No... but that is my heart saying that over my head. When he trained, he trained relentlessly. Later on in his career it would be hard to call
I doubt he was "on steroids" as a Panamanian teenaged bantamweight in 1969 or whatever. But it would be remarkable if he went a 30 year career without ever taking a drug/medicine that nowadays would be deemed "PEDs" and on the banned list. That's the problem with these historical discussions on "PEDs". Even back in the early 1990s steroids weren't explicitly banned in boxing, and if you go back to the 1970s and 1960s no one cared. Many of the boxers of that era wouldn't have even known or cared what an anabolic steroid was, that doesn't mean they weren't ever administered them. All this fuss about these drugs didn't exist back then. Dangerous stimulants were on the radar as a potential problem if a fighter dies, as were sedatives/tranquilizes administered pre-fight to FIX an outcome. But no one would give a **** about pills and injections that an athlete might take to get through a training camp and boost his performance. Why should they ? What could be wrong with that ?
He obviously didn't do steroids, however maybe some diuretics he did use. After all, he was a fighter in lower divisions and if the boxing community thought strength is bad for heavyweights, they certainly thought that for lower divisions. If anything, they maybe encouraged diueritics to get weaker so you can fit in the lower division
I wonder how many people here would call me insane for saying Botha used PEDs if he hadnt tested positive. You dont have to look like Schwarzenegger. Either way it doesnt matter because the playing field has more or less always been level in boxing until Floyd jr started this whole thing with using his star power to drag opponents into olympic testing after hes had months of time to take whatever he wanted and could have planned his PED cycles while his opponent has to adjust last minute
I agree. The whole "PED testing" movement taken to the extreme it is now is BAD FOR BOXING. It's just another avenue for corruption. Excuse to cancel fights, and a machine used to get an advantage over an opponent. I'm not against testing. I believe the old style testing was fine. Test them before and after the fight, and that will regulate the thing and prevent excessive use/abuse. People should accept the fact PEDs will always be used to some extent and the testing should be seen as a way to keep things a bit reasonable, rather than a sign of "drug free sport" which is neither realistic nor even desirable !
I agree. It's about as relevant as whether he used haemorrhoid cream. If you ask if he did, I'd say the same thing. I wouldn't be surprised at all. In a 30 year career he very possibly used haemorrhoid cream along the way. I'm guessing a lot of people do.