The Enhanced Games
Are the records worth the risk?
Athletes will take to the track and compete in field events, attempting to set new world records and demonstrate the physical prowess of the human body.
However, it won't be in Paris. It isn't the Olympics, it's the Enhanced Games. It promises to test human athletic limits… with science.
Science meaning performance-enhancing drugs.
The Enhanced Games founder Aron D'Souza. (enhanced.org)
The Enhanced Games founder Aron D'Souza. (enhanced.org)
The competition was founded by its president Aron D’Souza, who studied law at Oxford before earning a Ph.D. at the University of Melbourne.
He played rugby at Oxford and considers himself “an avid athlete and a keen believer in the importance of sport,” according to his bio.
Now, he’s funding a movement to provide an alternative to the “old, slow” Olympics, as he describes it. The events are the same, but the athletes are allowed, and encouraged, to take performance-enhancing drugs.
If it sounds like a Saturday Night Live skit, that’s because in 1988, it was.
Athletes losing limbs may be hyperbolic, but medical experts argue there could be serious health issues when sport accepts widespread use of performance enhancers.
“There clearly are negative effects that steroids can have,” said Peter Weyand, a professor and chair in the Harris College of Nursing and Health Science at TCU. “They can cause cancer and all sorts of weird things. Men can grow breasts if they do too much.”
Early on, blood doping was a popular enhancement technique, which Weyand described as pulling blood out of the body, taking out the plasma, holding onto red blood cells, freezing them and infusing them back in before competition.
This increased the hematocrit, the percentage by volume that red blood cells take up in blood. The normal level is 44-45%, but it can vary a little bit.
“If you bump that up too much and the red blood cell content goes up, your blood becomes sludgy or viscous and it becomes much more work for your heart to pump,” said Weyand.
Athletes that have died from too much blood doping often die from congestive heart failure, added Weyand, because their hearts can’t pump against such an elevated load.
The Olympics published the anti-doping rules for the 2024 Paris Summer games, stating under Article 4.3 that substances are prohibited because they “have the potential to enhance performance, represent a health risk or violate the spirit of sport.”
D’Souza argued that the Olympics only refuse performance-enhancing drugs because they give athletes an advantage over others, not for the well-being of the athletes.
“Let’s be clear. Drug testing is about fairness, not safety,” he said. “The Enhanced Games aim to be the safest sporting event in the world. At the Enhanced Games, we prioritize athlete safety.”
D'Souza claims scientists have developed a medical screening process, but Weyand said this won’t take away the risks.
“It’s not safer than athletes doing it in the dark,” he said. “Over a period of time, the tests catch up with the dopers. That puts a lid on how much these drugs, that are harmful or deadly, can do.”
Leader of the Astana team and Tour de France rider Alexandre Vinokourov tested positive for a banned blood transfusion after winning last weekend's time trial, prompting his Astana team to pull out of the race. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena)
Leader of the Astana team and Tour de France rider Alexandre Vinokourov tested positive for a banned blood transfusion after winning last weekend's time trial, prompting his Astana team to pull out of the race. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena)
The cat-and-mouse chase the authorities go on with athletes is to keep competition fair, but it also prevents athletes from taking too many substances and dying trying to win a gold medal.
“The best example I can think of is competitive cycling with the Tour de France where, for years, people were doping,” said Dr. Mark Denny, a retired professor at Stanford university with a background in biomechanics. “Once it came out that they were, it was to the point where the only way to be competitive was to dope.”
Famous cyclist Lance Armstrong was stripped of all seven of his Tour de France titles because he ran a doping program on his teams. Armstrong and his team micro-doped to get around the tests for years. According to the United States Anti-Doping Agency’s reasoned decision on the case, the team used saline infusions, blood doping, Erythropoietin (EPO) cortisone, testosterone and Actovegin (blood from a calf that can enhance aerobic performance).
Athletes continuously look for physical advantages, threatening the core values of the International Olympic Committee. The IOC’s website says it is “committed to promoting sport in society, strengthening the integrity of sport and supporting clean athletes and other sports organizations.”
The principles of the International Olympic Committee. (olympics.com)
The principles of the International Olympic Committee. (olympics.com)
The Enhanced Games has promoted itself as a safe haven for athletes that aren’t considered “clean” by the IOC.
D’Souza tried to quell President Joe Biden’s concerns about the competition, even saying the Olympics would “never be clean until there is an Enhanced Games.”
“We are offering to cooperate with the IOC and the White House to make the Olympics truly clean, natural and fair,” he said. “The Enhanced Games are an entirely new event which is very complementary and has an important place in a science-based society.”
However, Dr. Michael Sagner, the scientific advisor to the Enhanced Games, pointed out in the press conference that Olympic drug testing doesn’t work.
“Whilst the aim of an enhancement-free Olympics is a noble one, it is not and has never been true,” he said. “Olympic drug testing is ineffective and full of loopholes.”
This infers there would be an athletic imbalance when enhanced athletes leave because others would still get around the drug tests. Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson, who held world records in the indoor 100-meter and 60-meter dashes, won the 100-meters at the 1988 Summer Olympics before being stripped of his accomplishments due to anabolic steroid use.
The coach that provided the PEDs, Charlie Francis, argued he was keeping his athletes on the same level as rivals that were doping, as well.
That 1988 Olympic race is known as “the dirtiest race in history” because only two of the eight competitors never failed a drug test.
Weyand and Denny think it's possible that athletes on doping programs could challenge world records. Johnson’s uncertified 100-meter record was 9.79 seconds, which Usain Bolt beat with a 9.58. However, it won’t be just PEDs that aid them.
The above chart shows the Anti-Doping Rule Violations from 2020. ASOIF represents the Summer Olympics, which holds the majority. AIOWF represents the Winter Olympics. This includes failed drug tests and non-analytical violations (whereabouts violations and others that don't involve a direct failed test).
“Technology until very recently has not been a significant factor in running, but now it’s a whole new game because of advances in material science,” said Denny.
Even with new technology, Bolt’s record is one of the hardest to beat because his unique physique increased his efficiency.
“He’s a really tall guy, so he takes longer strides than anybody else and has enough muscle to drive the legs,” he said. “If just being strong would make someone faster than him, someone would’ve done it by now.”
The Enhanced Games boasts one of its athletes has already run faster.
The likelihood of this is low. If someone was close to Bolt’s record, it would likely be a familiar face, not a random person like in the video.
“A performance bump of 2% at the Olympic level is huge,” said Weyand. “But if you’re not within 3-4% to begin with, you’re still going to lose.”
He emphasized how dangerous this enhanced culture could be.
“If you try to sell that line to average Joes, they take some stuff and get better. They think they take more and get even better, but it doesn’t work that way,” said Weyand. “If you take too much, it’s gonna do real damage.”
The bottom line
D’Souza’s contradicting ideas about the Olympics and the next generation of athletics prove that the Enhanced Games will come and go, likely not making an impact on world records or luring competitors from the Olympics. If athletes join the Enhanced Games, the void in the Olympics would be filled quickly with other athletes getting around drug tests. Also, D’Souza can’t say he wants to embrace science while negating medical experts and the effects of enhancements throughout history. Finally, Denny and Weyand mentioned the odd position science would be in. There is no way an institute would fund any kind of research involving steroid use. Even if athletes were to have medical updates recorded, the results could add some value, but they wouldn’t be completely trusted to be recorded correctly.
What's next for the Enhanced Games?
The future of the Enhanced Games depends on the first year. Christian Angermayer, the Co-Founder of the event, has confidence it will stick around.
“It will undoubtedly inspire the public’s imagination and reinforce the profound impact of science on human progress,” he said.
Denny and Weyand think differently.
“I think the interest will go away if it’s just who has the best doctor shooting them up,” he said. “Weird, wacko things are gonna happen and we’ll find out why this was a bad idea.”
“I don’t see people embracing this,” he said. “If a corporation wants to invest, there is a significant downside because of how dangerous it is inevitably going to be.”
The inaugural Enhanced Games were originally planned for 2024, but is now scheduled for 2025.
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