Linford Christie

Linford Cicero Christie (born 2 April 1960) is a Jamaican-born British former sprinter. He is the only British man to have won gold medals in the 100 metres at all four major competitions open to British athletes: the Olympic Games, the World Championships, the European Championships and the Commonwealth Games. He was the first European athlete to break the 10-second barrier in the 100 m and still holds the British record in the event. He is a former world indoor record holder over 200 metres, and a former European record holder in the 60 metres, 100 m and 4 × 100 metres relay.

He remains one of the most highly decorated British athletes of all-time. By the end of his track career Christie had won 24 medals overall, more than any other British male athlete before or since. In 1993 he was awarded the BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

Christie tested positive for a banned stimulant in 1988 during the Seoul Olympics. In 1999 he was suspended for two years by the IAAF after the banned substance nandrolone was found in a test.

Early life and education

Christie was born on 2 April 1960 in Saint Andrew, Jamaica, where he was brought up by his maternal grandmother. At the age of seven he joined his parents, who had emigrated to Acton, London, England, five years before. He was educated at Henry Compton Secondary School in Fulham, London and excelled in physical education. He competed in the very first London Youth Games in 1977 for the borough of Hammersmith & Fulham. He also joined the Air Training Corps in 1978, 336 (Hammersmith) Squadron. He did not take up athletics seriously until he was 18.

Professional athletics career

Christie's early track career was not particularly promising. A comparatively slow starter, he failed to make the Great Britain team for the 1984 Summer Olympics, not even being included in the sprint relay squad. It was not until some years after he had begun to work in earnest on his running technique under the coaching guidance of Ron Roddan in 1979 that he fulfilled his potential.

In 1986, he was the surprise winner of the 100 m at the European Championships and finished second in the same event at the Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, behind Ben Johnson. At the 1987 World Championships in Athletics in Rome, Christie came fourth in the 100 m, but was later awarded the bronze medal, when winner Johnson was disqualified after admitting years of steroid use.

At the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, Christie won the 100 m silver behind Carl Lewis after Johnson, who set a world record in 9.79 seconds, was again disqualified following a positive drug test. Christie's time was 9.97 seconds, a new European record by 0.03 seconds and this was only the third time that an athlete had broken the ten second barrier in the 100 metres without winning the race.

In 1992, Christie became the third British athlete to win the Olympic 100 m, after Harold Abrahams and Allan Wells, winning the title ahead of Frankie Fredericks of Namibia at the Barcelona Olympic Games. In the absence of his great rival Lewis, Christie ran 9.96 s in the final, and at the age of 32 years 121 days became the oldest Olympic 100 m champion by four years and 38 days.

In 1993, he became the first man in history to hold the Olympic, World, European and Commonwealth titles in the 100m as he was victorious at the Stuttgart World Championships in his fastest ever time of 9.87. The time still stands as the British record as of 2022. His achievement saw him being voted BBC Sports Personality of the Year by the British public that year.

The following year, in 1994, he defended his Commonwealth title in Victoria in his second fastest ever 100 m time of 9.91.

Defending his Olympic title in 1996, Christie was disqualified in the final after two false starts. He said: "The first one I knew I did, but on the second one I felt I reacted perfectly to the gun. I have never been disqualified from a race before in my life. What a place to do it." His reaction time was 0.086 seconds. Under IAAF rules, sprinters are not allowed to start from their blocks faster than 0.1 seconds.

Christie retired from representative international competition in 1997, although he continued to make appearances at invitation meetings.

Doping allegations and ban

Early allegations

Christie faced an International Olympic Committee disciplinary hearing at the 1988 Seoul Olympics because of an adverse drug test for the banned stimulant pseudoephedrine after he ran in the heats of the 200m. He escaped sanction after the committee voted by a margin of 11 to 10 and gave Christie "the benefit of the doubt." Christie argued that he had taken it inadvertently when drinking some ginseng tea.

At the 1994 European championships staged in Helsinki, where British team captain Christie won his third European 100 m title, he was caught up in a doping controversy after Solomon Wariso, a 400 m runner making his international championship debut, tested positive for the stimulant ephedrine. Wariso revealed that he had used an over-the-counter pick-you-up called "Up Your Gas", which Christie had bought at a Florida pharmacy.

In 1998, less than six months before his first positive drug test, Christie won a libel action against the journalist John McVicar. McVicar had insinuated in a satirical magazine that Christie's remarkable rise from 156th in the world to triumph at an age when he should have been in decline could only have been achieved through performance-enhancing drugs. The jury found in Christie's favour by a 10–2 majority. The judge ordered that McVicar should be bound by an injunction restraining him from accusing Christie of taking banned substances. The modest £40,000 damages awarded were outweighed by the legal costs that Christie incurred to bring the case. After the judgment, McVicar called Christie "The Judy Garland of the 100 metres", referring to the emotion that Christie had displayed before the court.

Positive drugs test and ban from athletics

In February 1999, Christie competed in an indoor meet in Dortmund, Germany. A routine unannounced drug test found the banned substance nandrolone. After a six-month delay, a disciplinary hearing was convened by the British Athletic Federation which found Christie to be not guilty. But the IAAF overruled and confirmed a two-year suspension. He was found to have more than 100 times normal levels of the metabolites of nandrolone in his urine. Various explanations were offered to explain the results, including eating avocado, or using nutritional supplements. The IAAF rejected that explanation and gave Christie a two-years ban from athletics, despite UK Athletics feeling that there was reasonable doubt whether the drug had been taken deliberately, a decision which ignored the usual drug testing principle of "strict liability".

Several alternative theories have been proposed that might explain Christie's positive test. By way of context, Nandrolone is a long-acting anabolic steroid, and is well-known in athlete circles to be detectable in blood and urine screenings for long periods; ranging from 6 to 18 months. Skeptics of Christie's positive, and other Nandrolone sanctions in the late 1990s, have cited this detection window as a major deterrent to using the drug at any point during training or competition periods. Around this time pro-hormones like 19-norandrostenedione, Androstenedione, and 1-Testosterone, among others, abounded in the American supplement market, and were not yet codified as 'anabolic agents' under the Federal Controlled Substances Act. Given that Christie tested positive for Nandrolone, it is conceivable that he had been taking 19-norandrostenedione, a metabolic precursor to Nandrolone (this was sold over-the-counter in the United States until 2004). At the time Christie had been training in Florida in the winter months, and may have been using the prohormone without knowing it could produce a positive test.

Alternatively, Christie may have been under the impression he was administering a different anabolic steroid with a narrower testing window. Substances like Masteron and Primobolan are esterified in oil similar to Nandrolone, and would be indistinguishable if mislabeled.

Christie has always denied any wrongdoing. "If I took drugs there had to be a reason to take drugs. I had pretty much retired from the sport." Furthermore, he denied that his physique was gained through drug use and promoted an anti-steroid approach: "It does not follow that all athletes who are big take drugs ... Only by testing all athletes will the sport be kept clean of drugs."

Fallout following positive drugs test

Following his positive drugs test and ban from athletics, Christie was banned for life from the British Olympic Association, who announced that Christie would not be accredited for any future Olympic Games, in accordance with their regulations.

Following the positive drugs test, the IAAF prohibited Christie from attending the Olympic Games in Sydney as a member of the BBC commentating team.

The ban also resulted in Puma opting not to continue Christie's £100,000 sponsorship contract.

Retirement

Following the two-year ban, Christie worked as a presenter on the BBC programmes ''Record Breakers'' and ''Garden Invaders'', and also had a contract with BBC Sport. He has spent less time as a public figure and has devoted most of his time to managing his company. In 1990 he made his acting debut in the BBC
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