Doping
13.05.2022
Julia Plesovskikh
What is doping and how people began to fight with it?
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Every athlete is aiming to win a sports competition. Unfortunately, physical conditions are not always good enough to do that. That is why many sportsmen begin to play unfairly in order to win the desirable trophy. At some times the public ignored the situation. But they realized that it cannot continue in this way anymore. So, what were the first doping cases in sports and how people started to fight with it?
It is considered that even in Ancient Greece athletes took special drugs to develop their physical conditions. Historians think that it was special herbal infusions and hallucinogens. But only in the 20th century doping in sports became a serious issue. The first mass doping use was noticed in equestrian sport. Coaches gave drugs to horses, and it negatively affected its health. Many horses died because of the drugs. The races’ organizers tried to do as much as they could in order to prevent this situation.
Besides, marathon runners used doping quite a lot. For example, the winner of the 1904 Olympic Marathon Tom Hicks got his gold medal with the help of drugs. He fainted seven miles before the finish line, but the coach injected him with drugs and Hicks managed to reach the trophy. At those times there were no antidoping laboratories, drug testing or even video cameras, so no one could precisely control and punish anti-doping rule violators.
Despite this fact, people began to realise that legal prohibition on doping in sports is needed. The first sports federation who did it was World Athletics in 1928. Others have followed her example sometime soon, but it didn’t help to solve the problem. There still weren’t any anti-doping control systems. The situation has changed only several decades after, when many deaths because of doping were occurred and it was made public.
The first doping tests were taken in 1964 during the XVIII Olympics in Tokyo. Before that in 1960 the situation with doping in sports was taken into account by The Council of Europe. 21 Western European countries have adopted the resolution against the use of doping in sports. In 1963 The Council of Europe have organized a special committee aimed to fight with doping, but unfortunately, it was ineffective.
In the beginning of 1960s come countries’ governments coordinated with big international organizations and initiated anti-doping fight. In the same years, athletes began to be tested for the use of stimulants, beta-blockers, narcotic substances, etc. But the imperfection of control methods still allowed athletes to bypass testing or distort its results.
In International sports medicine congress, which was held in 1965, the definition of doping was declared. Doping is an introducing into the human body, by any means, a substance alien to that body, or any physiological substance in an abnormal amount, or introducing any substance in an unnatural way, in order to increase the athlete’s performance artificially and dishonestly during competition.
After that, the doping tests system has become widely used. Since these times there is a “competition” between those who widen the number of prohibited drugs, and those who develops new substances in order to encourage athletes to use banned drugs and hide this fact from the officials. Even though, both of these actions can be done by the same laboratories who initially was aimed to fight with doping. Not only athletes and their coaches, but also big pharmaceutical companies and even the government have become interested in doping in spots. The question is – which way of fight with doping is the most profitable and beneficial for all of them? What is the actual aim of anti-doping organizations? How can they influence on the sports situation?
These are the questions we don’t know the answers to yet. Despite the fact that IOC is actively fighting with doping for more than 50 years, the problem is still unsolved and becomes even more acute. So doping is only about unfair play, or about something bigger?
It is considered that even in Ancient Greece athletes took special drugs to develop their physical conditions. Historians think that it was special herbal infusions and hallucinogens. But only in the 20th century doping in sports became a serious issue. The first mass doping use was noticed in equestrian sport. Coaches gave drugs to horses, and it negatively affected its health. Many horses died because of the drugs. The races’ organizers tried to do as much as they could in order to prevent this situation.
Besides, marathon runners used doping quite a lot. For example, the winner of the 1904 Olympic Marathon Tom Hicks got his gold medal with the help of drugs. He fainted seven miles before the finish line, but the coach injected him with drugs and Hicks managed to reach the trophy. At those times there were no antidoping laboratories, drug testing or even video cameras, so no one could precisely control and punish anti-doping rule violators.
Despite this fact, people began to realise that legal prohibition on doping in sports is needed. The first sports federation who did it was World Athletics in 1928. Others have followed her example sometime soon, but it didn’t help to solve the problem. There still weren’t any anti-doping control systems. The situation has changed only several decades after, when many deaths because of doping were occurred and it was made public.
The first doping tests were taken in 1964 during the XVIII Olympics in Tokyo. Before that in 1960 the situation with doping in sports was taken into account by The Council of Europe. 21 Western European countries have adopted the resolution against the use of doping in sports. In 1963 The Council of Europe have organized a special committee aimed to fight with doping, but unfortunately, it was ineffective.
In the beginning of 1960s come countries’ governments coordinated with big international organizations and initiated anti-doping fight. In the same years, athletes began to be tested for the use of stimulants, beta-blockers, narcotic substances, etc. But the imperfection of control methods still allowed athletes to bypass testing or distort its results.
In International sports medicine congress, which was held in 1965, the definition of doping was declared. Doping is an introducing into the human body, by any means, a substance alien to that body, or any physiological substance in an abnormal amount, or introducing any substance in an unnatural way, in order to increase the athlete’s performance artificially and dishonestly during competition.
After that, the doping tests system has become widely used. Since these times there is a “competition” between those who widen the number of prohibited drugs, and those who develops new substances in order to encourage athletes to use banned drugs and hide this fact from the officials. Even though, both of these actions can be done by the same laboratories who initially was aimed to fight with doping. Not only athletes and their coaches, but also big pharmaceutical companies and even the government have become interested in doping in spots. The question is – which way of fight with doping is the most profitable and beneficial for all of them? What is the actual aim of anti-doping organizations? How can they influence on the sports situation?
These are the questions we don’t know the answers to yet. Despite the fact that IOC is actively fighting with doping for more than 50 years, the problem is still unsolved and becomes even more acute. So doping is only about unfair play, or about something bigger?
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