什麼時候自行車比賽能遠離服藥?

"It's a great rarity today for someone to achieve athletic success who doesn't take drugs." That quote seems rather timely, in the wake of the news that cyclist Lance Armstrong will no longer fight the accusations of doping leveled at him by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. The charges may cost Armstrong all seven of his Tour de France titles. The development in Armstrong's case follows two recent drug suspensions in baseball-in the past 10 days Melky Cabrera, an All-Star outfielder for the San Francisco Giants, and Bartolo Colón, a starting pitcher for the Oakland Athletics, both received 50-game bans after testing positive for artificial testosterone.

"如果現在有人不通過服藥而在體育賽事上獲勝，那是十分罕見的。"隨着自行車手阿姆斯特朗接受美國反興奮劑機構調查其服用藥物一事落下尾聲，引用這句話顯得十分及時。這次對阿姆斯特朗的判決將取消他的7個環法冠軍頭銜。緊接着阿姆斯特朗的案件，最近兩起棒球賽事的服藥事件——過去10天，效力於舊金山巨人隊的全明星外場手Melky Cabrera和奧克蘭運動家隊的先發投手Bartolo Colón被查出因服用人造睾丸激素而呈現陽性，兩個人得到500場禁賽的處分。

But the quote above has nothing to do with Modern-day athletics. It comes from a retired track coach quoted in a 1971 New York Times Magazine article. (The article's author, sportswriter and activist Jack Scott, who died in 2000, has one of the more interesting biographies you'll find-Oberlin College athletic director, Bill Walton confidant, onetime suspected associate of the Symbionese Liberation Army.) Whether or not the coach's statement then was somewhat hyperbolic, it's clear that the drug problem has loomed over the sports world for a long time. And although the abuses in cycling have become harder to ignore in just the past two decades, the sport has been home to all manner of chemical enhancements for more than 100 years.

上述引用的句子與現代體育無任何關聯。它是一個退休的田徑教練從1971年的《紐約時報》的一篇文章引用的一個句子。（這篇文章的作者Jack Scott，體育專欄作者和激進主義分子，2000年逝世，著有很有意思的自傳，如《奧柏林學院體育系主任》，《比爾沃頓密友錄》，《懷疑是共生解放軍的同事》）。不管這個教練的說法有否點誇張，很明顯涉藥問題很長時間在體育界已愈發凸顯。儘管在過去的20年裏，自行車的涉藥事件很難忽視，體育成爲化學增強劑的常客已有100多年之久。

Jacques Anquetil, a French cyclist who won the Tour de France five times in the 1950s and 1960s, openly admitted to doping. "Everyone in cycling dopes himself," he said in Scott's 1971 article. "Those who claim they don't are liars." In Anquetil's era, the agents of choice were stimulants such as amphetamines, but as early as the late 1800s cyclists fueled up with a mixture of coca leaf extract and wine called Vin Mariani, according to a 1983 Hastings Center report.

曾經在1950s和1960s間五次獲得環法冠軍的法國自行車手Jacques Anquetil，公開承認服用藥物。在Scott1971年的文章中，Jacques Anquetil 說："每個自行車手都有服藥。"同樣，"每個不承認他服過藥的人都是騙子。"在Anquetil眼裏，藥物的選擇有像安非他命這樣的刺激物，但在1800s晚期，據海斯汀中心1983年的報道，自行車手刺激興奮的選擇包括可卡葉的提取物和一種叫做維馬里亞尼酒的混合品。

Baseball, too, had its period of rampant amphetamine use, which is viewed in an almost nostalgic light now that stronger performance enhancers such as anabolic steroids and human growth hormone have tainted the game's image. But in endurance sports such as cycling, performance enhancement can be especially deadly. At the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, a Danish cyclist named Knud Enemark Jensen lost consciousness during a race, fell from his bicycle and died. Postmortem tests reportedly revealed the presence of amphetamines in his system. After English rider Tom Simpson collapsed and died during the 1967 Tour de France, amphetamines were found both in his bloodstream and in a vial tucked inside his jersey.

同樣地，棒球也有一段氾濫的安非他命用藥期，這在今天看來顯得有點過時。現在更強力的增強劑，如同化激素和生長激素玷污了比賽的形象。但在耐力比賽，尤其是自行車這樣的比賽中，性能增強劑是致命的。在1960年羅馬夏季奧運會上，一名來自丹麥的自行車手Knud Enemark Jensen在比賽中失去知覺，從車上倒下死亡。驗屍報告顯示在他的體內發現安非他命。此後，英國自行車手Tom Simpson在1967年的環法比賽上死亡，在他的血液和塞在運動衣的小瓶裏也都發現了安非他命。

More recently, cyclists have boosted their endurance with the use of an artificial version of the hormone erythropoietin, or EPO, which stimulates red blood cell production and boosts the oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood. Danish cyclist Bjarne Riis, who won the 1996 Tour de France, later admitted that he used EPO during that time.

最近，自行車手服用人造的激素促紅細胞生成素或稱作EPO使耐力增強。EPO刺激紅細胞生成，增大血液載養量。1996年環法冠軍，來自丹麥的自行車手Bjarne Riis，後來承認他在比賽時服用EPO。

EPO thickens the blood, and it also has proved dangerous. After a spate of suspicious rider deaths, a 1991 New York Times article highlighted the deadly potential of the drug du jour. "There is no absolute proof, but there's so much smoke that most of us are convinced," University of Oklahoma hematologist Randy Eichner told the newspaper. "You just don't get 18 deaths in four years, mysteriously, with 10 of them attributed to cardiac problems."

EPO雖然使血液變稠， 但它也被證明是危險的。在大量可疑的自行車手死亡後，1991年《紐約時報》的一篇文章突出了自行車比賽用藥的潛在致命後果。奧克萊大學血液病醫生Randy Eichner說："雖然沒有絕對證據指出這一危險，但正如我們確信的那樣，這的確有貓膩。""不可能在4年平白無故產生18起死亡案例，而且其中10例都是心臟問題。"

Cycling insiders, too, noticed drastic changes in 1991. That is the year that three-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond thinks that EPO took over his sport. As he told Scientific American writer Michael Shermer in 2008, "Something was different in the 1991 Tour. There were riders from previous years who couldn't stay on my wheel who were now dropping me on even modest climbs." LeMond had won the race the two previous years, but he fell to seventh place in 1991.

自行車業內人士也在1991年發現重大變化。這一年3屆環法冠軍得主Greg LeMond認爲EPO成爲他比賽的焦點。LeMond在過去兩年贏得比賽但在1991年只得了第七。他在2008年告訴科學美國作家Michael Shermer"1991年的環法比賽有些不同。去年的不如我的自行車手現在在一般的坡道上卻能拋下我。"