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BALCO
The Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO) (1984–2003) was an American company led by founder and owner Victor Conte. In 2003, journalists Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada investigated the company's role in a drug sports scandal later referred to as the ''BALCO Affair''. BALCO marketed tetrahydrogestrinone ("the Clear"), a then-undetected, performance-enhancing steroid developed by chemist Patrick Arnold. Conte, BALCO vice president James Valente, weight trainer Greg Anderson and coach Remi Korchemny had supplied a number of high-profile sports stars from the United States and Europe with "the Clear" and human growth hormone for several years. History Headquartered in Burlingame, California, BALCO was founded in 1984. Officially, BALCO was a service business for blood and urine analysis and food supplements. In 1988, Victor Conte offered free blood and urine tests to a group of athletes known as the ''BALCO Olympians''. He then was allowed to attend the Summer Olympic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marion Jones
Marion Lois Jones (born October 12, 1975), also known as Marion Jones-Thompson, is an American former world champion track and field athlete and former professional basketball player. She won three gold medals and two bronze medals at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, but was later stripped of her medals after admitting to steroid use. Jones was one of the most famous athletes to be linked to the BALCO scandal. The performance enhancing substance usage scandal covered more than 20 top level athletes, including Jones's ex-husband, shot putter C.J. Hunter, and 100 m sprinter Tim Montgomery, the father of Jones's first child. Jones has also played professional basketball in the WNBA, as point guard in the team of Tulsa Shock between 2010 and 2011. Personal life Marion Jones was born to George Jones and his wife, Marion, (originally from Belize) in Los Angeles, California. She holds dual citizenship with the United States and Belize. Her parents split wh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Victor Conte
Victor Conte Jr. (born 1950 in Fresno, California) is a former bassist with Tower of Power and the founder and president of Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO), a sports nutrition center in California. He served time in prison in 2005 after pleading guilty to conspiracy to distribute steroids and money laundering. He currently operates Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning (SNAC Nutrition). Early life and music Victor Conte Jr. was born in 1950 in Fresno, California to Shirley and Victor Conte Sr. He was the oldest of three children in a working-class Italian family. After graduating from McLane High School he attended Fresno City College but dropped out of college in 1969 after being convinced by his cousin, musician Bruce Conte, to join the band Common Ground as bass player. In 1970 he quit playing in Common Ground and joined the band Pure Food and Drug Act. At the time Conte's nickname was "Walking Fish", due to his unusual way of moving across the stage when he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barry Bonds
Barry Lamar Bonds (born July 24, 1964) is an American former professional baseball left fielder who played 22 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB). Bonds was a member of the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1986 to 1992 and the San Francisco Giants from 1993 to 2007. He is considered to be one of the greatest baseball players of all time. Recognized as an all-around player, Bonds received a record seven NL MVP awards and 12 Silver Slugger awards, along with 14 All-Star selections. He holds many MLB hitting records, including most career home runs (762), most home runs in a single season (73, set in 2001), and most career walks. Bonds led MLB in on-base plus slugging six times and placed within the top five hitters in 12 of his 17 qualifying seasons. For his defensive play in the outfield, he won eight Gold Glove awards. He also stole 514 bases, becoming the first and only MLB player to date with at least 500 home runs and 500 stolen bases. Bonds is ranked second in career Wins Abo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Remi Korchemny
Remi Korchemny (russian: Реми Корчемный; born 23 June 1932) is the former sprint coach of a number of high-profile athletes, including Soviet Olympic champion Valeri Borzov. He is serving a lifetime ban from the sport for his involvement in providing performance-enhancing drugs. After the 1972 Olympics, Korchemny moved to America. There he worked as a coach or advisor for a number of high-profile athletes, including British sprinter Dwain Chambers, and American athletes Kelli White, Chryste Gaines, Chris Phillips, Alvin Harrison, John Register and Jamaican athlete Grace Jackson. Life in the Soviet Union Korchemny was born on 23 June 1932 in Ukraine. In 1937, when he was five years old, his father was executed by firing squad on charges of sabotage amid a labor dispute while his mother was sent to a forced labor camp for four years, leaving Korchemny to live with his grandparents. As an impoverished youth, he would race the boys at his school for food. Drafted ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patrick Arnold
Patrick Arnold (born 1966) is an American organic chemist known for introducing androstenedione, 1-androstenediol, and methylhexanamine into the dietary supplement market, and for creating the designer steroid tetrahydrogestrinone, also known as THG and "the clear".Creator Of 'The Clear' Imprisoned CBS News, 04 Aug 2006, retrieved July 2007 THG, along with two other anabolic steroids that Arnold manufactured ( norbolethone and (DMT)), not b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greg Anderson (trainer)
Greg F. Anderson (born February 1966) is an American personal trainer, best known for his work with baseball player Barry Bonds, and links with BALCO. Biography Early life When Anderson was 10 years old, his father died after being shot during a gambling dispute. Anderson and Barry Bonds began a lifelong friendship when the two played middle-school baseball together in California. Bonds flourished as the team's star, while Anderson struggled to get playing time. In college, Anderson began an obsession with weight-lifting and spent long hours in the gym. He played college baseball at Fort Hays State University in Hays, Kansas with moderate success, but was advised by his coach to find a career outside of professional baseball. Soon after, Anderson moved back to California where he spent most of his time at the World Gym, now known as Diesel Fitness, only a few blocks away from BALCO. Steroid troubles Anderson allegedly began providing Bonds with performance-enhancing drugs in 1998 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trevor Graham
Trevor Graham (born 20 August 1963) is a Jamaican-born American former sprinter and athletics coach. Following the BALCO scandal, the US Olympic Committee barred him indefinitely from all its training sites. Athletics career Graham was part of the silver medal-winning Jamaican 4 × 400 m team at the 1988 Summer Olympics, running in the first round and semi-final, though not the final. He is a graduate from Saint Augustine's College with a degree in Business Management. Doping scandal BALCO Graham first played a critical whistleblower role in the BALCO scandal (Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative) of June 2003, anonymously sending a syringe containing the designer steroid Tetrahydrogestrinone to the United States Anti-Doping Agency The syringe started the investigation. Many others accused him of trying to wipe out a rival. Eventually the investigation came back to Graham, and he was charged with making false statements about his ties to a steroids distributor. He was convi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bill Romanowski
William Thomas Romanowski (born April 2, 1966) is a former American football linebacker who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 16 seasons. Nicknamed "Romo" and "RomoCop", he spent the majority of his career with the San Francisco 49ers and Denver Broncos. Romanowski was selected by the 49ers in the third round of the 1988 NFL Draft and played six seasons each in San Francisco and Denver. He was also a member of the Philadelphia Eagles and Oakland Raiders for two seasons each. At the time of his retirement, Romanowski won four Super Bowl titles, two each with the 49ers and Broncos, and twice received Pro Bowl honors during his Broncos tenure. He also led a controversial career due to often engaging in unsportsmanlike behavior, which resulted in altercations with opponents and teammates. Early life and education Romanowski was born in Vernon, Connecticut. He graduated from Rockville High School in 1984 and Boston College in 1988 with academic honors, and was a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Anti-Doping Agency
The United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA, ) is a non-profit, non-governmental 501(c)(3) organization and the national anti- doping organization (NADO) for the United States. To protect clean competition and the integrity of sport and prevent doping in the United States with a performance-enhancing substance, the USADA provides education, leads scientific initiatives, conducts testing, and oversees the results management process. Headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USADA is a signatory to the World Anti-Doping Code, which harmonizes anti-doping practices around the world and is widely considered the basis for the strongest and strictest anti-doping programs to prevent doping in sport. In 2001, USADA was recognized by the U.S. Congress as "the official anti-doping agency for Olympic, Pan American and Paralympic sport in the United States." While USADA is not a government entity, it is partly funded by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), with its remai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lance Williams And Mark Fainaru-Wada
Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada co-authored the book ''Game of Shadows'' while they were reporters for the ''San Francisco Chronicle''. For their investigative work in the field of steroids, Williams and Fainaru-Wada were given the 2004 George Polk Award. In the course of their investigative research, Williams and Fainaru-Wada were the first to report that: *track star Marion Jones purportedly received illegal drugs from the steroid supplier BALCO *world record-holder Tim Montgomery testified before a federal grand jury that he had used steroids *baseball slugger Jason Giambi testified that he had used steroids On May 5, 2006, Fainaru-Wada and Williams were subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury about how they obtained leaked grand jury testimony. On May 31, the authors urged United States District Judge Martin Jenkins of San Francisco to excuse them from testifying. This appeal was supported by affidavits from ''Washington Post'' reporters Carl Bernstein and Mark ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bobby Estalella (catcher)
Robert M. Estalella s-tah-LAY-yah(born August 23, 1974) is an American former professional baseball catcher, who played in Major League Baseball (MLB) from 1996 to 2004. His name is similar to that of his grandfather, Bobby Estalella (1911 – 1991), a Cuban professional baseball outfielder who played in the big leagues between 1935 and 1949. Baseball career In nine seasons, Estalella played for the Philadelphia Phillies (1996–1999), San Francisco Giants (2000–2001), New York Yankees (2001), Colorado Rockies (2002–2003), Arizona Diamondbacks (2004) and Toronto Blue Jays (2004). Estalella was a career .216 hitter with 48 home runs and 147 RBI in 310 games. He was signed by the Cincinnati Reds to a minor league contract before the 2005 season, but chose free-agency during spring training. He was signed by the New York Mets to a minor league contract before the 2006 season, but elected free agency as he re-injured his (r) shoulder and elbow before the season began requiring ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jeremy Giambi
Jeremy Dean Giambi (; September 30, 1974 – February 9, 2022) was an American outfielder and first baseman in Major League Baseball (MLB). He played for four teams from 1998 to 2003, primarily the Oakland Athletics, where he was a teammate of his older brother Jason Giambi during the club's division championship-winning seasons in 2000 and 2001. He enjoyed his best season in 2001, batting .283 with 12 home runs and 57 runs batted in (RBI), then hitting .308 in the Division Series loss to the New York Yankees. Following his brother's departure to the Yankees as a free agent in the ensuing offseason, Jeremy saw declining playing time with three teams over the next two seasons before finishing his career in the minor leagues. Early life Jeremy Giambi was born in San Jose, California. Like his older brother Jason, Giambi attended South Hills High School in West Covina, California. He attended California State University, Fullerton and played college baseball for the Cal State Fu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
