Steroids
Almost everyone has heard stories of professional athletes banned or suspended for the use of steroids, but not many understand what they do or how they work. Steroids mimic male (androgenic) hormones such as testosterone which cause androgenic and anabolic effects. Androgenic effects concern the sex organs are the mainly active during puberty. Anabolic effects are those of accelerated growth of muscle, bone, and red blood cells, and enhanced neural conduction, which are targeted by athletes. Anabolic steroids aim to minimize androgenic effects while maximizing anabolic effects. Steroids act as hormones, which travel through the bloodstream to stimulate receptors in muscles cells causing the creation of specific proteins. It is these proteins that cause the characteristic muscle growth. It is likely that tough workout routines increase the amount of these receptor proteins and thus increase the effectiveness of steroids. One of the biggest things users assert is that the drug allow for a faster recover. This is because they slow the work of cortisol, a molecule which causes the breakdown of muscle after a workout and the cause of some soreness. However, when the athlete stops taking steroids the amount of cortisol spikes upward and the amount of testosterone production remains very low resulting in the rapid loss of muscle tissue. Cortisol also impedes the immune system, leaving the athlete vulnerable to sickness.
Whatever its reputation, in most scientific studies of the drug have witnessed little difference in athletic performance. These experiments have been double-blind, meaning that neither the experimenter nor test subject are aware of who is on the real drug. The stories of famous athletes drastically improving their game and gaining thirty pounds of pure muscle can be attributed to four things; placebo effect, the resulting physiological toughness and aggressiveness, the extreme difficulty and size of a professional workout, and exaggeration. Either way using the drug is not worth losing the sport.
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