The term doping is used in sports and athletics to describe the act of taking an illegal substance in order to gain an unfair advantage in a competitive environment.
Doping has been a part of professional sport for over 100 years. Athletes in the early 1900’s were using alcohol. The frst case came in the 1902 olympics when a distance runner used alcohol to stimulate himself and finish the race. That was one of tje first known cases but its likely that doping of this kind was done even earlier. Since there were no penalties for doping during this time, athletes admitted to it freely. Once the benefits were realised by more athletes, a wave of new drugs entered competitive sport.
Throughout the decades we have seen the introduction of Amphetamines, Testosterone replacement, Steroids and EPO. Sporting environments became ravaged with PEDs. It became well known in sporting circles that alot of the top athletes were doing something to improve their strength, speed, stamina or endurance. The pressure to test athletes became too strong and sporting federations acted.
In the late 90’s, The World Anti-Doping Association (WADA) was established. They began a campaign to rid sports of all doping. They have implemented a number of National Anti-Doping associations world wide. Since its inception, these doping associations have made tremendous progress. Alot of famous athletes have been caught and punished as a result of WADA’s work.
Athletes that have been caught include, Former Pro Cyclist, Lance Armstrong, Athletics competitor Tyson Gay, Mark McGwire, Jose Canseco and Alex Rodrigues from Major League Baseball and Former footballer, Diego Maradonna. These athletes have been used as examples of how doping can lead to severe consequences. Alot of these athletes, in the aftermath, lost most maybe years from their careers to to lengthy bans, they lost sponsorship deals with millions, they lost the respect of peers (Those that were not doping) and fans. If the punishment for being caught is so severe, why would the athletes take the risk.
Lance Armstrong has gone on record to say that if he could do it all again he would. Mark McGwire was chasing a home run record in 1998 during a time when steroid use was rife within baseball, Tyson gay was running races during the era of Usain bolt, arguably the greatest short distance runner we’ve ever seen. The argument from their point of view is that they couldn’t compete without performance enhancers. Sports in general had become saturated with PEDs, if you were not taking anything you weren’t competing for the top honours. If Lance Armstrong didn’t take human growth hormone and EPO, he may have never won the consecutive Tour de France titles that he did and given the sport of cycling the popularity that it had as its standout star. Would Baseball have been as popular as it was in the late 90s and early 2000’s without the enhanced athletes. Usain Bolt is a freak of nature, he is an 8 time olympic champion and has won several other accolades. He has been drug tested so many times that he has come out and complained about it. Those who compete with Usain may feel that to get any kind of advantage against him they have to dope. This post is not designed to praise doping or excuse the practice but it’s designed to make people think about why those who dope do it.
The modern day athlete is a physical specimen. Human beings have evolved to be much faster and stronger than we were centuries ago. We’ve also become smarter, scientific research and discoveries have reached new heights and it continues to improve. There are those who are currently looking at ways to cheat the system without being flagged for violating the rules. As long as competition exists among humans, we will always be looking for a way to gain an advantage over our competitors, fairly or not. It’s now up to the Anti-Doping associations to catch the cheats and clean up sports around the world.