Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, a former college football player, WWE wrestler, and now movie star, told MTV that he used metabolic stimulation while playing football for the Miami Hurricanes.

Johnson admits, “I tried it. Me and my buddies tried it back in the day when I was 18 or 19. Didn’t know what we were doing.”

Johnson was a defensive lineman with at the time, and was a member of the 1991 National Championship squad. Johnson tried pro wrestling after a brief spell in the Canadian Football League and went on to become one of the top performers in the World Wrestling Entertainment. The WWE has had its fair share of steroid controversies from the suspension of ten wrestlers for drug-policy breaches in 2007 to the likely steroid-related deaths of stars Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit.

“It’s not as prevalent today in our sports as it was 10 years ago,” Johnson said. “But we have to recognize that a culture was created where it was OK to do that, and a lot of team managers, owners, players who didn’t do it would turn the other cheek. We recognize that, and now we have to institute stronger penalties, which we are doing.”

Johnson’s body changed dramatically during his first few years in the then-WWF, so it wouldn’t be surprising if he used drugs while wrestling.

Johnson also bemoaned the fact that steroid usage was so appealing to a wide spectrum of sportsmen for so long, from New York Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez to Olympian Marion Jones. “A-Rod is an example of a lot of guys — and women, for that matter — of that era in all athletics,” Johnson said.

Johnson goes on to say that youngsters should be educated about the hazards of AASs.

“I also believe in education,” he added. “It’s a bad example that you set for kids, and at the same time it’s a good example for kids to follow, not in terms of the use, but in terms of the repercussions of what can happen because there is no replacement for hard work.”

Now that he’s built a name for himself in family-friendly flicks like “The Game Plan,” “Gridiron Gang” and “Race to With Mountain,” Johnson may have even more youngsters looking up to him.