The headlines about illegal steroids have focused on[1] professional and Olympic athletes. But the most vulnerable users may be[2] kids in your neighborhood[3], high-schoolers[4] who are risking an array of frightful side effects[5] that can lead to death[6]

By Jerry Adler

Dec. 20 - It can take years to hit bottom with[7] many drugs, decades with alcohol. But on steroids Chris Wash managed it in just 12 months[8], starting with a dream of playing for a top college basketball team[9] and winding up on a highway overpass[10], waiting for the moment to jump[11]. In that time Wash, a 6-foot-2 guard[12] on the Plano West High School team in Plano, Texas, went from a rangy 180 pounds to a hulking 230[13], with shoulders so big he could barely pull on his backpack in the morning[14]. And he developed[15] a whole new personality[16] to match that intimidating physique[17]: depressed, aggressive and volatile[18].

After a series of fights in his junior year his coach threw him off the team[19], but by then building muscles had become an end in itself. He switched from pills to injecting himself with steroids in the buttocks[20], often with a couple of friends, including a promising[21] high-school baseball player named Taylor Hooton. That went on for several months[22], until one day Hooton was found dangling from his belt[23] in his bedroom, an apparent suicide. Frightened, Wash gathered up his vials and syringes[24] and threw them down the sewer[25]. But an insidious[26] thing about steroids is that stopping them abruptly[27] can lead to depression. A few weeks later Wash drove to a bridge across a Dallas freeway and walked to the middle, looking down at the rushing traffic.

(…) For teenagers who use steroids, the side effects may begin with severe acne[28] and run through hair loss[29], infertility[30], male breast development[31], violent mood swings and paranoia[32]. And, in an unpleasant irony, steroids can stunt growth[33] and cause injuries that could end the very career[34] they were intended to enhance[35].

And they don't even get you high[36], at least not in the way most drug addicts would recognize[37]. Consequently, steroid users don't consider themselves addicts[38], even those whose dependency is obvious, usually in retrospect[39]. "He'd say, 'Pop[40], I'd never do drugs'[41]," recalls Donald Hooton Sr., the father of Wash's friend Taylor. "I sincerely believe he didn't see steroids as a drug. None of these kids do." But steroids have their own seductions[42]. "They make you pumped[43], aggressive, hypersexual[44], and that's going to feel good to a lot of these kids," says Dr. Kirk Brower, an addiction-treatment specialist[45] at the University of Michigan. You can still hear the rueful note of pride[46] in Wash's recollection of how the other boys would steer clear as he swaggered[47] down the hallway—"They'd say, 'Don't fool with that kid[48]'"—and how his girlfriend admired the rocklike consistency of his biceps[49]. Athletes who train on steroids can gain muscle mass at phenomenal rates[50], as much as two pounds a week[51]. Training for strength and speed is grueling[52] work, pitting your muscles against the whole mass of the Earth[53], with only the unforgiving clock[54] or weight stack[55] to measure your progress. Suddenly, a pill appears and what seemed agonizingly impossible is within your grasp[56].

Joshua Dupont, a star running back at[57] a Southern California high school and a highly ranked wrestler[58], began taking steroids in the summer before his junior year because he was jealous of[59] the praise a stronger, faster teammate was getting from the coaches[60]. He began seeing results, he claims, within three days: "I could spend the entire day at the gym[61] and just keep pumping iron[62], working the same muscle without fatigue[63]. After a week of taking this stuff, I went from 4.7 seconds to 4.6 [in the 40-yard dash[64]]. It was incredible." For those who can tolerate, or have yet to experience[65], the side effects[66] of steroids, there isn't much motivation to give them up[67]. "If you're big and muscular and people admire you for that, why would you seek treatment to become smaller?" asks Harrison Pope Jr., a psychiatrist and addiction specialist at Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass. "I could count on both hands the number of patients[68] who have sought[69] treatment from me for [addiction to] steroids."

Steroids are hormones[70], and for body-building purposes[71] the ones of interest are "anabolic" steroids[72]—a number of related compounds[73] that mimic the effects of testosterone[74], the male hormone secreted by the testes[75]. (There are several other classes of steroids, including the female hormone estrogen and the drugs called corticosteroids[76], which are used to treat inflammation and asthma[77]; neither of these builds muscle[78], and their side effects are very different.) Anabolic steroids build strength by entering a muscle cell and switching on the genes that manufacture muscle proteins[79]. Weightlifting[80] amplifies the effect[81] by stressing[82] the muscles. "If you just took steroids by themselves[83], you'd gain some muscle protein, but not nearly as much as if you do it with exercise[84]," says Dr. Alan Rogol, a pediatric endocrinologist[85] at the University of Virginia. (…)

Testosterone and its relatives[86] are controlled substances, approved to treat only a few, uncommon medical conditions[87]—although any doctor can legally prescribe[88] them for so-called off-label use[89] to anyone. Some body-builders do obtain them that way[90], but most traffic[91] in a bewildering black market[92] of pills, gels and injectable solutions[93] purchased over the counter in countries such as Mexico, on the Internet or from a guy at the gym whose cousin knows a batboy[94]. Since the market is unregulated, products claiming to be steroids[95] might in fact be almost anything, in concentrations[96] that can only be guessed at by anyone without an analytical lab at his disposal[97].

Until now, teenage body-builders have been able to get around the obstacles to obtaining steroids by substituting[98] androstenedione[99], a chemical "precursor" that is converted to testosterone in the body[100]. In fact, says Dr. Gary Wadler of the New York University School of Medicine and a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, andro[101] has virtually[102] the same effects, and side effects, as steroids, although it requires a much higher dosage[103] (...) Andro has been sold legally in nutrition stores [104] and on the Internet for years. (Although a California law amde it illegal to sell to minors [105]. Dupont says he had no trouble buying it over the counter as a high-school student). Congress closed that loophole [106] only this October - the change takes effect in January - by adding andro to the lst of Schedule III drugs [107] with "medium" potential for abuse [108]. Wadler notes, though, that the law does not affect a compound known as DHEA[109] which is sold over the counter as an anti-aging drug[110] DHEA, as it happens, is converted in the body to.. androstenedione.

And this does not begin to exhaust the list [111] of performance-enhancing drugs in circulation[112]. Human-growth hormone[113] and compounds to enhance the oxygen-carrying capacity of blood[115] are all available, albeit [116] illegally, to professional and Olympic athletes; soon gene therapy [117] may make its mark on the record books [118]. There's not much evidence[119] that hign-school athletes have access to these. They do, however, legally obtain, and often use in prodigious amounts[120] a produck known as creatine phosphate[121], which doesn't build muscle, but is believed to boost athletic performance by enhancing cellular-energy production [122]. Most researchers believe that creatine is essentially harmless for adults, but it hasn't been studied much in children[123]. At least one survey found it was being used by sixth graders [124] a result Dr. Eric Small, the chairman of the sports-medicine committe [125] of the American Academy of Pediatrics, calls "scary". Moreover, since the sale of "dietary supplements[126]" like creatine is essentially unregulated, "you don't know what's in them," says Dr. Douglas McKeag, who heads the Indiana University Center for Sports Medicine. "You've got somebody saying, "Well, my trainer gave me this'," says McKeag, who once analyzed a "protein supplement" one of his students had bought at the gym, and found it contained a cocktail of steroids, plus the poison strychnine [127], none of them listed on the label.

Anabolic steroids are inherently [128] dangerous, though, no matter what else the pills may contain. The average adult male produces 35 to 50 miligrams of testosterone a week in his testes; athletes may inject 300 to 1,000 miligrams or more. That induces [129] a kind of hypermasculinity, like adolescence on [130], well steroids. Users may develop "hornific" acne, Walder says, and can suffer an early onset of male-pattern baldness [131] Women are at risk for a whole set of masculinizing changes [132] including body hair, and a deepended voice [133]. Paradoxically, steroids can also cause feminizing changes in men. The pituitary gland [134], which regulates hormone production in the body, responds to an oversupply of testosterone [135] by signaling the testes to shut down, causing them to shrink. Another way the body deals with excess testosterone is by converting some of it to estrogen, which can cause men to grow breasts. Asmittedly [136] these effects are unusual, and sophisticated users [137] try to manage them [138] by taking the drugs in cycles of four to 20 weeks, timed to their training regimen [139]. At any gym in the country you can find people who claim to have been using steroids for years with minimal problems, says Pope. But there's an enormous range of variability [140] in how people respond to steroids - and some of the effects are permanent.

There are other risks as well. Adolescence signals the beginning of the end of skeletal growth [141] and steroids can hasten [142] this process, shutting down growth prematurely [143]. Steroids cause muscles to grow without a compensatiing strengthning of the tendons [144] that attach them to the bones [145] a disproportion that increases the risk of crippling injuries [146]. Steroids lower levels of so-called good cholesterol and raise tha bad kind [147], sometimes to alarming levels, and they can be toxic to the liver [148]. And there are the infamous psychological effects of volatile aggressiveness - the "roid rage" that cost Wash his position on the team, and have landed other users in jail or in the hospital [149]. "When I was hitting someone, I couldn't stop," says Mike Bauch, an 18-year-old former [150] high-school wrestler who has been off and on andro and steroids since seventh grade. Yet when a heavy user stops taking steroids, his testosterone level can drop practivally to zero for weeks until his testes resume production [151] - producting the opposite syndrome, a devastating depression.

Unfortunately, explaining cholesterol ratios [152] to a 15-year-old who's just been cut from the baseball team and thinks his life is over anyway may not have the disired effect. "You have to understand high-school kids." McKeag says." They think they're immortal [153] ". In any case, the message doesn't seem to be getting through as well as it could: the proportion of high-school seniors who consider steroids a "great risk" to their health actually dropped [154] from 68 to 55 percent over the past five years [155] according to [156] the University of Michigan study. In talking to yound athletes who did take steroids, it's strinking how little notice their parents and coaches took of the Gargantua taking shape before their eyes [157]. Other than his brother [158], "nobody knew" he was taking steroids, says Bauch, even after he added what he claims was 30 pounds of muscle last summer. "Coaches are oblivious to it," says California state Sen Jackie Speier, who sponsored a bill to crack down on sales of dangerous supplements to minors [159], "some out of lack of knowledge [160], others because they don't want to know" Speier's bill was vetoed [161] by Gov. [162] Arnold Schwarzenegger - who has admitted using steroids in his own body-building career - on the ground that tietary supplements were best left to the FDA [163]

Testing might help, of course, but only about 13 percent of school districts test athletes for drugs at all [164], and virtually none for steroids; it would cost $50 to $100 for each test, compared with $10 to $30 for the standard urine sample for substances like marijuana [165]. In the largest high-school steroid scandal in memory, which led to the suspension of 10 varsity-football players [166] in Buckeye, Ariz. [167] coach Bobby Barnes - who had coached the team for only nine weeks - was as surprised as anyone when the police swept down on [168] the practice field [169] one day in September 2003. "This is the first time in all my years of coaching it had come up [170] Barnes told NEWSWEEK. "It wasn't something coaches were looking for."

And even if they were looking for it, they would miss the increasing number of cases of steroid use that don't involve athletes at all, but students who simply believe they don't measure up to what an American boy ought to look like [171], an image they probably formed playing [172] with their G.I.Joe action figures, around the same time their sisters got their dea of female body shape from their Barbies. " Much like the anorexic never feels thin enouth [173] men with muscle dysmorphia [174] never feel big enough," says Roberto Olivardia, a clinical psychologist ar Harvard and coauthor [175] with Pope of "The Adonis Comples [176] - The Secret Crisis of Male Body Obsession".

Could it really be that decades of education aimed at boosting the self-esteem of normal teenage girls [177]  has just transtered the body-image problem to boys[178]? Or is vanity [179] simply too deeply ingrained in human nature to eradicate[180], merely[181] shifting its form and locus with the times[182]? For answers, we turn to Charlie Hyvarinen, a 15-year-old aspiring[183] football player from a suburb of Cleveland, who insisnt he would never take steroids. "Those are fake [184] muscles, and it's cheating, and it's bad for you, "he says. "The ones who use it are really a bunch of losers[185]. But man, "he adds wistfully[186], "for a little while, they're really something[187]"

Oops, sorry, that's not the answer we were looking for. Let's hear instead from Chris Wash, who stepped back from the railing[188] and called his mother to come get him, and after intensice therapy is now free of steroids - but after losing months of classes transferred our of Plano West and is now finishing up at an alternative high school for troubled kids that has no basketball team. "I could have had a scholarschip to play ball in college," he muses. "Basketball was my life. It's who I was."

Opracowanie: Agata Papiorek

Źródło: Newsweek

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6700913/site/newsweek/

[1] have focused on - skupiły się na

[2] the most vulnerable users may be - najbardziej narażonymi użytkownikami mogą być

[3] in your neighbourhood - w twoim sąsiedztwie

[4] high-schoolers - uczniowie szkół średnich

[5] an array of frightful side effects - szereg strasznych efektów ubocznych

[6] lead to death - doprowadzić do śmierci

[7] it can take years to hit bottom with - lata mogą minąć zanim spadnie się na dno z powodu

[8] but on steroids Chris Wash managed it in just 12 months - ale dzięki sterydom Chrisowi Washowi zajęło to zaledwie dwanaście miesięcy

[9] starting with a dream of playing for a top college basketball team - zaczynając od marzeń o grze w najlepszej studenckiej drużynie koszykówki

[10] winding up on a highway overpass - kończąc na wiadukcie nad autostradą

[11] waiting for the moment to jump - czekając na odpowiedni moment by skoczyć

[12] a 6-foot-2 guard - drugi obrońca o wzroście sześciu stóp (ok.183 cm)

[13] went from a rangy 180 pounds to a hulking 230 - zmienił się ze szczupłej 180-cio funtowej (ok.83 kg) osoby 230-sto funtowy (ok.107 kg) ciężar

[14] he could barely pull on his backpack in the morning - że ledwo mógł rano założyć plecak

[15] developed - wykształcił

[16] a whole new personality - zupełnie nową osobowość

[17] to match that intimidating physique - pasującą do onieśmielającego wyglądu

[18] volatile - zmienny

[19] threw him off the team - wyrzucił go z drużyny

[20] he switched from pills to injecting himself with steroids in the buttocks - przerzucił się z tabletek na zastrzyki w pośladki

[21] promising - obiecujący

[22] that went on for several months - trwało to parę miesięcy

[23] dangling from his belt - dyndający na pasku

[24] vials and syringes - ampułki i strzykawki

[25] threw them down the sewer - wrzucił je do kanalizacji

[26] insidious - zdradziecki

[27] abruptly - nagle

[28] severe acne - poważny trądzik

[29] hair loss - wypadanie włosów

[30] infertility - niepłodność

[31] male breast development - rozwój piersi u chłopców

[32] violent mood swings and paranoia - gwałtowne zmiany nastroju i paranoja

[33] stunt growth - zachamować wzrost

[34] that could end the very career - które mogą przerwać samą karierę

[35] they were indended to enhance - które mają ułatwić

[36] they don't even get you high - nie podowują "odlotu"

[37] at least not in the way most drug addicts would recognize - przynajmniej nie w takim sensie jak u narkomanów

[38] steroid users don't consider themselves addicts - sterydowcy nie widzą swojego uzależnienia

[39] usually in retrospect - zazwyczaj z perspektywy czasu

[40] pop - potocznie: tato

[41] I'd never do drugs' - nigdy nie wezmę narkotyków

[42] but steroids have their own seductions - ale sterydy nęcą

[43] pumped - "napakowany"

[44] hypersexual - nadreaktywny seksualnie

[45] an addiction-treatment specialist - specjalista od uzależnień

[46] the rueful note of pride - smutna nutka dumy

[47] swagger - dumnie maszerować

[48] don't fool with that kid - nie zadzierajcie z nim

[49] admired the rocklike consistency of his biceps - podziwiała jego twarde jak skała bicepsy

[50] at phenomenal rates - w niesamowitym czasie

[51] as much as two pounds a week - nawet dwa funty tygodniowo (ok.1kg)

[52] grueling - wyczerpujący

[53] pitting your muscles against the whole mass of the Earth - walka mięśni z ciężarem całej Ziemi

[54] the unforgiving clodk - bezwzględny zegar

[55] weight stack - atlas (rodzaj sprzętu siłowego)

[56] what seemed agonizingly impossible is within your grasp - coś, co wydawało się boleśnie niedostępne jest nagle w zasięgu

[57] a star running back at - gwiazda, która zaczęła karierę w

[58] a highly ranked wrestler - wysoko notowany zapaśnik

[59] he was jealous of - był zazdrosny o

[60] the praise a stronger, faster teammate was getting from the coaches - o pochwały, które jego silniejszy i szybszy kolega z drużyny otryzmywał od trenerów

[61] the entire day at the gym - cały dzień na siłowni

[62] just keep pumping iron - podnosząc ciężary

[63] working the same muscle without fatigue - ćwicząc ten sam mięsień bez zmęczenia

[64] in the 40-yard dash - w biegu na 40 jardów amerykańskich (ok.37m)

[65] or have yet to experience - albo dopiero doświadczą

[66] the side effects - efekty uboczne

[67] there isn't much motivation to give them up - ne ma wystarczającej motywacji, żeby je odstawić

[68] I could count on both hands the number of patients - mógłbym policzyć na palcach obu rąk ilu pacjentów

[69] have sought - szukało

[70] hormones - hormony

[71] for body-building purposes - dla celów kulturystycznych

[72] "anabolic" steroids - anaboliki

[73] a number of related compounds - wiele pochodnych substancji

[74] that mimic the effects of testosterone - które naśladują efekty testosteronu

[75] secreted by the testes - ukryte w jądrach (testes - jądra; testis - jądro)

[76] corticoseroids - kortykosteroidy

[77] which are used to treat inflammation and asthma - stosowane przy stanach zapalnych i astmie

[78] neither of these builds muscle - żaden z nich nie powoduje przyrostu masy mięśniowej

[79] swichting on the gens that manufacture muscle proteins - uaktywniając geny odpowiedzialne za produkcję białek mięśniowych

[80] weightlifting - podnoszenie ciężarów

[81] amplifies the effect - wzmacnia efekt

[82] stressing - obciążanie

[83] if you just took steroids by themselves - jeśli będziesz tylko brał sterydy

[84] but not nearly as much as if you do it with excercise - ale nie tyle ile nabrałbyś dodatkowo ćwicząc

[85] a pedriatric endocrinologist - pediatra-endokrynolog

[86] testosterone and its relatives - testosteron i jego pochodne

[87] approved to treat only a few, uncommon medical conditions - dopuszczalnych jedynie w leczeniu paru rzadkich chorób

[88] can legally prescribe - może je legalnie przepisać

[89] off-label use - w calu innym niż przeznaczenie leku

[90] do obtain them that way - faktycznie otrzymują je w ten sposób

[91] most traffic - największy ruch

[92] in a bewildering black market - na oszałamiającym czarnym rynku

[93] injectable solutions - roztwory do zastrzyków

[94] batboy - dealer

[95] products claiming to be steroids - produkty będące rzekomo sterydami

[96] in concentrations - w stężeniu

[97] without an analytical lab at his disposal - bez laboratorium analitycznego do dyspozycji

[98] substituting - zastępując

[99] androstenodione - androstenedion

[100] a chemical "precursor" that is converted to testosterone in the body - chemiczny prekursor, który w ciele zostaje zmieniony w testosteron

[101] andro - androstenedion

[102] virtually - w rzeczywistości

[103] it requres a much higher dosage - wymaga znacznie większych dawek

[104] in nutrition stores - w sklepach z odżywkami

[105] minors - nieletni

[106] loophole - luka

[107] Schedule III drugs - leki na receptę

[108] with "medium" potential for abuse - o średnim ryzyku uzależnienia

[109] DHEA - Dehydroepiandrosterone - dehydroepiandrosteron

[110] an anti-aging drug - lek przeciw starzeniu

[111] this does not begin to exhaust the list - nie wyczerpuje to listy

[112] in circulation - będących w obiegu

[113] human-growth hormone - ludzki hormon wzrostu

[114] thyroid hormones - hormon tarczycy

[115] the oxygen-carrying capacity of blood - zdolność krwi do przenoszenia tlenu

[116] albet - aczkolwiek

[117] gene therapy - terapia genowa

[118] may make its mark on the record books - może zaznaczyć się w księdze rekordów

[119] there's not much evidence - niewiele jest dowodów

[120] prodigious amounts - ogromne ilości

[121] creatine phosphate - fosforan kreatyny

[122] enhancing cellular-energy production - wzmagając produkcję energii komórkowej

[123] but it hasn't been studied much in children - ale nie przebadano jej działania u dzieci

[124] sixth graders - szóstoklasiści (ok.12-13 lat)

[125] the chairman of the sports-medicine committee - przewodniczący komisji medycyny sportowej

[126] diary supplements - dodatki dietetyczne

[127] plus the poison strychnine - z dodatkiem trującej strychniny

[128] inherently - z natury

[129] induces - wywołuje

[130] like adolescence on - jak w okresie dojrzewania

[131] an early onset of male-pattern baldness - przedwczesne łysienie

[132] women are at risk for a whole set of masculinizing changes - kobietom zagraża cały szereg zmian maskulinizacyjnych

[133] a deepened voice - obniżony głos

[134] pituitary gland - przysadka mózgowa

[135] responds to an oversupply of testosterone - reaguje na nadmiar testosteronu

[136] admittedly - niewątpliwie

[137] sophisticated users - osoby z doświadczeniem

[138] try to manage them - próbują sobie z nimi poradzić

[139] timed to their training regimen - ropasowane do programu treningów

[140] an enormous range of variability - niezliczona ilość możliwości

[141] adolescence signals the beginning of the end of skeletal growth - objawy dojrzewania są końcem procesu wzrostu kośćca

[142] hasten - przyspieszyć

[143] shutting down growth prematurely - kończąc wzrost zbyt wcześnie

[144] without a compensating strengthening of the tendons - bez jednoczesnego wzmocnienia ścięgien

[142] that attach them to the bones - które mocują je do kości

[143] the risk of crippling injuries - rysyko urazów prowadzących do kalectwa

[144] lower levels of so-called good cholesterol and raise the bad kind - obniżają poziom tzw dobrego cholesterolu a podwyższają złego

[142] they can be toxic to the liver - mogą być toksyczne dla wątroby

[143] have landed other users in jail or in the hospital - a innich wpakował do więzienia lub szpitala

[144] former - były

[145] resume production - wznowią produkcję

[146] - cholesterol rations - proporcje cholesterolu

[147] immortal - nieśmiertelny

[148] dropped - spadłą

[149] over the past five years - w ciągu ostatnich paru lat

[150] according to - według

[151] how little notice their parents and coaches took of the Gargantua taking shape before their eyes - że większość rodziców i trenerów ignorowała fakt, że przed oczami rośnie im istny Gargantua

[152] other than his brother - nikt poza bratem

[153] who sponsored a bill to crack down on sales of dangerous supplements to minors - poparła ustawę zakazującą sprzedaży niebezpiecznych dodatków nieletnim

[154] some out of lack of knowledge - niektórzy z powodu niewiedzy

[155] was vetoed - została zawetowana

[156] Gov. - gubernator

[157] the FDA - Food and Drug Administration - Administracja Żywności i Lekarstw

[158] but only about 13 percent of school districts test athletes for drugs at all - zaledwie 13% okręgów szkolnych gada zawodników na obecność środków chemicznych

[159] compared with $10 to $30 for the standard urine sample for substances like marijuana - w porównianiu z 10-30 dolarami za standardowe badanie próbki moczu na obecność marihuany

[160] which led to the suspension of 10 varsity-football players - który doprowadził do zawieszenia dziesięciu uniwersyteckich zawodników

[161] Ariz. - Arizona

[162] swept down on - wdarła się na

[163] practice field - boisko

[164] had come up - zostalo poruszone

[165] they don't measure up to what an American boy ought to look like - nie wydlądają tak, jak amerykański chłopak powinien wyglądać

[166] an image they probably formed playing - wizerunek, który prawdopodobnie ukształtował się zabawą

[167] much like the anorexic never fills thin enough - tak jak anorektyczka nigdy nie czuje się wystarczająco szczupła

[168] muscle dysmorphia - dysmorfia mięśniowa

[169] coauthor - współautorka

[170] Tha Adonis Complex - kompleks Adonisa

[171] aimed at boosting the self-esteem of normal teenage girls - mającej na celu podniesienie samooceny nastoletnich dziewcząt

[172] has just transferred the body-image problem to boys - przeniosła po prostu problem wizerunku na chłopców

[173] vanity - próżność

[174] too deeply ingrained in human nature to eradicate - jest zbyt głęboko zakorzeniona w ludzkiej naturze by można ją było wyplenić

[175] merely - po prostu

[176] shifting its form and locus with the times - z czasem zmieniająca swoje miejsce i formę

[177] aspiring - ambitny

[178] fake muscles - nieprawdziwe mięśnie

[179] a bunch of losers - banda nieudaczników

[180] he adds wistfully - dodaje z zadumą

[181] they're really something - są naprawdę kimś

[182] stepped back from the railing - cofnął się od balustrady