As long as there have been sports, there have been athletes in search of an advantage and of all the ways to get a leg up. There is 300 known performance-enhancing drugs, only 200 can be tested for. These days professionals often turn to performance-enhancing drugs. You hear about them in just about every sport.
In the U.S. some of the best baseball players of all time have been accused of using PEDs, American football players are regularly suspended for failing a drug test and Lance Armstrong famously finally came clean about blood doping in 2012, vacating his 7 Tour de France victories in the process. There is no shortage of ways athletes tried to enhance their performance. Some of them work, but at a high cost to their health, their wealth, and others just do not work at all. But, cheaters never win.
Which are which, how do they work and do not work?
we refer to them as drugs but most performance enhancers are really just versions of the chemicals that you already have in your body. These are the compounds that your body uses to build and heal itself and keep itself healthy. But by ramping up the levels of these compounds in the hopes of getting more out of your body you could end up putting yourself in a world of hurt.
HGH
Human growth hormone is a good place to start. Even though we all have it, a lot of people have no idea what it is. your body produces human growth hormone from the pituitary gland at the base of your brain. It stimulates growth and cell development and works with another called insuline-like growth factor 1 also known as IGF1. So, human growth hormone (HGH) is converted into IGF1 in the liver and it has several effects throughout the body including increasing bone and muscle growth. The natural production peeks during your teenage years, starts to naturally decrease by the time you hit 30 and continues to fall for the rest of your life. Growth hormone does help regulate metabolism in adults but its main purpose is really to spur growth during childhood. Since 1985 there has been an injectable form of HGH, for children with growth issues, but human growth hormone has become popular among athletes looking for an edge. A big reason for this is that it is really hard to detect since everyone’s body produces it. HGH may stimulate muscle and bone growth but whether that translates into increased power strength or endurance is unclear.
Steroids
However, performance does improve when HGH is used with testosterone, and you know how they call synthetic derivatives of the hormone testosterone? Anabolic steroid. Steroids are fat molecule and your body makes two very different types. When synthetic versions of anabolic steroids are used illegally by athletes, the combination of steroids and exercise can increase a man’s strength by more than 38 percent, and it is at least that high for women. Anabolic steroids can be freakishly efficient especially if the user takes more than one. Doping athletes generally take steroids in cycles lasting between one and three months when strength training in the offseason this is also when they are less likely to get tested.
Steroids Side Effects
Not only do raise testosterone levels often lead to increased aggression and sex drive but they can also (strangely enough) lead to shrinking testicles, impotence, and heart damage. In women, steroids can cause facial hair growth, acne, liver damage, breast reduction, changes to or total stopping of the menstrual cycle.
Blood Doping
Blood Doping is becoming more and more common in large part because it is harder to detect. This kind of doping generally works in one of two ways, either through direct blood transfusion. In many cases, athletes use their own blood. Or, through injections of a synthetic erythropoietin, or a hormone that controls your body’s production of red blood cells. In both cases, the goal is the same – to increase the number of red blood cells in the body to increase physical stamina.
The dangerous world of performance enhancing drugs is of course not limited to human growth hormone, steroids, and blood doping. As said in the beginning, there are 300 well known in which only 200 can be tested for. In any case, an athlete should rely on their own natural ability to improve and succeed without the need for anything.
