Defending Stawell Gift champion Nathan Allen has been charged with importing steroids, just three days before the heats of Australia's most famous footrace.

Victoria Police spokesman Senior Constable Wayne Wilson said a 30-year-old man from Toowoomba in Queensland was arrested in Melbourne following a joint Victoria Police/ Australian Customs Service operation.

He was later charged with a commonwealth charge of knowingly importing a tier one good (anabolic substances), alleged to be amounts of nandrolone, testosterone and a third substance, and a Victorian charge of attempting to possess a drug of dependence.

He was bailed by police to appear in the Melbourne Magistrates' Court on May 21.

Allen was arrested shortly after appearing at the official race launch at the State Library in Melbourne.

He officially withdrew from the 2008 Stawell Gift and is set to be provisionally suspended by Athletics Australia on Thursday, pending the court hearing.

"In the light of recent events involving myself in regards to a police matter I think it is in everyone's best interests and especially that of the Stawell Gift if I stood down from competing in this year's event," Allen said in a statement to the Stawell Athletic Club.

"I believe it is wrong for me to compete until the conclusion of these police matters is heard.

"I truly hope that this year's event can be a success and I am sorry for the negative press that this affair has created."

Possession or trafficking of banned substances are breaches of the International Association of Athletics Federations' anti-doping rules.

Allen won last year's Gift off a handicap of 5.25m in a time of 12.35 seconds.

His handicap mark was brought in to 2.25m for the 2008 race, which he said would be his last Stawell campaign.

The heats of the world's oldest professional footrace are run at Central Park in Stawell on Saturday, with the semi-finals and final on Easter Monday.

The winner of the handicap event receives a prize of $40,000.

Former Stawell Gift winner Jason Richardson said it was another sad day for the sport of athletics.

"It's not a great surprise," the 1993 Gift champion told Radio SEN.

"... Police surely wouldn't make charges without a whole stack of evidence.

"I know at the moment it is allegedly, he's been allegedly charged with distributing anabolic steroids in the form of nandrolone.

"It's a sad day once again for the sport and a sad day for the Stawell Gift, it's on this weekend ... we get this incident coming to light and it's sad.

"But you know what, if it is all true it's great that they caught him and try to kick him out of the sport."

Allen edged out training partner Nick Sampieri by one hundredth of a second to claim a dramatic victory in last year's Gift final, with the words "never forget what Brima said" scrawled on his forearm.

The comment referred to a perceived slight the previous year to Allen from Steve Brimacombe, the 1991 Gift winner and coach of the 2006 victor Adrian Mott.

Allen and his coach later got matching tattoos on their arms to commemorate the 2007 win.

"Before the race I remember I just had a massive confidence that I was going to win," Allen said at the launch, shortly before being arrested.

He admitted he struggled for motivation at times after the victory, prompting the decision to make the 2008 Gift campaign his last.

"I decided I wanted to finish up being on top," he said.

"All I ever wanted to do was run in the red (the backmarkers jersey) and I achieved that ... I don't want to be the sort of person that keeps running to get my handicap back out again."

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