against a lifetime Olympic ban, and a trial period at rugby league side Castleford Tigers passed without the athlete being offered a contract.

The use of drugs in sport is a subject Sharks’ fitness expert Steve Walsh is passionate about and this week he explains why keeping players, and the game, clean is so important.

"If Dwain Chambers had been allowed to sprint in the Olympics that would have been the death knell for British athletics.

The bottom line is the bloke, like many before him, had taken steroids. He cheated, he got caught, he’s guilty and he correctly got banned for life - that sends a clear message out to other wavering young athletes.

Being involved in professional rugby league for over 20 years, I have over the years had my doubts about a few players. However, on the whole the sport does police itself as well as any other professional sport. I was very disappointed though, when Castleford Tigers gave Chambers a trial. They got plenty of mixed publicity from the stunt, shame on them, no wonder they are propping up Super League.

Zero tolerance to drug cheats is the future, we need to find them and force them out of sport and ignorance is no longer an excuse. Blood testing can be a very effective way of hunting down the cheats. It’s an invasive way of doing things, but hey, if it does the job, I’m for it.

One problem I have with banned substance usage is that some privately owned gyms have users who use and distribute banned performance enhancers. Surely it’s not the environment to be letting our young people train in, especially those that have aspirations of having a career in professional sport.

We’ve got to be careful - you get a lot of young people who want to make it as a professional sports person and their peers are saying you need to be bigger, which isn’t true. Actually you need to be stronger, with strength and age will come size. Everybody is different. Young people develop at different stages and ages and you can’t rush it. The quick fix is a bad fix.

At Sale Sharks all our professional athletes predominantly train in the team’s Carrington gym, on the odd occasion they are allowed and encouraged to train away, especially during off-season.

So, what do steroids actually do? Well, with the correct training you can look like Dwain Chambers, however, the side effects of steroid usage can be horrendous for contact sport athletes: career threatening joint and muscle injuries, as well as physiological and psychological problems.

The best advice to anyone is train hard, stick to a good diet and get plenty of sleep, remember an hour before midnight is worth two hours after."

THE opinions expressed in this column are those of Steve Walsh and do not necessarily reflect the views of the newspaper or its editor.