Doping in Sport
Doping has to be fought, cheats must be unmasked, abuse should be punished but all this should remain human - Eddy Merckx
image by: Zaher Zee
Resources
Doping in Sport: Why it Matters in the Context of Global Sport Psychology
“When you hear the word ‘doping,’ what comes to mind?" In my experience, common responses include: ‘steroids’, ‘blood doping’ and ‘human growth hormone’. Each of these constitutes a banned substance, but the reality is that taking/using a banned substance is only one of ten ways that someone can receive an Anti-Doping Rules Violation (ADRV)
FYI: If I Did A Bag Of Lance Armstrong’s Blood, Could I Bike Up A Mountain?
No surprise: performance enhancers enhance performance. But they might not give me the instant mountain-scaling boost I want.
Most people who dope aren’t Russian Olympic athletes. Here’s how the drugs work
But while Russia’s widespread doping operation and other elite sport scandals often put performance-enhancing drugs in the spotlight, it’s mostly non-Olympians—actually, mostly non-athletes—who use those drugs on a daily basis. Anabolic steroids are more popular than you might think, especially given the potential side effects. Estimates put the number of total users in the 3-4 million category, many of whom are just your average gym rats hoping to pack on the pounds more easily.
Should the Olympics Change the Way It Handles Doping? Here Are Some Possibilities
Three experts debate the effectiveness of the International Olympic Committee’s efforts to deter and punish the use of banned substances.
Athletes Look For Doping Edge, Despite Tests And Risks
A positive test for performance-enhancing drugs can ruin athletes' careers. And prolonged use of steroids, for instance, can cause lasting damage. So why do many athletes still take the risk?
Churchill Downs Extends the Suspension of Bob Baffert Through 2024
Baffert, a Hall of Fame trainer, was suspended after his horse Medina Spirit failed a drug test at the 2021 Kentucky Derby. Churchill Downs said he “continues to peddle a false narrative” about what happened.
Combatting doping in Sport
Protecting athletes from sliding into doping requires a joint effort, and in recent decades it has become one.
Doping in sport and exercise: anabolic, ergogenic, health and clinical issues
The use of doping agents is evident within competitive sport in senior and junior age groups, where they are taken by non-elite as well as elite participants. They are also taken in non-sporting contexts by individuals seeking to ‘improve’ their physique through an increase in muscle and/or decrease in fat mass.
Doping in sport: a review of elite athletes' attitudes, beliefs, and knowledge
Doping in sport is a well-known phenomenon that has been studied mainly from a biomedical point of view, even though psychosocial approaches are also key factors in the fight against doping. This phenomenon has evolved greatly in recent years, and greater understanding of it is essential for developing efficient prevention programmes.
Doping in sports and its spread to at-risk populations: an international review
Doping is now a global problem that follows international sporting events worldwide. International sports federations, led by the International Olympic Committee, have for the past half century attempted to stop the spread of this problem, with little effect. It was expected that, with educational programs, testing, and supportive medical treatment, this substance-abusing behavior would decrease. Unfortunately, this has not been the case. In fact, new, more powerful and undetectable doping techniques and substances are now abused by professional athletes, while sophisticated networks of distribution have developed.
Doping in Sports, a Never-Ending Story?
Although antidoping controls are becoming more rigorous, doping and, very importantly, masking doping methods are also advancing, and these are usually one step ahead of doping detection techniques.
Doping In Sports: A Story We've Gotten Too Used To?
The Olympics, baseball, track and cycling, among others, continue to struggle with the problem of doping, despite threat of sanctions. Sports fans are trying to digest news that never quite goes away. Some are wondering if it ever will.
Drug use in sport is hard to tackle
Complex politics and ever-changing methods make it difficult to stop cheats.
How to argue about doping in sport
There has been a huge amount of academic, policy, and public debate over the years about doping in sport (i.e. the use of banned performance enhancing substances or drugs and other prohibited practices), and significant resources devoted to addressing it. Doping is a complex issue – we are still striving to understand how and why it happens, and how to prevent it. But despite the attention doping in sport has received, there is still significant public disagreement about how best to respond to this problem.
How to stop doping in sports
Athletes who cheat are rarely caught. The drug-testers need better incentives to catch them.
Lance Armstrong and The Business of Doping
This one is from 2012, and it's about Lance Armstrong, the Superman cyclist who, at the time, was in the middle of this huge doping scandal. Zoe Chace wanted to understand exactly how the whole doping thing worked and how cheating became so widespread, so normal.
Lance Armstrong Ran the 'Most Sophisticated' Doping Ring Ever
The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency is going big with its charges against embattled cyclist Lance Armstrong: Not only did Armstrong dope, the agency says, he "ran the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen."
Sniffing Out The Science Behind Sports Doping
How does blood doping boost performance in events like the Tour de France? Do anabolic steroids help the world's fastest man run faster? In his book, Run, Swim, Throw, Cheat , Chris Cooper discusses how these banned drugs work, or don't — and how they are detected.
Sport is still rife with doping
Between 10% and 40% of athletes in Tokyo might be cheating.
The Boosts in Performance Tempting Athletes to Dope
The testing figures provide a look into the performance enhancers for which athletes test positive most often, in different categories. Here, we take a look at five such classes and break down the science of how these drugs can help athletes crush the competition—and the risks that come with the boost in performance.
The Brave New World of Sports
Performance-enhancing technology and drugs might lead to an athletic renaissance.
The Drugs Won: The Case for Ending the Sports War on Doping
The fight against performance-enhancing drugs has long been framed as a moral crusade. But some heretics like retired investigator Don Catlin and former USATF exec Doug Logan now contend that the battle is a quagmire, and doing more harm than good.
The Only Good Reason to Ban Steroids in Baseball: To Prevent an Arms Race
A philosophy scholar investigates six dumb lines of logic—and one really compelling one—for opposing performance-enhancing drug use among MLB players.
The world’s top anti-doping scientist thinks we can end cheating in sports. Here’s why.
“Biological passports” could end abuse of performance-enhancing drugs.
What if Doping Were Legal?
The premise isn’t new. After the Olympic doping scandals of the late 1990s, International Olympic Committee president Juan Antonio Samaranch tested the waters of drug legalization in an interview with a Spanish newspaper. “Doping now is everything that, firstly, is harmful to an athlete’s health and, secondly, artificially augments his performance,” he said. “If it’s just the second case, for me that’s not doping.”
Why doping in sport is so hard to catch
FOR more than two decades, 50 was a kind of magic figure for cyclists in the Tour de France. That is the maximum threshold for hematocrit, the percentage of oxygen-carrying red-blood cells that can be found coursing through human vessels without external help. In The Secret Race, Tyler Hamilton, a former cyclist for the American team, likened the number to his personal stock price (“You are 43,” his doctor told him). Britain’s David Millar called it “the cyclist’s holy grail”. Breach the 50-mark and be suspended on the reasonable suspicion that you were using EPOs (erythropoietins), which boost red-blood cell production; but ride with a lower figure and risk being left behind.
UKAD
UK Anti-Doping is an active participant in the global fight against doping in sport - and is the national body responsible for creating a UK-wide environment of confidence in clean sport. Whether that is in competition, training or spectating, we are working for everyone who loves sport.
ITA
The International Testing Agency (ITA) is an international organisation constituted as a not-for-profit foundation, based in Lausanne, Switzerland. Its mission is to manage anti-doping programs, independent from sporting or political powers, for International Federations (IFs), Major Event Organisers (MEOs) and all other anti-doping organisations requesting support.
WADA
Help us protect the clean athlete and the integrity of sport. Every time someone steps forward with information on doping, we move closer to a clean and fair playing field for all.
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