The Steroid Olympics are happening in Las Vegas today. Former Olympians competing openly on performance enhancing drugs. Is this the future of sport?

[Depot76]

An event being called the Steroid Olympics is taking place in Las Vegas today, May 24, featuring dozens of athletes including former Olympians competing openly while using performance enhancing drugs. The event is designed as an explicit counterpoint to the traditional Olympic model of drug-free competition, operating in a legal grey area by holding the event in a jurisdiction where the specific substances used are not prohibited.

The event raises fundamental questions about what sport is for, whether the prohibition model has failed, and whether an explicit open category for enhanced competition has merit or simply normalises doping.

Tech

https://www.cnbc.com/technology/

[Cheugy89]

The honest argument for this event is that doping in elite sport is already near-universal and undetected, so an open category simply removes the hypocrisy rather than changing the underlying reality

[IronFist21]

The counter argument is that normalising open PED use creates pressure on athletes at lower levels who feel they must use to remain competitive even where it is prohibited

[TheLegendJohn32]

Former Olympians participating is the detail that legitimises the event beyond a fringe spectacle. These are people who competed at the highest level under the prohibition model and have chosen a different path

[SilverRider]

The Las Vegas location choosing jurisdiction carefully is the legal architecture that makes this possible. The regulatory geography of performance enhancing substances varies enormously across US states

[Oscar_57]

The what is sport for question is the philosophical one underneath all of this. If sport is human performance at its absolute limit then enhancement is compatible with that. If sport is human performance within natural limits then enhancement defeats the purpose

[Hannah56]

Cycling went through the Lance Armstrong era and came out the other side with supposedly stronger testing. The cynical view is that testing will never catch the frontier of what is being used

[Megan95]

The AI angle worth noting for this forum: AI-assisted drug design is producing performance enhancing compounds faster than testing regimes can develop detection methods. The arms race has a new participant

[NealBinnom-Williams]

The event will either be a curiosity or a precedent. If it attracts significant viewership and sponsorship it becomes a model. If it does not it remains a philosophical statement