The Dirtiest Race in History: Ben Johnson, Carl Lewis and the 1988 Olympic 100M Final

The book details and chronicles the drug culture among world-class track and field athletes, their coaches, enablers, and hangers-on. This book should be read along with Calvin Smith's 'It Should Have Been Gold'. Everyone knows that Carl Lewis was a selfish, arrogant, narcissistic prima donna, but to this day there are those who will swear he was as "dirty" as any of those that were caught. The section about Peter Ueberroth sweeping Lewis's positive tests under the rug because he feared the financial fallout would harm the LA Olympics is fascinating.

After Sha’carri Richardson blew up in the Tokyo Olympic trials, I was fascinated by the comparisons to FloJo so I dove down a Seoul Olympics rabbit hole this past week. I’m not that interested in track or sports in general- I just love a good story. I saw this book mentioned a lot so I bought it. I am typically a fiction reader, but this story was incredibly well written and the air of mystery it leaves is potent. Highly recommend even if you have a passing interest in professional sports.

Good account and background about that race. I still like Ben Johnson. Take home message, the gains for cheating are so great for both the athletes and the Olympics (in terms of maintaining a spectacular that can be translated into TV revenue), that you can see why it happens. The testing process is so under resourced, that athletes will continue to try and beat the system in the future. The amount of athletes that have now been stripped of their medals from the 2008 and 2012 games as a result of their samples being retested is a case in point.

This book started out with a great premise but really only described the PED use of Ben Johnson and not of the other sprinters in the race until the end of the book. Carl Lewis career arc is described but not nothing but hearsay about any PED usage. I would call it a Ben Johnson biography but well written.

This is a well written. lively account of a nearly forgotten moment in sports history, when the Olympics was in danger of becoming a complete farce, due to the abuse of 'performance enhancing drugs'. It's given me a new insight into what happened back in 1980, and a vivid description of the personalities involved and the stresses they were under to succeed. It does require a desire to learn about the incident. I don't think a person who would rather go for a walk than watch the Olympics would be interested in reading it. I don't normally read books about sport, so I can't compare it to anything else. It's worth reading, if you are an athletics fan, a casual runner (as I am), or if you just fancy reading something a bit different.

Very interesting perspective on the state of track and field drug testing and the view that committees, sponsors etc don't really want drug tests to tarnish the sports and the lengths they often go to cover them up. Seems to me that Ben Johnson was set up by a competitor or his handlers and then the test results were leaked to the press so they couldn't be suppressed. Another good book on this subject is the one by Charlie Francis, Johnson's coach.

At the time of the event I recall two headlines in the Canadian press.Immediately after the event: "Canadian athlete wins gold:Immediately after the drug test results were published: "Jamaican immigrant tests positive for banned substance"I read this book with a great deal of curiosity as I have recently been proved wrong in my support of Lance Armstrong. There was never any doubt about the guilt of Ben Johnson, but this book did provide an insight into something I had no idea of and how Ben Johnson was actually set up.Read this book and work it out for yourself.This is the kind of book I love. Where the truth is a greater story than any fiction.

Excellent, deeply researched book on the story behind the race of the century. Read this book along with Charlie Francis' "Speed Trap" and you'll come away with a clear-eyed understanding of the inescapable pressures bearing down on elite track and field athletes like Ben Johnson. Unlike recent books on fallen stars like Lance Armstrong, Moore is not a moral scold. I found it refreshing to read an account of doping in sport that was not blemished by the writer's own sense of moral superiority. Definitely pick up a copy of The Dirtiest Race In History.

An iconic moment in sporting history captured superbly. I still remember waking up early in the morning as a teenager to watch the race, utterly encapsulated by the prospect of watching the race. I was a Johnson fan and delighted he won. Days later the world of sport seemed to cave in as he was outed as a drugs cheat. Devasting for a fan of Johnson and of sport in general. Of course over the years much of this story has been told but this book delves into the personalities as much as the story of the race. This isn't a book that points fingers, it is about attitudes and tries to assess why the protagonists did what they did. Coaches insights are included too.Ben Johnson broke the hearts of many sports fans yet this book humanises his role and he comes across as an individual to pity not to demonise. So much to like about this book; well written and great stories enveloped around a time in sport many would want to forgot. Personally that race was a part of my childhood and this book brought it all back...I just wish it was around when I used the race as the subject for my PE coursework! A great read and huge congratulations to the author.

During London 2012 my interest in the men's 100 metre final switched on again - as it does during every Olympic Games. This time round I wanted to read something about the recent history of the event and came across this book. It describes what is perhaps the most controversial race ever. Like most, I had only casually listened to the news when Ben Johnson was stripped of his medal.I wanted to know the full story and that is why I bought this book.It is written is a very readable style. It provides the reader with the facts and leaves you to draw your own conclusions about what may have really happened! It is a real eye opener. Amongst other things, this book examines the rivalry between Johnson and Carl Lewis in great detail. It considers their respective backgrounds, coaching and such like before building up to how they both came face to face in Seoul 1988.I do not want to spoil your read, but can say that if anyone were to ask me now what I thought of Ben Johnson, I would say that steroids do not make champions. A champion is a champion due to their relentless hard work - year in, year out. Unfortunately, the use of steroids has infiltrated 'amateur' sports due to the massive sums of money that athletes can get from commercial sponsors: Everyone wants to be the best. Everyone wants to win. Viewed in this context, is it at all surprising that the top athletes and their coaches will want to surpass normal human limitations by using performance enhancing drugs? I am firmly of the view that Ben Johnson was not alone and indeed may have been set up - though like I say, the author does not promote conspiracy theories - he just presents the facts in a most brilliant objective manner.This book has a nice hard cover and comes at a very reasonable price. I read it over a weekend and found it difficult to put down. I would recommend it to everyone interested in sport or even to those just interested in modern world changing news events.Well done by the author Richard Moore.

I had read the Charlie Francis "Speed Trap", which is excellent, and then I hoped this would be a good follow up to give a more rounded viewpoint. I've read a couple of Richards other books and so had high expectations which were well met.An excellent breakdown of all of the hidden truth around the 1980s sprinting rivalries and how they were all on the game with a huge breadth of interviews from those that were involved on all sides, including the establishment.

Just finished the Dirtiest Race in History, in spite of the fact that most of the facts are already in the public domain this book grips and takes you inside the minds of the main protagonists.People like Calvin Smith have the spotlight shone on them and it was fascinating to learn about Joe Douglas, the shadowy mentor to Carl Lewis, who seemed to exert great and sometimes undue influence in his career.Carl Lewis comes across as a selfish and evasive figure whilst the writer evokes a degree of sympathy when it comes to the sad figure of Ben Johnson. As Calvin Smith says of himself, he should have won the gold medal, with the exception of Robson Da Silva, the rest of the field had failed drug tests of one type or another.Highly recommended and you don't need to know anything about athletics to enjoy this book as its really all about the personalities involved.

Although the case of Ben Johnson is notorious, I was only vaguely aware of his intense rivalry with Carl Lewis. The rivalry on the track, was more than outmatched by the goings on, off it. This book gives a fascinating insight into the politics behind athletics, and some historical context to what is happening now with regards to drug testing, suspensions, authorised neutral athletes and the pressure to succeed.As an indication of how compelling this book actually is, I've spent the past week seeking out further reading on the subject via the bibliography and references.