Doping in Sports and in the Olympics

By Sofia Finnemore | Photography by Jake Chan | Layout by Ningjing Huang

What is it, why is it done and when did it start?

According to the American College of Medical Toxicology, "doping" refers to the usage of banned drugs, treatments or medicines by athletes in order to enhance their own performance (ACMT, 1). Especially over the past few years, doping has received more attention not only because of its growing forms but also because of the popular cases where the news of an elite athlete having doped spreads like wildfire (ACMT, 1). Prior to the existence of performance enhancement drugs, athletes often followed strict diets to maximise their sporting performance; however, these days athletes prefer to opt for drugs given the quick short term performance benefits (ACMT, 2). Doping in sports was first found during the 1904 Olympics in St. Louis when an American marathon runner named Tom Hicks was given a bit of strychnine by his coach. At the end of the race, he collapsed and had to be revived by four doctors and his coach admitted to doping him. However, even after the admission, his medal was not taken away and he showed no remorse (Kremenik, 2).

WADA and the Punishments for Doping

Following the ban on doping by the International Association of Athletics Federation in 1928 which relied solely upon the athlete’s conscience and morals, once the technological world caught up with the need to test for banned substances, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) was created by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1999 (ACMT, 3). WADA was made to educate people on the long term risks of doping, further the research into the effects of doping, test different methods for the highest success in doping detection as well as actually carry out drug tests (ACMT, 3). According to WADA’s code, a treatment counts as doping if it meets two of the three following criteria: “It enhances performance, it presents a risk to the athlete’s health, it is contrary to the spirit of the sport” (ACMT, 4). Furthermore, depending on the degree of doping that an athlete participates in, they can suffer punishments as severe as never being allowed to participate in any sporting competitions ever again (ACMT, 5). What different doping methods do athlete’s use? There are four main types of drugs each with an aim of their own including: Anabolic Steroids: these are derivatives of testosterone and help to increase one’s muscle mass (ACMT, 7). Stimulants: these help to increase the athlete’s stamina, reduce the feeling of fatigue and/or pain and also improve their mental function (ACMT, 8). Hormones: these help to stimulate their body’s natural protein production, thereby increasing their muscle mass (ACMT, 9). Oxygen Transport: this method aims to increase the athlete’s blood volume thereby also increasing the amount of oxygen in their blood via blood transfusion (AMCT, 10).

How does drug testing work?

Drug tests can be done either via urine or blood samples; the difference being that some treatments such as growth hormones can only be detected in the blood (Wade, 4). How the tests actually work is that each athlete has a biological passport (ABP) which monitors select biological variables (like blood proteins) in their samples over time so as to catch any spikes should they occur (Wade, 2). These tests are done by the athletes national anti-doping agency (Wade, 5). If WADA thinks that the country’s tests aren’t vigorous enough then they will inform the IOC for immediate correction (Wade, 5). There are not only scheduled in-competition tests but there are also out-of-competition unscheduled tests so that athlete’s can’t time their doping to make sure it is

untraceable by the time of the testing (Wade, 6). However, over the past few years, it has been said that more outof-competition blood tests should be done as they only take up reportedly 5.2% of all the tests completed and just 10% of all the blood tests completed (meaning that most of the athletes were aware of the upcoming tests) (Wade, 4). Athletes can get selected for out-ofcompetition testing by their national anti-doping organisation or the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) following extreme sudden improvement, confidential doping intelligence, the athlete’s country’s lack of national testing or other situations (Wade, 9).

Biggest Doping Scandals in Olympic History

These are some of the most well known doping scandals in the history of the Olympics: Lance Armstrong (2000): An American cyclist and cancer survivor who became extremely popular as a model of resilience (Uyeno, 1). However, once he was exposed of doping in 2012, his seven Tour de France titles and bronze Olympic medal got revoked (Uyeno, 1). Russian Team1 (2012-2016): During the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia made a “sample swapping system to protect cheating athletes” in order to maximise their number of medals (Uyeno, 4). Once exposed, 30% of Russia’s athletes where sanctioned from competing along with all of the Russian paralympic athletes (Uyeno, 4). Tyson Gay (2012): An American sprinter who got a silver Olympic medal from the 100 metre relay team at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London; however, in 2013 he failed three consecutive drug tests which led to the revocation of his and his teammate’s medals (Uyeno, 8).

2022 Beijing Winter Olympics Doping Scandal

The story of 15 year old Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva, the first woman ever to land a quad jump and who led the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) to win gold, was the root of much controversy during the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics once it was revealed that she had tested positive for the banned heart drug trimetazidine in December (Church, 3). Despite WADA, the IOC and International Skating Union (ISU) appealing for sanction from the Olympics to remain, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) backed the Russian Anti-Doping Agency’s (RUSADA’s) decision that the ban would be lifted due to her young age and by extension, her welfare (Church, 4). Valieva then went on to compete in the individual event where she gained empathy as she was met with yells from her coach Eteri Tutberidze after she fell multiple times and left the ice in tears (Church, 3).

1 If you are interested in learning more about Russia’s doping scandal in the Sochi Olympics then you can find an informative documentary on Netflix called “Icarus”.

Editorial

Photography by Tony Shu