Quote Originally Posted by bulldog View Post
Ok, well I hope I don’t regret replying, because sometimes I think you just like to get a rise out of me. Lol I guess that is what makes a forum a forum though…opinions

I knew at some point Kimbo’s steroid use would come into play, so guess it is a good discussion. I have seen these articles (usually small outlets: Sydney Morning Herald….never heard of them before), but really there has been no concrete proof over all the years that steroids do cause heart problems. When articles try to bring this up, they twist things around and forget to mention things like what else the person was on (fatburners, painpills, etc) that usually go hand in hand with pro athletes doing steroids. For example the article you posted clearly states “young men, in 20’s and early 30’s”. So right there is the kicker that most people would not get. A man taking steroids under the age of 35 is extremely harmful because the body is still producing testosterone naturally and your levels are still rising. So when a man in his early 20’s takes steroids then the body shuts down its production because it sees it gets it from an outside source. This leads these men to ruin their natural production and there body may never bounce back. Yet after 35, the male body is done in raising production levels, so the risks are way lower (especially if under a doctor’s care). Next, I see the article mentions a 28 year old they tested who had liver damage; this is a sign of using oral steroids (very hard on liver), but these pro athletes have money so they hire doctors to do this for them and I’ve never heard of a doctor giving out oral steroids (always injections that have no bearing on the liver/kidney). That brings me to my next point….not all steroids are the same, so they are classifying them all in this study; guy says he went to a daily injection and that is usually HGH (human growth hormone) which has been proven to enlarge the heart (newer and not as much is known about it as testosterone). Again, testosterone vs steroids can also be a different thing…totally different solutions that cause different effects in the body.

Last, it is always the “abuse” you hear in these stories. Anyone can abuse anything though and things in excesses will cause problems…..hell you can die from drinking too much water or taking too many vitamins, so abusing steroids should not be a surprise if a few legal Tylenol would kill you if you abused it too.

Yet I still wonder how pro bodybuilders have stacked up to 7 different types of steroids to get where they are (no testing in pro bodybuilding and no point in competing unless on stuff) and are still alive. For example Mr Olympia, Chris Dickerson, is still alive and 76 years old. Franco Columbu, another Mr Olympia winner, is still alive at 74. Frank Zane just hit 73. Anyways these were some of the biggest abusers of steroids and one look at their bodies can tell you they used for a long time. Then if we get into the thousands (yes thousands) of pro athletes that are on steroids then I’d just think if it was this big a cause we would see pro’s dropping off from heart attacks left and right…yet it has not happened. Lance Armstrong is probably the most widely known to admit to steroid use and he is alive and still to be in great shape. I can google and see list of pro athletes that were caught for steroids that have had no heart issues, so it just makes me think the media hypes it more just to get stories out there http://www.ranker.com/crowdranked-li...nhancing-drugs

So I agree it can be a factor, but I believe if they saw severe signs of steroid abuse in Kimbo, the medical examiner would have commented on that as that makes for better news than a heart problem. Also the fact he was put on the donor list for a heart usually shows there was no abuse of the organ found. For example, if an alcoholic need a liver transplant from years of drinking, he/she will not be eligible for a transplant….won’t even be put on the list. It takes three years of proven sobriety to even be considered and by then most die waiting because even after the three years you go to bottom of list.
Cyclists don't use steroids for #1, they use other drugs for boosting hematocrit, and for recovery, steroids for a cyclist would be counter productive, #2, he almost died of testicular cancer, funny you left out this fact.