The early years continued

Following on from yesterday I mentioned very little effort went into choosing a club,basically I went along with family pressure.Not the best decision looking back at it now as if you join a team full of stars the chances of outshining anyone and being noticed is small. The team I joined had 3 Springboks,5 Provincial players who played for the Sharks and 3 Scottish Internationals. The problem is they didn't play all the time and the team chopped and changed regularly.

I should have gone with my gut and joined my ex Army team mates across the road who were the same age as me and we knew the style we played.We were an unbeatable team in the Army and the priority should have been to keep the team together.

The new season was about to start and we had to attend aerobic classes for fitness and to stretch our muscles to reduce injury.Little did I know aerobics were more important for the others for their new increased physiques.The chap who went to Italy in the off season returned a different person.I am not exaggerating but he had grown in size.From someone who was similar in size to me had increased to a staggering 130 kg's and all muscle.For someone to transform their body so quickly it had to have been steroids.Looking back at it now I was probably one of the rare breeds who had no idea how wide spread it was.

I understand why athletes bitch at others when they know they are on steroids.The fairness goes out the window and makes a huge difference. Someone on steroids will increase their body mass over 10 weeks by around 10 kilograms. Steroids resets your body back to puberty and your muscles grow in size. You will gain strength and bulk up, but your actual muscles are weak. The tissue that makes up the muscle isn't as strong as natural muscle and is prone to tearing.

I struggled during the matches as others around me were now bigger and stronger than me. I was big at 120 kilograms, but I didn't have their physique. I was a forward and it was like playing against 8 action men.The first game of the season I was flattened like a rag doll.I have never been hit so hard in my life and was winded,struggling to breathe.I still have the rib damage form that hit which still baffles me today.Recent x rays show a trauma and scar tissue has built up.around the damaged ribs.I had no idea my ribs were in a bad way at the time, but I can feel the lump today.

Tests have proven how the body changes with the use of steroids. Someone who uses Steroids will gain strength through increased muscle size. The muscles have more androgen receptors in their cells and is common to increase the strength by up to 25 percent.The benefit is not only that though as the steroids help shorten the catabolic phase of metabolism.In English that means your muscles take half the time to recover after a workout.I was playing against super humans and had no real idea.

Every game I put my body on the line and I didn't breakdown like the others around me. I have never seen so many torn muscles in one season.Normal muscles just don't tear and these guys were tearing all sorts.This was the first year I had seen this first hand and had no idea it was even possible.Up until that point I had experienced players pulling a muscle or a muscle strain but never a tear.The steroid enhanced muscles are not as strong as normal muscles and the new growth tears away from the original muscle.A back line player tearing a bicep,another tearing a calf muscle as these injuries started to add up.We had back up players for every position,but a muscle can take ages to repair and sometimes surgery is required.

That season I played every game and was battered and bruised but I had survived.Sometimes I couldn't walk for a few days afterwards and just hobbled around everywhere.Luckily I was working for a cigarette company and were used to seeing me arrive on a Monday morning sporting a black eye and some stitches.They were very good to me as it benefited them having me playing sport at a high level.I knew all the top players and would often end up in some night club with some of the players doing promotions.

I will continue with the next episode tomorrow.Thinking back I must have been mad to play with this lot. I should be able to wind this up tomorrow and do a follow up on how wide spread steroid abuse is in rugby.

Image source everydayhealth.com