Faust's Gold: Inside The East German Doping Machine - Hardcover

Ungerleider, Steven

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312269773 ISBN 13: 9780312269777

Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books, 2001

Synopsis

For nearly twenty-five years, East Germany's corrupt sports organization dominated international athletics. While the German Democratic Republic's secret "State Plan" was in effect, more than ten thousand unsuspecting young athletes-- some as young as twelve years old-- were given massive doses of performance-enhancing anabolic steroids. These athletes achieved miraculous success in international competitions, including the Olympics, but for many of them, their physical and emotional health was permanently damaged.

Faust's Gold draws on the revelations of the ongoing trials of former GDR coaches, doctors, and sports officials who have now confessed to conducting ruthless medical experiments on young and talented athletes selected for Olympic training camps. It also draws on the extensive research of Brigitte Berendonk, who escaped from East Germany to begin a decade-long crusade to bring justice to her fellow athletes, and that of her husband, Professor Werner Franke. Berendonk's story, and those of her colleagues in the GDR, offers a unique insight into a bizarre regime.

Faust's Gold is a true-life detective story that plunges into the dark, secretive world of the GDR doping scam, where elite competitors and their families are up against a formidable opponent: the East German secret police, known as the STASI. What emerges is a complex tapestry of the politicized modern Olympics that culminates in a powerful testimony to the massive wrong done by one Eastern Bloc nation to its world-class athletes.

About this title

From the Author:

"In 'Faust's Gold,' the first book in English to fully convey the systematicdoping of athletes in the former East Germany, Ungerleider makes aprovocative comparison to the gruesome human experimentation of theHolocaust. The book is a disturbing reminder of the willingness of scienceto pervert itself to satisfy politics and sport."-------- Jere LongmanThe New York Times

From the Inside Flap:

"You may grow faint...but I urge you to endure, to take it all in...forthen you will cry out NEVER AGAIN, NEVER AGAIN!"------- Kenny Moore, CorrespondentSports Illustrated----------"The truth is that what happened in East Germany is a gross exaggerationof what happens in countless gyms across America. Athletes aredowning the drugs as if their bodies were bulletproof. They ought to readthis book."----- Joan RyanSan Francisco Chronicle

About this edition

• Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0312269773
• ISBN 13: 9780312269777
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256