Massive steroid conspiracy

AG, First, before I disagree with you, let me start by saying I appreciate your willingness to raise this issue and make an argument against prevailing opinion. I think this is a worthwhile discussion and I appreciate your willingness to take the heat (which I am about to apply) necessary to get it started. Having said that, I am amazed that you would discount the immediate and/or long term health risks associated with many performance enhancing substances. I believe there is no reasonable dispute that regular use of steroids over an athlete's career, or some substantial portion of it, will cause all sorts of health problems later on. I believe there is no resonable dispute that you can overdose on certain substances taken to enhance your immediate performance, e.g. amphetimines or EPO, and risk immediate death or disability. Moreover, some of these substances are addictive. You may start out only wanting to go faster, and end up a druggie, with neither a swimming career, nor a life any rational person would want. Please, don't start this discussion on permitting the use of performance enhancing drugs with the erroneous suggestion that the risks are minimal. As I will discuss below, the way people will actually use them will change. You seem to have in mind a scenario where someone takes a moderate amount of seriods (or some other substance that primarily helps recovery during training, not immediate performance enhancement) in the precompetition phase of their training cycle. That is what people do today, but that is because they don't want to get caught. They will be tested when they compete, and may be spot checked while training. They don't down amphetimines the morning of the meet because they know they will get caught. They use smaller amounts of steroids to avoid being detected. If you allow any drug use, those limits go away. Then it will be a competition of whose body can stand the most chemical abuse. This is the primary reason why I am not OK with allowing use of these substances. A little drugs in moderation may not be all that dangerous. (After all, we do use drugs to treat medical conditions.) But if you tell people anything is permitted, the people who are willing to take on the greatest amount of risk will cause everyone else to follow suit, or fall out of competition. It may be true that simply competing in some sports causes health problems later in life, but I would pefer that Olympic Champions NOT drop dead from drug use before the next Olympic Games roll around. Matt

If, indeed, the concern here is exclusively the health (short-term or long-term) of the Masters swimmer, then one could argue that USMS would also need a policy on the use and abuse of alcohol, the use and abuse of recreational drugs, high-risk sexual activity, high-fat diets (and if anyone tries to take away my cheese their in for a fight!), etc. I’m fairly sure that most folks would consider this a clear infringement on their personal lives. So, I don’t believe that health is the only concern of many of the swimmers posting here. The one element we can’t remove from this issue is the perception that someone is receiving an unfair advantage. Ask yourself: Can I except the possibility that my competitor may be taking performance-enhancing products and still enjoy Masters swimming?

Originally posted by snorkel If, indeed, the concern here is exclusively the health (short-term or long-term) of the Masters swimmer, then one could argue that USMS would also need a policy on the use and abuse of alcohol, the use and abuse of recreational drugs, high-risk sexual activity, high-fat diets (and if anyone tries to take away my cheese their in for a fight!), etc. I’m fairly sure that most folks would consider this a clear infringement on their personal lives. So, I don’t believe that health is the only concern of many of the swimmers posting here. The one element we can’t remove from this issue is the perception that someone is receiving an unfair advantage. Ask yourself: Can I except the possibility that my competitor may be taking performance-enhancing products and still enjoy Masters swimming? Yes

Tom: What are the serious long term consequences you are referring to? Specfically, what drugs are you referring to? The media parades a few sick athletes in front of us that have grossly abused steroids for decades and we then draw the inference that you will immediately die if you use at all. Talk about a slippery slope. I don't personally take performance enhancing drugs but I beleive all the hyperbole over immediate death, the downfall of all competitive sports and poor examples for all children is over the top. It's hard to have any meaningful discussion of this topic when such extremes are thrown out without supporting evidence.

Most of those are anecdotal based on extreme users of steroids and fruther emphasizes my point. Cancers? C'mon, what doesn't cause cancer? Big Macs also cause the health risks you have identified below. The broad range of generic health items you list below can be associated with about a million things we do or encounter daily. If a person who doesn't take steroids has an incident of road rage and has HPB, what causes that versus a steroid user that does the same thing? Even if what you say below is entirely correct, so what? A person can do what he/she wants. I don't hold this view for athlete participating in santioned Olympic events, just those of use slogging away in the pool.

Please, look carefully at your list. Give me a break here. A google search that returns articles on Steroids and Victims of Rape, Helping adolescents avoid steroids, the history of steroids? What's the relevance? Stop being big brother. If a person wants to read those articles AND still use steroids, let them. Otherwise, all that is proven is your ability to use google.

Phil, the point about technology improving training aids and dietary supplements is excellent. Whats the difference between a swimmer wearing one of the techno suits during a meet and taking a dietary aid to improve his/her time? As a byline, I attended an age group meet this past weekend. One of the kids, oh maybe 12 or 14, was wearing one of the high tech suits. He didn't win either. I thought it was very sad that he was trying to compensate for something, like lack of training or lack of skill, at such a young age. Lainey

I think I'm coming off as a steroid pusher here, which isn't true. But, my message certainly could be read that way. I just generally could care less what people put into their bodies. It doesn't phase me a bit if the guy on the blocks next to me is 50% human and 50% juice. I'm not there to beat him. I'm there to beat myself. I think it's probably rather dumb to load up on the stuff but that's your choice, not mine. It's probably a much worse idea to eat fast food daily and I'm sure more Americans do that every day than take steroids. That is a real crisis, not steroid use by ahtletes. The Russians and East Germans pumped their athletes so full of chemicals they probably glowed. And, no doubt some are suffering some consequences. I guess we all worry about what matters. To me, steroid use is down on the list.

Regardless of what type argument it is, moral or common sense, using illegal drug for performance enhancement (at this point in time), is plain and simple cheating. I for one, hope the governing bodies in sports continue to outlaw the use of performance enhancing drugs. Winning at any cost in NOT winning, in this case, it's winning while driving to the cemetery. Most, if not all sport endeavors at the beginning level are designed to instill good sportsmanship in our children. It teaches goal setting, dedication, hard work, decency, commitment and many other positive things in life. How can we possibly justify telling our children that it is OK to use performance enhancing drugs to win, all the while knowing it will cause serious long term health problems? Entertaining the use of this junk is a very slippery road I hope we never travel down.

Gosh, I think there is enough supporting evidence out there for us to look at if we chose to believe what we read. I have not advocated a quick death scenario with the use of steroids because the evidence does not indicate that. Having said that, long term steriod use has been proven to cause serious health problems and many studies indicate this in vivid detail. Steroid Use “Health Problems”: • Reduction in HDL, the “good” cholesterol. • Roid Rages (wide mood swings with periods of violent, even homicidal episodes) • High blood pressure • Liver damage and cancers • Increased chance of injury to tendons, ligaments, and muscles. • Jaundice • Trembling • Depression • Paranoid, jealousy, extreme irritability, and delusions. • Impaired judgment stemming from feelings of invincibility. • Other side and ill-effects are male specific and female specific I do not have time right now to research the studies indicating the above mentioned health problems, but I will, if you would like to see clinical evidence of the health problems associate with the use of steroids.