Agassi admits to taking crystal meth
Andre Agassi's upcoming autobiography contains an admission that he used crystal meth in 1997 and lied to tennis authorities. (File Photo: AP)
Mark Hodgkinson
First Published : 28 Oct 2009 04:04:41 PM IST
Last Updated :
Andre Agassi was "worried for a moment, but not for long" about how his fanbase would react to his admission in his autobiography that he took crystal meth, an addictive stimulant more commonly associated with the American underclass than former Wimbledon champions.
But perhaps the Las Vegan, who won the 1992 Wimbledon Championships, should be concerned about how the tennis authorities will view another disclosure in his book, that he lied to the men's tour about why he failed a drugs test, after writing a letter saying that he "unwittingly" took crystal meth after sipping from a drink that had been spiked by his personal assistant. The ATP Tour accepted Agassi's story and he avoided a ban.Agassi, who gathered eight grand slam titles, and is only of only six players to have won all four slams at least once, took the drug in 1997. He was at home with his assistant, who was known as Slim. "Slim is stressed too. He says, 'You want to get high with me?'
'On what?'
'Gack.'
'What the hell's gack?'
'Crystal meth."
'Why do they call it gack?'
'Because that's the sound you make when you're high. Makes you feel like Superman, dude.'
As if they're coming out of someone else's mouth, I hear these words: 'You know what? F*** it. Yeah. Let's get high," Agassi recalled in his autobiography, Open.
"Slim dumps a small pile of powder on the coffee table. He cuts it, snorts it. He cuts it again. I snort some. I ease back on the couch and consider the Rubicon I've just crossed," Agassi wrote.
"There is a moment of regret, followed by vast sadness. Then comes a tidal wave of euphoria that sweeps away every negative thought in my head. I've never felt so alive, so hopeful - and I've never felt such energy. I'm seized by a desperate desire to clean. I go tearing around my house, cleaning it from top to bottom. I dust the furniture. I scour the tub. I make the beds."
Later that year, Agassi received a phone call from a doctor working for the ATP.
"There is doom in his voice, as if he's going to tell me I'm dying. And that's exactly what he tells me. He reminds me that tennis has three classes of drug violation. Performance-enhancing drugs would constitute a Class 1, he says, which would carry a suspension of two years. However, he adds, crystal meth would seem to be a clear case of Class 2. Recreational drugs. My name, my career, everything is now on the line. Whatever I've achieved, whatever I've worked for, might soon mean nothing. Days later I sit in a hard-backed chair, a legal pad in my lap, and write a letter to the ATP. It's filled with lies interwoven with bits of truth."
I say Slim, whom I've since fired, is a known drug user, and that he often spikes his sodas with meth - which is true. Then I come to the central lie of the letter. I say that recently I drank accidentally from one of Slim's spiked sodas, unwittingly ingesting his drugs. I ask for understanding and leniency and hastily sign it: Sincerely. I feel ashamed, of course. I promise myself that this lie is the end of it.
