Lance Armstrong

[stickem]

fuck armstrong's cheating and lieing ass. who cares about cycling anyway? i can understand folks putting him on a pedistal for being a cancer survivor and all, but would laugh outloud knowing they supported a cheater by wearing his nike crap thinking he's a god.

[Luke]

Am I the only one who feels that we should let athletes pump whatever the hell they want into their bodies? It's not like they start off on an even playing field in the first place; some have better genetics for their sport than others, there's various levels and types of training, etc.

I think it was Carlin who advised that every athlete, for what they are paid, should pump as much performance enhancers in their body as possible. "Show me the freaks, and I'll pay for a $200 nosebleed ticket".

[Ivo]

Am I the only one who feels that we should let athletes pump whatever the hell they want into their bodies? It's not like they start off on an even playing field in the first place; some have better genetics for their sport than others, there's various levels and types of training, etc.

As I understand it, part of the idea of many sports is to see how far humans can go. I mean, obviously with the aid of technology you can cover distances faster than just by cycling, but instead of doping just use some vehicle right? So it misses the point a bit.

There is also the issue that the best doping is accessible only to the richer teams and so on. Even though in many sports money already makes most of the difference (you mentioned training, there was the famous issue with the technologically advanced swimsuits, and motor sports like F1 are of course obvious). If you now allow doping wholesale this would greatly increase and extend basically to every sport.
Cycling is already an example as big teams have better guys to basically "pull" the team "leader" and then drop out of the race etc.
I think olympic-style velodrome cycling is not as bad but I'm not sufficiently informed, and certainly it doesn't seem as popular as the Tour de France style of cycling.

Finally, perhaps the more important issue is that this stuff tends to have significant side-effects and you then create a situation where even more young athletes that want to become athletes would start doping before they are adults (some of them pushed to it by coaches and I dare say even parents). Many of them wouldn't even make it to professional level, and would still reap the problems from the use.

I think I see where you are coming from, but these issues (and maybe some that I haven't thought about) makes me disagree.

[MrPopo]

As I understand it, part of the idea of many sports is to see how far humans can go. I mean, obviously with the aid of technology you can cover distances faster than just by cycling, but instead of doping just use some vehicle right? So it misses the point a bit.

Mmmm... that's more of the pure expression of what sport is, not the practical realities of what sports are. Sports are about seeing who can outdo the other guy. And even going to the pure expression, I'd argue that if you don't proscribe the exact same diet to every athlete you're already adding in a factor similar to performance enhancing drugs and stuff like doping.

Now, if you wanna talk replacing your arms with bionic arms so you can box better, that's much more on the side of "defeating the purpose".

If you now allow doping wholesale this would greatly increase and extend basically to every sport.
Cycling is already an example as big teams have better guys to basically "pull" the team "leader" and then drop out of the race etc.
I think olympic-style velodrome cycling is not as bad but I'm not sufficiently informed, and certainly it doesn't seem as popular as the Tour de France style of cycling.

In general, life favors those with more money than those without, and this is already something that occurs in every sport. So I don't see this as an argument against the practice.

Finally, perhaps the more important issue is that this stuff tends to have significant side-effects and you then create a situation where even more young athletes that want to become athletes would start doping before they are adults (some of them pushed to it by coaches and I dare say even parents). Many of them wouldn't even make it to professional level, and would still reap the problems from the use.

There's already numerous problems from pushing your body to its athletic limits for long periods of time that hopeful athletes run into in later life, not to mention every kid who neglects academics to focus on sports and then doesn't make it and now is behind in life. Life involves risk.

[retrosportsgamer]

sport of cycling

I had a difficult time typing that without laughing, but what else do you call it?

I call it a recreational activity but that pisses people off Same with bowling.

[Ivo]

Disclaimer: I actually don't care so much about sports.

I'd argue that if you don't proscribe the exact same diet to every athlete you're already adding in a factor similar to performance enhancing drugs and stuff like doping.

Now, if you wanna talk replacing your arms with bionic arms so you can box better, that's much more on the side of "defeating the purpose".

There are several lines that can be discussed, in terms of bionic enhancements, chemical ones or even genetic manipulation. I don't think they are that much different really in this particular case.

Regular food is hopefully sufficiently different from performance enhancing drugs that consistent rules already exist and will continue to exist. Eating huge plates of pasta because it is loaded with carbohydrates should always be allowed. Chewing industrial amounts of coffee beans may be a different story and I'm aware not all doping substances are synthetic (in fact in cycling storing your own blood and putting it back in is one of the things that is disallowed).

If you put in bionic arms (MK3 Jax style) and they are, say, X% better, or you just do heavy doping and get X% better arms that way, why is one different than the other? Or is the issue that you think with bionics you can go 15% better and with dopping only 9% and you drew the line at 10% or something?
If clever people can not figure out how to draw a well defined, consistent line, then I agree it should not be drawn at all, but for now I remain convinced that it is possible and desirable to have some lines there.

In general, life favors those with more money than those without, and this is already something that occurs in every sport. So I don't see this as an argument against the practice.

This is certainly true but I think my point remains valid. Notice that the swimming suits were eventually banned for giving too much advantage (I presume you were also against those getting banned). But if you do allow those swimming suits why don't the swimmers just use flippers entirely (at that stage we are merging into the bionics issue again).

There's already numerous problems from pushing your body to its athletic limits for long periods of time that hopeful athletes run into in later life, not to mention every kid who neglects academics to focus on sports and then doesn't make it and now is behind in life. Life involves risk.

Some sports are worse than others, but in general I understand most athletes that are involved in non-contact sports and didn't dope can actually retire quite healthy (and the ones that are good enough to be pushing their body for really extended long periods of time may even be retiring quite wealthy). Throw doping in and I don't think that is still the case in terms of health. If you know more about this than I do please enlighten me.

Life involves risk, but I think society in general does not want to encourage people to take certain risks, and that applies specially for kids. That apparently goes for smoking, with cigarette advertising targeting kids being illegal (as far as I understand), so I think at least it is consistent that it should apply for doping. A policy of "everything goes" really does not send the correct message.

Personally I don't think the comparison with neglecting academics is relevant here. The idea is that these athletes weren't fast or smart enough and now they are behind. Some kids may just as well focus on academics and then fail and be behind in life because it turned out they weren't smart enough.
Having kids doping up and then dying young of cancer because of it (granted, that is taking a worst case scenario) - regardless of having been fast/strong enough to make it to the professional level, that is beyond "being behind in life"!

Ivo.

[harper]

Who the hell is Lance Armstrong?

I'm kidding...



Or am I?

[Breetai]

I am keeping my fingers crossed that our forum members are smarter than Snooki and know who Lance Armstrong is.

Who is Snooki?

Anyway, of course cheating in sports (including using illegal enhancing drugs in sports which are supposed to demonstrate natural ability) is wrong. On the other hand, which sport doesn't have rampant cheating or fraudulent activities? It has come out that numerous matches in pro sports have been affected by bribery. There is a lot of money in that. It's been proven with 2nd/3rd tier sports here in Canada (often European gamblers bribing players to throw a game in order to profit from betting), and I'd bet that it occurs in the NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL, etc. more often that we realize. A lot of people think it happened in some of the Olympic woman's soccer matches. I can think of a few high profile NHL games where I wonder if this was the case also (not gambling, but higher-ups in the league who want to see the market expand in the southern part of the US).

[MrPopo]

Disclaimer: I actually don't care so much about sports.

Neither do I.

Regular food is hopefully sufficiently different from performance enhancing drugs that consistent rules already exist and will continue to exist. Eating huge plates of pasta because it is loaded with carbohydrates should always be allowed. Chewing industrial amounts of coffee beans may be a different story and I'm aware not all doping substances are synthetic (in fact in cycling storing your own blood and putting it back in is one of the things that is disallowed).

If you put in bionic arms (MK3 Jax style) and they are, say, X% better, or you just do heavy doping and get X% better arms that way, why is one different than the other? Or is the issue that you think with bionics you can go 15% better and with dopping only 9% and you drew the line at 10% or something?
If clever people can not figure out how to draw a well defined, consistent line, then I agree it should not be drawn at all, but for now I remain convinced that it is possible and desirable to have some lines there.

Here is the line as I see it between the two. If I inject some substance into my body, it is still my body doing all the work. The substance may have encouraged growth or encourages the brain to release certain chemicals but at the end of the day your body is doing the activity.

By comparison, if you put in bionic arms (I was thinking TJ Combo, since being kicked out of boxing for it was in his backstory) then it's no longer you that's doing the work; it's this grafted machine that's doing the work. And yes, I understand that there is a massive edge case when you include the competitors at the Special Olympics. Let's ignore that one for a bit, because it's conceivable that they'd have some sort of rules crisis when our level of prosthesis is better than the original limb, rather than a decent substitute.

In general, life favors those with more money than those without, and this is already something that occurs in every sport. So I don't see this as an argument against the practice.

This is certainly true but I think my point remains valid. Notice that the swimming suits were eventually banned for giving too much advantage (I presume you were also against those getting banned). But if you do allow those swimming suits why don't the swimmers just use flippers entirely (at that stage we are merging into the bionics issue again).

I don't actually know enough about that particular issue to have an opinion about it. But in general I feel like it is reasonable to mandate what equipment is allowed. Just not what you do to your own body.

[Erik_Twice]

A sport that requires you to do drugs to compete is a shitty sport. Hence we ban drugs.