Confessions of a drug cheat

myflipflops

http://www.runnersworld.com/article/0,7120,s6-243-521--13729-0,00.html

Fascinating interview/article with EPO cheater Eddy Hellebuyck where he admits his guilt years after the fact and talks very frankly about drug use in the sport.

Pisco Sour

I feel ill reading that!

BeepBeep67

compelling read thanks - I wonder how rife it was / is?

plodder

It's shocking on so many levels all right. The justification/explanation by his wife that others are doing it more effectively than he was, is what I found most disturbing. Fair play to the anti doping authorities for persisting against him. At least by admitting his wrong doing he has strengthened the system to some extent.

YFlyer

He liked to party.

thetonynator

and here was me thinking the OP was on epo . . .:P

clubcard

I think everyone involved in running should read this story.
People will have a lot of opinions about him.
But don't look at it as a story about a person but a story about the sport and a story about the consequences of decisions you make.

For the sport, there are a lot of dopers out there. People often accuse certain runners of doping without great evidence.
They also proclaim certain runners as being clean without really knowing the truth and put them on a pedestal above others.
You never know who's clean. I hate when people make lists of the greatest clean athletes. You just don't know.

Then the consequences of a decision to dope.
The guilt you will have to live with. The relationships you will destroy. An uncertain professional future.
Eddy is going to have this hanging over him forever.
His life is worse for this decision.
Antonio Pettigrew took his own life while struggling with the admission of his guilt and how difficult it was to live with this.

I hope all athletes and those involved in coaching read this before making any decision to get involved with PEDs.
You may win some but you have a whole lot lose.

WHIP IT!

I'm not a runner or anything but found that article fascinating. I'm into horse-racing and you can draw several parallels with the story. To some people, anyone who has success is deemed a cheat - the stigma of performance-enhancing drugs taints the whole sport, guilty and innocent alike. Like a previous poster said about athletes, some horse trainers are deemed beyond reproach and declared "clean" because, well, presumably because they are/were nice guys throughout their careers.

I remember reading somewhere that is "is well known throughou the industry that Usain Bolt races clean" - what a strange statement?? I'm sure it's true and I certainly like to believe it's true. But it's just a funny thing to say - people say the same thigns about horse trainers. No hard facts, just a popularity contest.

Having said that, I live by the innocent til proved guilty rule. Thee way I see it - they can't ALL be cheating, some of em just have to be GOOD at what they do!

Reading between the lines of that story, I think the athlete's missus seems like a right piece of work and he's your typical weak, hen-pecked husband! Having said that, to make it (supposedly) to 40 and run successfully drug-free, what a calamity to give in while heading for the twilight of your career and flush everything you achieved legitimitely down the toilet.

Pisco Sour

WHIP IT! wrote: »

Thee way I see it - they can't ALL be cheating, some of em just have to be GOOD at what they do!

Exactly. In my opinion its a small number that actually dope. Maybe 3-5% of all athletes competing at an IAAF world championships or an Olympic Games. The reason why it gets such attention is because the majority of these drug users would be high profile, because.... well the drugs do work!

Anytime I have doubts regarding drug taking in sport I remind myself of Paula Radcliffe, somebody I would be willing to bet my house on is clean. If she can achieve what she has without chemical aid then success can absolutely be achieved clean!

gerard65

Eamonn Coghlan writes in his book how he came very close to using drugs to prolong his career a bit longer. He even had the presciption in his hand and was about to walk into a Chemist. He did'nt do it when he realised he could lose everything he'd achieved in his career. Interesting read. I wonder how easy it is to step over to the dark side if given the option for just one more great race? Try to put the 'moral outrage' to one side and think about, just one more great race, one chance to roll back the years.

Pisco Sour

gerard65 wrote: »

Eamonn Coghlan writes in his book how he came very close to using drugs to prolong his career a bit longer. He even had the presciption in his hand and was about to walk into a Chemist. He did'nt do it when he realised he could lose everything he'd achieved in his career. Interesting read. I wonder how easy it is to step over to the dark side if given the option for just one more great race? Try to put the 'moral outrage' to one side and think about, just one more great race, one chance to roll back the years.

Yeh but there would be no point as even if you got away with it you yourself would know deep down that you were a fraud and it would stay with you and haunt you for the rest of your days.

Anyone with a conscience anyway. Anybody who doesnt have one of those is unlikely to have gotten to late in their career without giving in anyway!

nerraw1111

Fantastic read.

Seems odd in retrospect that no-one questioned his results while using EPO. I think his wife comes across badly which is a bit unfair.

The comments section are very interesting, including this curious comment from an apparent friend of Eddy.

"Eddy, remember the last time we ran the Tokyo Marathon together? Mike O'Reilly was with us.
Remember the 40 year old guy doping right in the middle of the race? O'Reilly was super mad and filed a complaint at the finish. What did they do about it? They asked us to shut our mouths because the soon to be IAAF boss was there- it would cause trouble they said. No worry they nabbed the doper a month or two later somewhere in a masters race in the US.
I'm very surprised by the half-wit comments I'm reading. Kinda makes me wonder whether their writers really know how dirty the sport of road running is: true the drugs are rampant but not as bad as the cheating through scum-bag agents setting up races for the entire elite field to consist of only runners they represent. Eddy what's the difference between you cheating for yourself and an agent ripping off fifteen African runners at a time by having them come to the US to run for him - cramming them into his basement, charging them fifty bucks a night for a mat on the floor - sleeping like sardines in a can, charging them for dubious claims not seen since the share cropping days of the deep south, drawing ten percent from each runner's total earnings as his fee? Eddy there is so much documented evidence out there - but the do-gooders simply don't give a damn because we're not Americans.
Eddy - worst of all is when the corporations greasing the palms of IAAF officials are cheating athletes, like they did to me, nobody cries foul, instead they go to the company and ask for sponsorship themselves(!).

Runner's World if you want to do something about cleaning up the sport start with the agents and IAAF. So called "outing" guys who are feeding ducks in the park isn't going to earn anybody brownie points. In your very pages you're featuring active superstar runners... can't wait to read what you'll be saying about them ten years from now."