Here at CalorieLab we don’t usually have a lot of interest in sports (unless you’re talking about huge high school football players) but we did happen to notice that the Mitchell Report, that 409-page behemoth on steroid use in professional baseball released last week, also makes mention of Hollywood’s favorite diet pill, the horse medicine clenbuterol.

Apparently some ballplayers were using clen to stay lean even in the minor leagues. According to the report, baseball commissioner Bud Selig banned the use, sale or distribution of clenbuterol by affiliated minor league players in June 2001, when Schedule III steroids were also banned.

Clenbuterol, in addition to being used by starlets trying to look invisible, is also sometimes used by bodybuilders (and major league players) to keep them lean as they build muscle. Here are a few incidents from the report mentioning the drug, which is not approved for any use in humans.

Clenbuterol in Juan Gonzalez’s bag

One mention of clenbuterol in the report has to do with a bag searched by Canadian Border Service officers in October 2001. The bag had been taken from a flight the Cleveland Indians had been on, and it contained steroids, syringes, and clenbuterol, according to the report.

The bag was linked to Cleveland outfielder Juan Gonzalez, but might not actually have been his:

On prior trips, Gonzalez had included bags for members of his
entourage with his own bags, and Walsh had the impression that this was the case with some of the bags he sent down to be packed for the Toronto flight.

Jason Grimsley and human growth hormone

Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Jason Grimsley was also a friend of clen, according to the report. Federal agents were prepared to serve a search warrant on Grimsley’s house in April 2006 after he ordered two “kits” of human growth hormone.

Instead, he agreed to talk to agents and said that he had used steroids, clenbuterol and human growth hormone, but since the league started drug testing he had only used human growth hormone.

The trend toward clen

Former Mets batboy Kirk Radomski, who has pleaded guilty to distribution of steroids and money laundering, says that even before the league started testing for steroids players were moving toward other choices. From the report:

Even before drug testing began in Major League Baseball, Radomski observed that players were moving away from oil-based anabolic steroids, such as Deca-Durabolin, that stay in the body for a long time. Instead, the players increasingly requested water-based anabolic steroids, such as Winstrol, and other drugs such as clenbuterol and human growth hormone, that
cleared the body faster and were less likely to be detected. That trend continued after drug testing began.

It just goes to show that technology will always come up with ways for players to enhance their performance that are just beyond the ability of the drug tests to pinpoint.

(By Sarah White for CalorieLab Calorie Counter News)

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 and is filed under Diet pills, drugs, supplements and devices. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed. Permalink.