A peek into the past:
Since the dawn of times, athletes have always been aiming at an optimum
performance during any event. Therefore, the search for performance enhancing
substances has been ongoing ever since. It all started in the period 776 BC – 393 BC, the
time of the original Olympic Games, where athletes and warriors consumed deer liver
and lion heart to impart certain benefits, in hopes of gaining certain attributes such as
speed, strength, or courage. Most of what we consider methods of cheating was perfectly
acceptable to them. They ate large amounts of meat and experimented on themselves with
herbal medications to heighten their performance. They also drank wine potions, used
hallucinogens, and ate animal hearts and testicles in search for potency. The word
‘doping’ comes from the Dutch word 'doop,' which is a viscous opium juice, the drug of
choice of the ancient Greeks.
In 100 AD, gladiator competitions and chariot races were popular in Ancient
Roman culture, and the Coliseum is expanded to hold 60,000 spectators. Roman
gladiators used stimulants and hallucinogens to prevent fatigue and injury. Chariot racers
fed their horses substances such as hydromel, an alcoholic beverage made from honey, to
make them run faster, and they ingested hallucinogens and stimulants to wear off fatigue
and increase the intensity of their fights.
In the late 19th century, the modern application of drug use in sports was initiated,
where French cyclists and Lacrosse players used a mixture of wine and coca leaf extract
to prevent exhaustion. From 1904 to 1920, Olympic athletes used mixtures of strychnine,
heroin, cocaine, and caffeine and each coach or team developed its own unique secret
formulae, until cocaine was only attainable by prescription in the 1920s.
Written by : Ahmed Koptan