Essay about Performance Enhancing Drugs

Athletes use performance enhancing drugs to boost their game. The professionals who use these drugs are ruining the integrity of the game. Many people don’t understand why professional athletes would go to such extreme measures to be better when they have already proven themselves. Athletes are just taking away from their natural ability by using these dangerous drugs. The risk of using performance enhancing drugs is a lot greater than the reward, because an athlete’s reputation could be tarnished and their career ruined. Money is one of the major reasons why players use them; if they perform at levels higher than what their natural abilities could do they will be offered a large sum of money.

As the use of performance enhancing drugs is becoming more popular amongst athletes, many of them do not understand the risks involved in taking these drugs. Many people are looking for a quick way to build muscles, or to get stronger the fastest way possible. Using these performance aids may very well be a quick fix for many athletes, but taking the drugs is unethical and dangerous. Using special drugs to boost an athlete’s performance is degrading to sports and to the athlete, but after they stop using the drugs and lose some strength, you become

The use of drugs date back to the ancient Olympic games. This is where the word doping originated from which was the Greek word “doop” (CITE). Performance enhancing substances also known as steroids are used for the improvement of human activity. Because drug use is also a huge thing outside the United States the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) was created as the first international governing body to prohibit doping. However, at the 1960’s Olympic the first athlete to die of doping was of the name Knut Jensen. He was a Danish cyclist who was found with narcotics in his system which resulted to his death. In result, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) was established to fight doping. The United States created their own anti-doping agency called United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA). Therefore, drug testing is an important factor in professional sports world-wide.

The desire to compete — and win — is as old as history itself. From the beginnings of sport, athletes have sought out foods and potions to turn their bodies into winning machines. As early as 776 BCE, the very first Olympic games, there are records of attempts to increase testosterone levels (“Steroid Abuse in Sports”). Ancient Greek wrestlers ate vast amounts of meat to gain muscle mass, and Norse “Berserker” warriors took hallucinogenic mushrooms before battle. The first competitive athletes to be charged for doping, however, were swimmers in 1860s Amsterdam. Doping of all kinds, from caffeine to cocaine to anabolics quickly spread to other sports (“Anabolic Steroids, a Brief History”).

In all areas of sports, professional, college, and even high school, there is widespread illegal use of performance-enhancing drugs. It seems like you can’t go more than a week without hearing about somebody’s PED problems. Although there are many reasons for athletes to choose to use these drugs, the cost of such use, both to the athlete and to society can be extraordinarily high. The question that many people must answer to themselves is “is it worth the risk”. Therefore, it is important to understand why performance-enhancing drugs are used, the consequences of their use, and then apply that knowledge to how they are represented in the media.

In the world of sports it is a competitive place where athletes lay everything they have worked for their whole lives to win the game. Now these athletes have been striving for greatness and dedicating so much of their lives to getting bigger faster and stronger to be able to win some games and ultimately move up in their careers and possibly make a living out of the sport they love to play. Sports rewards players who are motivated and works harder than the other team and stay focused and just dedicate so much to the sport. Now there are shortcuts to becoming bigger and faster and stronger. While some athletes bleed sweat and work as hard as they can and sometimes get changes slowly and far between some athletes will take performance enhancing drugs which will help these athletes take a shortcut and beat out the others who strive to get better. There in my opinion is nothing wrong with athletes wanting to get an upper edge on opponents by getting bigger and stronger but when the athlete uses performance enhancing drugs to get an upper edge I do not agree with this and feel like those athletes should receive some type of punishment.

Doping in sports has caused a lot of controversy throughout the years in the sports world from youth sports to the professionals. The World Anti-Doping Agency does their best to catch all the drug users but falls short with some people. This causes for an “unfair” advantage and goes against the true value of sport. It can make these players stronger and more athletic which causes more excitement for the fans to watch, more revenue for teams, and growing popularity. Using performance-enhancing drugs is banned in almost every sport, but with the allowed use of them could bring to the players and the sports teams themselves, could outweigh the negative effects of them being used in sports.

Drugs, they are a wonder of medicine. They can be very helpful, but they can also be very dangerous .Some athletes use peds, (performance enhancing drugs) for muscular growth and or endurance and an example of them are anabolic steroids. They give the user more muscular endurance and growth so they can work out longer and grow more muscle in a shorter amount of time. These drugs are used in athletics to help the athletes win and have pretty bad symptoms, not only that but it is unfair to the rest of the competition for them to have that kind of advantage. athletes usually are compelled to use drugs because they want to win at all costs.this, win at all cost, mentality is a reason why athletes use PEDs.we need to improve the regulations of peds in sports.

For example, body builders know that the stereotype is to be strong and built big. Hence they use drugs to try and fill that stereotype. Likewise, some athletes may need these drugs to feel like they are doing something more. This is because they want to perform at a level their mind desires, as they may feel like what they are capable of on their own is not good enough. On the other hand, athletes may feel like they have reached top capabilities on their own, and want more so they turn to drugs. In addition, athletes may turn to drugs because of pressure from peers and to fit in with the crowd. If one sees an athlete strive while consuming drugs, then the athlete may want that same performance outcome so they take part in taking drugs as well. All in all, performance-enhancing drugs have many side effects on the athletes and overall they damage the sport due to unfairness (Howe, 2004,

The reference explains how performance enhancing drugs diminish the idea of participation and promote ONLY winning, ruins the ‘spirit of sport’, pose severe health risks, promote unhealthy and dangerous behaviour, and questions the ethical issues of drug advertising/ sponsorship if doping were allowed in

In the past couple of years, many athletes in different sports have been caught using performance-enhancing drugs. When an athlete tests positive for performance-enhancing drugs it is usually one that is well known. Furthermore, there have been many instances never reported. It has come to a point where an athlete is doing really well in his sport, speculations on the use of steroids or other performing-enhancing drugs arise, the bothersome thing about sports today is that the speculations may very well be true. The usage of steroids, and other performance-enhancing drugs, is precarious. While it has enhanced the entertainment value of sports, it also has

The use of performance enhancing drugs has been in full effect since the very first olympic game. According to Sally Jenkins from the Washington Post "The ancient Olympic Greeks champions were professionals who competed for huge cash prizes as well as olive wreaths, experimented with herbal medications in an effort to enhance their performances." "Greeks would take a dose of strychnine before and after every olympic game so they wont wear their body out" (Jenkins 2007) . Greeks knew that the drug cheat was against every law in sports. Drug use in sports should be banned, because the use of drugs in sports has a number of different features. Drug use in sports could be very harmful to not only athletes but their families too. Using the wrong kind of drug or to much of it can lead to health risks.

Doping has widely become known as the use of banned substances and practices by sports personnel particularly athletes in an attempt to improve sporting performances. No sensible fan of sport today denies the prevalence of drugs in virtually every major sport, yet none would argue they can ever be eliminated completely. Money alone would seem to guarantee that much. High profile athletes today are competing for high stakes, not just millions, but dozens of millions. The fear of losing everything career, opportunity, contracts, name, fame, and money is pushing more sportsmen all over the world to use performance enhancing drugs, mainly

Looking back through ancient times, it can be seen that this issue was manifested back in the ancient Greek and Roman times. These two countries’ sportsmen were using mushrooms and herbs to improve their performance while playing sport. In the 19th century, other substances such as alcohol, opium and caffeine began to be used in sport. Most of the drugs were used in the World War 2, for example amphetamines were used by the soldiers to aid alertness. The word “doping” came from Dutch word dop, which is a name of alcoholic beverage made of grapes skins and were used by the Zulu warriors in order to enhance their power in the battle. (http://www.teachpe.com/drugs/drugs.php/accessed 2014

In competitive sports, doping refers to the use of banned athletic performance-enhancing drugs by athletic competitors, where the term doping is widely used by organizations that regulate sporting competitions. “Steroids, doping and other illicit performance enhancing drugs and treatments have become the biggest scourge of professional sports leagues, and that's why it may be time they were made legal” (Smith, Forbes). The agencies regulating and controlling the use of PEDs should now legalize drugs because doping has been done since the very first sports competitions have been played. There have been bans and restrictions on taking these drugs but no matter what the rules and regulations says, athletes have always used these drugs to improve their game and will continue to do this in the future. “Athletes from all sports have made their intentions clear--they intend to use performance-enhancing substances no matter how severe the punishments, as stated by Ellis Cashmore in his source “Why should sports allow doping?”.