3 ms·

Obviously PEDs are bad but IMO non-falsifiable accusations about athletes using them are uninteresting. You can always claim (and someone usually is) that an at

Obviously PEDs are bad but IMO non-falsifiable accusations about athletes using them are uninteresting. You can always claim (and someone usually is) that an athlete is dirty and just hasn't been caught yet for some reason. Slightly off-topic though; you're acknowledging that they might contribute which isn't unfair here.

silverquiet 3y ago
I assume that all professional athletes are on PEDs of some sort (I read awhile back that essentially all tennis players are on some heart medication that is allowed and they probably don't all have a heard condition). I don't think they care about what is legal, just what is detectible. The incentives are just too big for them to abstain.
- hinkley 3y ago
  I think there’s a loophole with endurance athletes and asthma medication as well. But I would not immediately think, “mood or judgement altering” there. We are still looking at whether over the counter pain killers are mood altering substances. I’ve seen circumstantial evidence of this in myself. (Though I don’t think I’d want me or a friend to fight on painkillers - reduced coagulation and bruises are no joke).
- chrisfosterelli 3y ago
  You're maybe thinking of Meldonium, which is banned. The drug was developed in the 1970s and is a very common OTC sale in eastern Europe. It was banned in 2016 when WADA decided it was possible it could be able to act as a performance enhancer. Maria Sharapova, a tennis champion, made the news later that year when she tested positive, and received a two year ban which was later shortened when the court determined she had originally started taking it years ago in good faith on a doctor's recommendation. About two hundred other athletes from eastern Europe across different sports received positive tests shortly after the ban as well, a lot of which were reversed when it turned out they were detecting use from 2015 (it takes months after use for it to stop showing on tests).
  - silverquiet 3y ago
    That is indeed what I was thinking of, but I remember that she was also on other drugs that were approved (and she was not alone in that).
btilly 3y ago
My view is this. Suppose that there are enhancement drugs. They work, and a lot of competitors are using them. Then it becomes far more believable that the current champion is enhanced and has managed to hide it, than that someone who is not enhanced has miraculously managed to beat the entire field of people who have such a big advantage. My view lead to me being certain about Lance Armstrong years before he was caught.
- chrisfosterelli 3y ago
  I agree, given "they work" and "a lot of competitors are using them", the rest follows logically. But those assumptions are simplistic, they do some very heavy lifting and are typically presented without evidence. The most effective doping agents are often the easiest to detect, and modern anti-doping programs like the biological passport and whereabouts program are very effective. It's no reason to be complicit -- the science continues to evolve, athletes who go awry will continue to get caught, and athletes who follow the rules will continue to have to work hard to stay within the boundaries (it is not trivial to stay within WADA guidelines even as an amateur athlete; a lot of people who get medical treatment for a common issue would violate the rules a few times over without realizing it). But to look at an entire sport and disregard them all as cheaters without evidence does nothing but encourage young athletes to feel like they need to risk their health in order to compete and belittle the accomplishments of clean athletes. We need to hold cheaters accountable, not throw in the towel.
  - btilly 3y ago
    Is there any reason to doubt that performance enhancing drugs enhance performance? The science on that has been clear for decades. It would make no sense for people to give a list of citations on such a well-known fact every time. I agree that "a lot of competitors are using them" is an assumption. In the case of Lance Armstrong, so many other bikers had been caught before him that it was no longer an assumption. But that does vary by sport. I entirely dismiss the argument that our tests catch cheaters. There have just been too many examples over the years of athletes getting away with cheating for years. At this point the burden of proof is on those who think we're catching them. In fact as articles like https://www.shu.ac.uk/news/all-articles/features-and-comment/athlete-doping https://www.shu.ac.uk/news/all-articles/features-and-comment... show, anonymous surveys show that most athletes are getting away with it. All that said, I agree on holding cheaters accountable. And think we should go farther. If someone who trains with you gets caught, you should also be punished. On the assumption that there is a chance you were just not caught, and if you weren't doping, you likely knew and didn't tell. That would create social pressure to not put your teammates at jeopardy. And I think THAT would finally end cheating.

silverquiet 3y ago

I assume that all professional athletes are on PEDs of some sort (I read awhile back that essentially all tennis players are on some heart medication that is allowed and they probably don't all have a heard condition). I don't think they care about what is legal, just what is detectible. The incentives are just too big for them to abstain.

hinkley 3y ago
I think there’s a loophole with endurance athletes and asthma medication as well. But I would not immediately think, “mood or judgement altering” there. We are still looking at whether over the counter pain killers are mood altering substances. I’ve seen circumstantial evidence of this in myself. (Though I don’t think I’d want me or a friend to fight on painkillers - reduced coagulation and bruises are no joke).
chrisfosterelli 3y ago
You're maybe thinking of Meldonium, which is banned. The drug was developed in the 1970s and is a very common OTC sale in eastern Europe. It was banned in 2016 when WADA decided it was possible it could be able to act as a performance enhancer. Maria Sharapova, a tennis champion, made the news later that year when she tested positive, and received a two year ban which was later shortened when the court determined she had originally started taking it years ago in good faith on a doctor's recommendation. About two hundred other athletes from eastern Europe across different sports received positive tests shortly after the ban as well, a lot of which were reversed when it turned out they were detecting use from 2015 (it takes months after use for it to stop showing on tests).
- silverquiet 3y ago
  That is indeed what I was thinking of, but I remember that she was also on other drugs that were approved (and she was not alone in that).

btilly 3y ago

My view is this. Suppose that there are enhancement drugs. They work, and a lot of competitors are using them. Then it becomes far more believable that the current champion is enhanced and has managed to hide it, than that someone who is not enhanced has miraculously managed to beat the entire field of people who have such a big advantage. My view lead to me being certain about Lance Armstrong years before he was caught.

chrisfosterelli 3y ago
I agree, given "they work" and "a lot of competitors are using them", the rest follows logically. But those assumptions are simplistic, they do some very heavy lifting and are typically presented without evidence. The most effective doping agents are often the easiest to detect, and modern anti-doping programs like the biological passport and whereabouts program are very effective. It's no reason to be complicit -- the science continues to evolve, athletes who go awry will continue to get caught, and athletes who follow the rules will continue to have to work hard to stay within the boundaries (it is not trivial to stay within WADA guidelines even as an amateur athlete; a lot of people who get medical treatment for a common issue would violate the rules a few times over without realizing it). But to look at an entire sport and disregard them all as cheaters without evidence does nothing but encourage young athletes to feel like they need to risk their health in order to compete and belittle the accomplishments of clean athletes. We need to hold cheaters accountable, not throw in the towel.
- btilly 3y ago
  Is there any reason to doubt that performance enhancing drugs enhance performance? The science on that has been clear for decades. It would make no sense for people to give a list of citations on such a well-known fact every time. I agree that "a lot of competitors are using them" is an assumption. In the case of Lance Armstrong, so many other bikers had been caught before him that it was no longer an assumption. But that does vary by sport. I entirely dismiss the argument that our tests catch cheaters. There have just been too many examples over the years of athletes getting away with cheating for years. At this point the burden of proof is on those who think we're catching them. In fact as articles like https://www.shu.ac.uk/news/all-articles/features-and-comment/athlete-doping https://www.shu.ac.uk/news/all-articles/features-and-comment... show, anonymous surveys show that most athletes are getting away with it. All that said, I agree on holding cheaters accountable. And think we should go farther. If someone who trains with you gets caught, you should also be punished. On the assumption that there is a chance you were just not caught, and if you weren't doping, you likely knew and didn't tell. That would create social pressure to not put your teammates at jeopardy. And I think THAT would finally end cheating.