Baseball fans in college are shocked that their favorite sports hero Alex Rodriguez had admitted to using performance enhancing drugs while he was still with the Texas Rangers in 2001-2003. Apparently, the effects of the news had taken quite a while to ebb. A-Rod was just one of the 104 who were tested positive for steroids. There were 103 more to be revealed. Jose Canseco had already identified some in his book Juiced. Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds, and Roger Clemens were some of those who had been named in the book.

From The Batt:

“A-Rod was one of those players that we all had no doubt that he wasn’t taking steroids,” said Texas A&M junior pitcher Travis Starling. “He was kind of the poster child of the perfect baseball player. He worked hard. He showed up every day and he played hard every day and he produced good numbers off of purely his talent and his work ethic, and now we are being told that he did take steroids. So for me individually, as a baseball player, and as someone who enjoys the game of baseball, it is still a shock to me.”

“I think when it’s admitted, you get it out of the way,” said A&M junior infielder Brodie Greene. “People are obviously not going to forget it. You admitted it, and you came out and told your side and that helps you. That’s why I think Bonds and [Roger] Clemens are going to end up hurting themselves in the long run because they are just denying it. I guess they are innocent until proven guilty. I feel that they are on the guilty side but haven’t really admitted it yet.”

Very few had expected A-Rod to cheat by using the banned substances, but he is admired for stepping forward and admitting it. No one knows really what the out come of this steroid era to those who are linked and involved with the use of PEDs, but one thing is for sure, A-Rod is facing a dim future in his baseball career.

It was just last week when news broke out that Texas has been reconsidering its 6 million dollar anabolic steroid testing program meant to provide random drug testing high school athletes of different sport. The main issue was that the first batch of results had low positive yields. Out of the 10,000 tested, only 4 were proved to be taking performance enhancing drugs. Because of this, Gov. Perry did conclude that steroids use doesn’t appear to be a problem among the youth of Texas and is considering scaling the program back. This has produced different violent reactions, such as one from Dr. Don Hooton, a Texas local.

Hooton is an advocate of the anti-steroids campaign after he lost his son in 2003. Hooton believes that the initial test results aren’t enough to conclude anything. The program was not meant to check if steroid use is a problem. In fact, Hooton even cited a survey of local high school students conducted by Texas A&M back in 2007. The survey suggests that approximately 2% of the students had use steroids. While only 4 of over a thousand tested positive in the recent drug test, Hooton believes that the low outcome is a result of the program itself. The steroid testing program is meant to serve as a deterrent and it has been just that to students. At present, the future of the program is still unsure.

From Dallas Morning News:

“I’m disappointed that stance is being taken before all the results from the field are in,” Hooton said. “I was under the impression we’d get at least one full year of results with football players before there was any recommendation.”

Perry made his remarks during a wide-ranging interview with The Associated Press on Tuesday. His office said the governor has not made any official recommendations for trimming the program.

Perry also said during the interview that he had no issue with leaving some degree of testing in place. But he added, “Do we need to test every kid in every school?”

Florida is in the right path of creating clean, disciplined athletes with their new program to test high school students for alcohol and illegal drug use.

Athletes in the Olympics and Major League Baseball won’t be the only ones submitting urine samples to authorities. The program is being funded by a U.S. Department of Education grant

From Palm Beach Post:

High school athletes will have to submit to random testing to detect the use of alcohol as well as illegal and widely abused prescription drugs under a policy preliminarily approved Wednesday by the Palm Beach County School Board.

If the board gives final approval next week, the same company that tests district employees for drug use would randomly test this season’s baseball and softball players at six high schools.

The test for anabolic steroid use will not be available initially. This is because the Florida High School Athletic association was already testing for steroids when the grant was made and funding had already run out. NMS Management Services Inc., the company who would do the tests, is willing to add steroid testing on the program later on though.

Many school officials support the idea of testing the athletes. This will work by assigning a number per athlete and numbers will be chosen randomly. The corresponding students to the numbers picked will be the ones tested. Just as Ron Hoyt, West Boca Raton High’s softball coach, had said, the new policy will serve as a warning to students who plan on using drugs or steroids since they know that there will be consequences in doing so. When caught for the first time, an athlete will be banned from joining any games for 10 days, although he or she can practice with the team. When caught for the second time, the athlete will be removed from his or her team and will be prohibited from joining any competitions for an entire year. The main goal of the program is to make sure that the students are safe, and that they develop some discipline and knowledge with what is really going on in sports.

Before Lance Armstrong’s comeback can become official, he needs to pass the United States Anti-doping Agency out-of-competition testing pool which entails constant drug testing. Armstrong was placed under a six-month probation period by the USADA at the beginning of August.

So far, the seven-time Tour de France winner says he’s been tested 11 times in the past 18 weeks and two times in the past four days. The latest test was carried out by the International Cycling Union on Thursday that took place at his home in Texas.

According to AFP report, the 37-year-old rider keeps his fans updated on his latest testing via Twitter, a social networking online utility.

“UCI control. They flew a guy from Germany for it. That makes a ton of sense,” Armstrong wrote on the website.

“I am back from the shop after riding four hours. I hear the drug testers are waiting at the house. #11,” he wrote.

Armstrong’s career has been plagued by doping accusations, prominent of which was the report published by a French sport newspaper in 2005. The report alleged that Armstrong six urine samples from his victory in 1999 contained the blood booster EPO. Armstrong has denied any wrongdoing and the UCI has cleared him in 2006.

The 37-year-old rider has said many times that his primary reason for the comeback is to raise cancer awareness, but sports observers say that the motivation behind his comeback is to prove to his critics that he won his titles without the use of performance-enhancing drugs.

Armstrong was diagnosed with a testicular cancer on October 1996.