Newbie road cyclist here. I absolutely would never touch any performance enhancing drugs as I am too concerned about my long-term health.
However, in all honesty it's crazy to see just how far human endurance can be pushed with the use of EPO, cortisone, testosterone, anabolics, etc. I can only imagine how much faster racers could be with a fully legalized palate of PEDs at their disposal.
So while I am completely opposed to using these drugs myself, I think it would be awesome to split races into categories of Natural (Current USADA banned list) and Pharmed (or some other less offensive title, with any and all substances legal for use).
I know full well this will never happen but like I said before, it's just interesting to see just how far the limits of human athleticism can be pushed.
Because people will always try to cheat the system. You'd still have those who try to race in the "Natural" catagory, but still find ways to take PED's. Why be a bottom tier rider in the "Doped" catagory when you can cheat and be top dog in the "Natural" catagory?
"in all honesty it's crazy to see just how far human endurance can be pushed with the use of EPO, cortisone, testosterone, anabolics, etc. I can only imagine how much faster racers could be with a fully legalized palate of PEDs at their disposal."
yeah, sanctioning/paying people to essentially kill themself for our entertainment and idle curiousity is a great idea.
Why don't they legalize all PEDs and split races into Natural and Pharmed categ
TdF used to ban assistance to riders, resulting in legendary stories like some rider (don't know who) welding his own frame back together in a blacksmith shop. So, why not let them take any drugs they want, but ban any human assistance? That would be fun.
What fun would that be? If they did that we couldn't speculate on who's "Juicing" and who isn't ... though I guess we still could on the "Clean" division.
The reality is there would be no sponsorship of the "Doped" category (who would want their name associated with drugged up athletes?) so it wouldn't exist ... then they would all revert back to one category and the game would start all over again.
Most of the banned substances aren't the safest to be using, even EPO. Ricco and Kelme showed us exactly why blood transfusions aren't a good idea.
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