Steroids Q&A
	Enhancing performance
	The science of testing
	Have your say

His consistent stand against the use of steroids in the sport made his disqualification for a positive drugs test all the more shocking and - in the twilight of his career - incomprehensible too.

The 39-year-old is an icon to young British athletes as the Jamaican boy from west London who went on to win the 1992 Olympic 100m gold.

Whispering campaign

But despite Christie's attempts to cast himself as the "Mr Clean" of an event dogged by high profile drugs disgraces, most notably Canada's twice-banned Ben Johnson, he has faced allegations of using performance enhancing drugs before.

Christie running in 1999

Even the fact that his results have come back negative in over 100 drug tests - a "virtual impossibility" for a persistent banned-substance user according to one sports doctor - a whispering campaign has continued throughout his career.

In the 1988 Olympics, he tested positive for miniscule traces of the stimulant pseudoephedrine. His explanation that it came from a non-banned ginseng product was only narrowly accepted by the authorities.

Then in the summer of 1998, he won £40,000 in libel damages against armed robber-turned-author John McVicar, who claimed that Christie's astonishing achievements were "consistent with the use of anabolic steroids".

'Sexual harrasment'

The case ultimately left the sprinter £50,000 out of pocket, but he believed it was worth it because he had been completely exonerated.

His controversial Puma contact lenses were banned as advertising

"I am living proof that success achieved after hard, natural, drug-free work lasts so much longer and is so much sweeter," he said at the time.

Christie's record is quite remarkable, with a haul of 23 major titles as he shot from 156th to 4th in the world rankings for his event. He has even received an OBE in recognition of his services to British athletics.

His sometimes controversial pronouncements - such as accusing reporters of "sexual harrasment" for referring to his famous "lunchbox" running suit - were always tempered in the public eye by the fact that he had won gold in the highest profile Olympic event of all.

Russell Christie: Stabbed to death

As former British 400 metres champion Derek Redmond once said of Christie: "He is perfectly balanced- he's got a chip on both shoulders."

And perhaps not without cause, given his fraught private life. Russell, his younger brother and a career petty criminal, was stabbed to death at the age of 34 on London's Portobello Road.

Since effectively retiring from serious competition, Christie has pursued a successful career as a promoter and trainer to upcoming young British talent, such as the sub-10 second sprinter Darren Campbell.

Christie's career record