Published: July 04, 2008 12:08 am            

ADAM VANKIRK: Golf gets a little juicy

Let me just say this. The world of sports and the use of performance enhancing drugs in relation to it is out of control. You can barely even get through a day without hearing about it.

This week is no exception with Thursday marking an unusual first as the PGA Tour opened a tournament with an anti-doping program in effect. Hundreds of random players were tested as the AT&T National teed off in Bethesda, Md.

Some professional players are OK with it, others not so much. To me, it’s the humor of it all that overshadows any attempts at exposing drug-related problems with the PGA.

I mean come on. Does anyone really believe juicing up is going to give you an edge in golf? Does anyone even care if someone is?

In my younger days, I was a highly competitive player in golf. I played in several junior events with some of the best players around the region. I can honestly tell you I would have loved it if the competition at that time was actually dumb enough to think that drugging it up to look like Hulk Hogan was a good thing for their golf game.

Football plus steroids? Yes.

Basketball plus steroids? Yes.

Even baseball plus steroids could potentially give someone an edge over the competition.

But an edge in golf? No way. No chance.

I was into minor weightlifting when I was a teenager, which is about the time I starting getting serious about golf. Let me tell you, muscles DO NOT equal good golf!

Golf is about precision, skill, hand-eye coordination, repetition, touch, vision, mental toughness and you get the idea. It’s not about beefing up to plug the gap or to run so fast you could break away from the Harlem Globetrotters.

I haven’t really heard it yet, but I can’t wait to see a guy like John Daly’s reaction to being exposed to the PGA’s testing regimen, which by the way closely follows the World Doping Agency’s prohibited list.

I can see Daly fresh off a wild night, ready for his Wednesday morning practice round, belly hanging way out and way below his belt — maybe a breakfast burrito in one hand and a cigarette in the other — when he is called in for a random test to see if he’s on some kind of steroid.

Now Daly’s not the best player in the world — though definitely my favorite — but

the point is you don’t have to be physically fit to play golf at the highest level. Heck, you may not even want to be.

Jack Nicklaus was overweight for much of his playing career. He wasn’t too bad I don’t think.

You know the Walrus, Craig Stadler. Not exactly fit to run a marathon, but a great player in his own right.

The old-school greats, like Walter Hagen, they weren’t too much into fitness either, though that was well before the Steroid Era.

Whether golf today has drug-related problems remains to be seen (the LPGA ladies and seniors will be tested also). I seriously doubt it however.

I will say, though, I can’t wait to see that first player who gets tagged with a negative result. Please, please, please don’t let it be some guy ranked in the 500s that no one’s ever heard of. That would be such a waste in a great story.

Can you imagine the reasons that guy — or maybe it will be a gal — will give for using ...

“Since I started using, I can now hit a mean fade under and around the trees.”

“You’ve seen the way I can sting a 1-iron right down the middle every time. I couldn’t do that before steroids.”

“It has helped me get more up-and-downs from greenside bunkers.”

The possibilities are endless.

Apparently, so is the connection between sports — all sports — and steroid use.

It’s way out of control. So you may as well kick back on the 19th hole and have a laugh about it.

ADAM VANKIRK can be reached at avankirk@

dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2664.

        

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