The Olympics is a sacred event that can be dated back all the way from 776 BC. It was originally used to be part of a religious festival in honor of Zeus, Father of the Greek gods and goddesses. However, over the many hundreds of years since then, the underlying basis of the Olympics have slightly changed. Although it is no longer recognized as a religious event, the best of the best of all athletes come together to compete for the number one title. These are not just your normal every day athletes. These athletes make training their full time job and their lives ultimately revolved around their chosen sport. The basis of the Olympics is to bring together the best of raw natural talent, those who train naturally, and to compete for not only their nation, but for also themselves.
When someone says “raw natural talent”, what exactly does that mean? This statement refers to an athlete who does not consume any type of performance enhancing drugs or stimulants. They train solely with the healthiest of methods, whether it being eating or exercising. In this method, it is truly the athlete and their capability as an individual, without the aid of secondary enhancements. There are many different types of stimulants that are currently banned from the Olympics, ranging from Steroids, Blood Doping, Growth Hormones, Masking Drugs (that aid in the masking of other performance enhancing drugs), Uppers and Downers, and Gene Doping.
Official Drug Testers of the Olympics catch about one to two athletes for every 100 tests administered, according to the World Anti-Doping Agency. Over the past sixty years, the amount of doping violations by athletes have increased a factor of 6. The Summer Olympics currently has the highest rate of doping cases detected. The real question is, is who gets tested and why? Not everyone in the Olympics get drug tested! A majority of the time, those who are drug tested are previous Olympian Winners or randomized other athletes. Many athletes claim they have been sabotaged when drug tests come up positive. However, The World Anti-Doping Agency states “You are responsible for what ends up in your body no matter how it got there” (The Washington Post). What WADA means by this statement is that regardless if it a cold medication or nutritional supplement that you unsure of it’s contents, that actually contains a banned substance, the athlete will sill be held accountable. “Two-thirds of all doping violations in Olympic disciplines have come from three sports: track and field, weightlifting and cycling” (The Washington Post) The most commonly used performance enhancing drugs is steroids, which in it’s own classification has over 40 banned substances.
Anabolic steroids, otherwise known as male hormones, is the most commonly used banned drug in the Olympics. The World Anti-Doping Agency has put a ban on any drug that increases the testosterone level. Steroids are known for increasing the muscle size and strength, thus making it possible for athletes to compete harder and have a faster recovery time from intense-training. With WADA placing the ban on steroids, athletes have found a way around the ban by using what is known as “designer steroids”, which is difficult to detect because they act on the body in different ways as opposed to naturally occurring steroids (ABC Rio 2016). One thing many people are not aware of, is athletes are still at risk of being tested even out-of-competition season, without any warning whatsoever. This has a huge impact on the Olympics today because steroids do not leave the sport as a pure, natural raw talent. The athlete is not the “best of the best” if they are being aided in performance by a drug. Many athletes do not get removed from competition if said drug is found in their system. Depending on the dosage size, an athlete can be cleared to return back to competition, or they can even be stripped of their previous Olympic Medals.
Another major form of performance enhancing drugs is called “Blood Doping”, which means essentially the athlete was using a synthetic oxygen-boosting drug, otherwise known as erythropoietin. Athletes use this method because their muscles need oxygen to function; the more oxygen in the blood, the increase in endurance durative. This is a very common method used by athletes because originally it was very hard to detect in drug tests, due to it’s chemical nature matching closely to a naturally occurring hormone already present in the body. Erythropoietin is also very commonly used because it will disappear from the body within just a few days. Cycling and track and field are two of the major sports you will find blood doping to occur. Ultimately blood doping can cause heart attacks, stroke, and can even cause death.
One of the most influential athletes to have exposed with the use of steroids is cancer survivor and Philanthropist, Lance Armstrong. For years Armstrong was suspected of drug use since his return to competition after remission of cancer back in 2001. It was not until 2012 that formal charges were brought to Lance Armstrong. Five of Armstrong’s previous teammates were planning to testify against Armstrong, who was wanting to fight the charges in court. Armstrong soon after decided to not fight the charges due to the stress the case had caused on himself and his family. In August of 2012, the United States Anti-Doping Association announced that Armstrong was to be stripped of all of his seven tour Titles, and was to be banned from cycling for life. “It was soon released by the USADA that the Pro Cycling Team had become the most professionalized and successful doping program the sport had ever seen” (Biography: Lance Armstrong). It was not until January of 2013 that Armstrong publicly announced his true involvement with the use of steroids.
Michael Phelps, also known for winning the most Olympic medals known in Olympic history, totaling 28 gold medals. Phelps was caught in 2009 in a photo of him with a bong consuming marijuana. According to World Anti-Doping Agency, Marijuana is classified as a banned “in-competition” substance, thus not risking and of Michael Phelps medals. Many sports fans found this as an outrage and demanded all of his medals to be given back. Michael Phelps, previous to the photo being leaked, had never failed a drug test to this date. With it being classified as banned while in-competition, Phelps was able to keep all medals won in the Olympics. Is this a double standard compared to the Lance Armstrong case? Most definitely. Although taking any type of substance while being an Olympic athlete, Michael Phelps drug of choice was not used in the aid to help him be a better swimmer, unlike Armstrong who used drugs to make him a better cyclist. The situation in a nutshell do seem similar, however, Armstrong’s cause has stronger merit than Michael Phelps.
In the most recent Olympics in Rio, over 45 athletes tested positive for banned substances. Any athlete who is found to have an in-competition anti-doping violation will have their results disqualified from the event in which they competed. The International Olympic Community then has the authority to decide if all the previous competitions won by said athlete would be disqualified as well. As an athlete you don’t even have to fail the test. If you miss the drug test, that itself is also considered a failed test. The International Olympic Community has their own rules with confidentiality; meaning they must alert any athlete that is involved in a doping violation but cannot disclose a failed to anyone not involved until an appeals process has occurred. What this usually means is that we will not know of any drug scandals that occur in the Olympics until the entire Olympics events has come to end.
Ultimately the use of banned substances in the Olympics is highly frowned upon and should be taken more seriously. The Olympics is supposed to represent raw-talent, not talent that came from an injection of a needle. The World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Olympic Community need to create stronger regulations to lessen the amount of athletes using performance enhancing drugs. Before any athletic event, every athlete should be tested for any of the banned substances. The only issue with doing this, is the cost of drug tests, and also the vague testing of drug tests. Every test is different and every test does not detect every drug, mainly to test an athlete of a specific drug there has to be a high precedence of possibility that the athlete has consumed a specific type of banned substance for them to test.