The use of drugs to enhance athletic performance has been around since before the creation of the ancient Olympic games in the 8th century BC. Greek and Roman athletes would steel their courage and dampen their pain with mead, beer, and wine. After the creation of the modern Olympics in 1896, the methods changed, but the practice remained. During the early decades of the 20th century athletes experimented with a range of performance enhancing drugs (PED) from simple elixirs containing caffeine and alcohol to harder drugs including heroin, cocaine, and even strychnine. In the 1940s, soldiers returning from the front lines of World War II brought amphetamines back to their sports. The new drug that was provided to soldiers to keep them alert and fearless proved to be just as good for delaying fatigue and reducing the sensations of pain brought on by participation in ever more grueling athletic events that demanded superhuman feats of strength, courage, and stamina. The human body isn't designed to ride a bike for 100+ miles in 90°F heat, up and down the Alps and Pyrenees, every day for three weeks. It's little wonder that many athletes resort to any means necessary to keep themselves in the game. Not surprisingly, the combination of these extreme sporting events with drugs led to several notable deaths in the 1950s and 1960s. The practice of doping was soon banned. But making unwanted practices illegal rarely makes them go away, instead they become more dangerous.
In the modern landscape of anti-doping practices, testing measures have become so sensitive that many high-profile athletes have tested positive for PED after consuming contaminated food, drink, and prescribed drugs. There have even been documented cases of athletes failing doping control tests after banned drugs taken by their partners crossed into their bodies during sex. Although most athletes and fans do not want us to return to the wild days of strychnine smoothies, the current model of doping control isn't sustainable. There is strong evidence that many PED including anabolic steroids and growth hormone have legitimate uses in speeding recovery from injury, safely returning athletes to training and competition. Finally, no athlete should be banned for the use of recreational drugs that have no performance enhancing capabilities, namely marijuana. In Defense of Doping explores the relationship between doping and sports and offers an alternative pathway forward.