May 04, 2005

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Palo Alto Online

Pumping up

by Alexandria Rocha

An avid athlete, Gunn High School senior Juan Cativo maintains a strict diet of three protein shakes a day. His breakfasts usually consist of eggs and wheat bread; his dinners a hefty portion of chicken or steak. He runs two miles and weight trains almost daily.

Occasionally, he uses the performance-enhancing drug creatine. A friend who worked at GNC recommended it for weight loss. The friend had also used it, and Cativo thought he looked physically fit and better prepared to play football that coming school year.

At first, the idea horrified Cativo's parents. After consulting a few friends who are doctors, however, they eventually agreed. That was two years ago.

"Creatine seems to help out. I'm moving fat and gaining muscle," said Cativo, now 18, who will wrestle at West Valley College this fall. "It seems to have great effects, and I don't feel any negative side effects."

With steroid scandals plaguing major league baseball and other professional sports, the spotlight has now turned to high school athletes and their methods of training.

In Palo Alto, many on the front lines -- including high school coaches and students -- say they know teenage athletes are using performance-enhancing drugs. Few, however, are willing to talk openly about the matter. Cativo and his family are the exception.

"It's a touchy subject for most people, because everybody thinks it's illegal and nobody wants to be caught," said Colin Felch, a varsity baseball player at Gunn.

Perhaps that's because some schools have received bad press from the national media after students either came forward or were busted for steroids. Stories concerning five football players from Connecticut's Daniel Hand High School, who were arrested in March for using steroids bought in Mexico, have been splattered on dozens of Web blogs and sites.

Others stand behind the notion that performance-enhancing drugs, often called PEDs, are legal -- although unregulated -- and therefore not worth discussing.

"I have seen supplements and I have seen kids take them, so it's not like they're not here," said Jason Funj, Paly's head track coach.

Most players in Palo Alto say they simply work hard to achieve their ideal physiques. They read magazines, look on the Internet and talk to experts at Stanford University. The coaches at both Gunn and Palo Alto high schools post different workout regimens in the weight rooms as one way to help the students train.

But just like in academics, some young athletes are willing to go to extremes for an extra edge. According to the California Interscholastic Federation, nearly 3 percent of high school athletes across the nation are using steroids or PEDs.

"A small amount of kids will use steroids because they want to look big and cool like the professionals. Who doesn't? I want to look like Barry Bonds. I want to look like Michael Jordan," said Cativo. "The pressure is to be bigger, better, faster and stronger. You want to be the best, not to show off, but you want to be number one."

Local students and coaches say steroids are far less common than PEDs, and it's important to recognize the difference.

Jose Canseco made anabolic steroids famous in "Juiced," his recently-published book about the widespread use of shots, pills and creams in the major leagues. These steroids -- such as anadrol, oxandrin, dianabol, winstrol, deca-durabolin, and equipoise -- are synthetic substances similar to the male sex hormone testosterone.

Anabolic steroids are illegal without the prescription of a doctor and have a wide range of proven side effects, including jaundice, depression, aggression and infertility, among many others.

PEDs include vitamins, amino acids, creatine monohydrate and caffeine. Although they are not regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, they are legal and can be bought at neighborhood food-supplement stores, as well as common drug stores.

"I've bought protein and no one asks questions. If you're 5 maybe, but not if you're in high school," said senior Nabill Balamane, a Paly football player headed to the U.S. Air Force Academy this summer.

Creatine, an amino acid that can increase muscle energy, is one of the most popular. It hit the market in the early '90s and although there is almost no data on its benefits or side effects, some users report quick bursts of energy when sprinting or power-lifting.

The American College of Sports Medicine and the American Academy of Pediatrics both advise against the use of creatine in teenagers under 18 because of the lack of data.

"The newer supplements are not well studied. The long-term risks are not known," said Tara Coghlin Dickson, a sports nutritionist for Stanford's sports medicine program. "Supplements are not regulated for safety, potency, purity or efficacy."

Substances such as ephedrine and androstenedione -- or "andro," -- were once lumped into the performance-enhancing drug category and sold on shelves alongside creatine and other vitamins. As more research was done and users began reporting serious side effects, the FDA pulled ephedrine off the market in 2003, flagging it as an illegal steroid.

The same happened to "andro" last October.

Coghlin Dickson cautions that both ephedrine and "andro" are still easily accessible via the Internet.

With so little known about these substances, experts say those using creatine and other supplements are conducting unregulated laboratory tests on themselves.

"Not enough real scientific information is made available to people in the public. Most of their information comes from magazines and friends and ads," said Clyde Wilson, who teaches nutrition at Stanford and the UC San Francisco Medical School.

"Anyone who thinks there aren't downsides (to supplement use) is definitely wrong. The worst-case scenario is that an athlete who uses large amounts of creatine will become a subject in a future research paper," he said.

Adding to the problem are coaches who don't necessarily encourage supplement use, but don't prohibit it either. Coghlin Dickson says most coaches and parents don't have access to proper information about these supplements and are guiding without a lot of knowledge.

For that reason, Wilson is sparking a movement this year among nutritionists, sports medicine professionals and biochemists willing to help bring awareness into high school and college sports scenes about the dangers of these unregulated supplements.

While many people are tight-lipped about the subject, Cativo and his family talk openly about the teenager's use of creatine.

"Our biggest issue was the safety. We asked two or three opinions and they said it's important to follow the directions," said Cativo's dad, also named Juan. "You can do it if you eat right, if you rest right, if you practice right."

Felch, who has played baseball his entire life and is headed to the University of Washington this fall, said many students using PEDs want to keep it hidden.

"Some people like to keep it a secret, they don't like to tell other people they're using performance-enhancing drugs," Felch said. "Other people might think about them in a different way, like they're trying to gain an edge by basically cheating.

"I don't think (PEDs) are cheating as much as regular steroids. They're mostly for weight training and getting stronger," he added.

Adam Juratovac, 18, a Gunn varsity athlete, said creatine does have a negative stigma attached to it. If someone had a bottle of it in the weight room, they would be teased, he said.

However, many Gunn and Paly athletes, who work out regularly and take weight training seriously, say they are questioned about PEDs all the time anyway, whether they use them or not.

Juratovac said prodding typically comes from those who don't spend as much time in the work-out room and don't see the amount of hard work some athletes put in daily.

"I hate it when people accuse you of using steroids," he said. "The people who haven't worked incredibly hard, who haven't pushed themselves the whole way, those are the people who accuse people of using steroids. It's pretty unfair."

As a varsity football player at Paly all four years, Balamane said it's common every year for the new young players to ask about getting "stronger and faster."

"Once you tell them it's not a good idea, that it will mess up your health, the idea just kind of floats out of their head," he said.

Currently, lawmakers in more than five states, including California, are considering passing new laws and policies to ban supplement use altogether. Their efforts, however, have been met with resistance.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed Sen. Jackie Speier's bill last year that would have prohibited the use of steroids and most PEDs -- including creatine and protein -- at the high school level. The former Mr. Universe wanted the bill to focus specifically on illegal steroids.

However, California lawmakers' efforts have not been diffused.

Two weeks ago, the state Senate passed a bill that would require all high school athletes to sign pledges starting in 2007 to not use steroids or supplements. Senate Bill 37 would also require all coaches to undergo specific training on how to educate about substance abuse. Some students are skeptical.

"People who are dead set on doing it, I'm sure they'll find a way around a pledge," said senior Nathan Ford, a Paly football player.

The bill -- which Speier, D-San Francisco/San Mateo, rewrote and reintroduced after Schwarzenegger's veto -- is a small step toward a much larger initiative: mandatory drug testing for all high school athletes. Currently, less than 4 percent of high schools across the nation test their players for steroids, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations.

The biggest reason schools fail to test, however, isn't due to any shroud of secrecy. It is cost. Emmy Zack, with the state Interscholastic Federation based in Oakland, said tests for steroids and supplements cost between $100 and $150 each.

"It's much more expensive than testing for marijuana or other substances of that nature," she said. "That's a lot of money that school districts do not have right now."

Besides the hefty price tag, many high schools don't test because they insist that most of their athletes are like Paly's Alex Gibson -- hardworking and clean.

At 6-feet tall and more than 200 pounds, Gibson has been accused of using steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs. He shrugs off the notion. His coach laughs.

"I'm against any supplementation," Gibson said that Monday on a break between sets. "I work out every day and I don't feel the need. I'm proud of having not used anything."

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