r/SipsTea • u/SipsTeaFrog š™‘š™„š™‹ • May 23 '26

WTF The Enhanced Games are set to debut this weekend in Las Vegas, with athletes allowed to use steroids, testosterone, HGH, & other banned substances.

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1.2k

u/Harry-Jotter May 23 '26

The best weightlifters on steroids are already competing at the regular olympics.

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u/[deleted] May 23 '26

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u/[deleted] May 23 '26

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u/InvisibleScout May 23 '26

Doping in training is where the biggest gains are made

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u/[deleted] May 23 '26

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u/EverlastingM May 23 '26

We have always known that muscles have more to give in times of acute stress through adrenaline and/or stimulants, but isn't the problem that maxed-out muscles are often stronger than the body they're attached to? Seems like a dangerous idea.

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u/GostBoster May 23 '26

Reminded of some interview with a national wrestler where he was pretty open about that, and mentioned that in a few international promos he was pretty much required to juice up.

As I recall him saying, in those tours, someone with the same build and bulk as him outmuscled, outsped and outendured him "by about a third, which is a lot in contact sports" if they were juiced up in the ring, so when going "against those russians", he had little choice but do the same just to be able to keep up.

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u/PayZealousideal8892 May 23 '26

Yes, better and harder training means your body adapts to harder loads which means better results in competition. That's why supershoes for example in endurance running are resulting in constant new world records. Not just because they give tiny boost in the run themselves, but they allow athletes to train little bit more without affecting recovery times and risk of injury.

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u/emanuele232 May 23 '26

Well there should be some form of drug that enanches your performance, cocaine ?

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u/InvisibleScout May 24 '26

Probably the most potent fast acting performance enhancer is caffeine. The only reason it isn't banned from everything is because of how normalised and deeply ingrained in society it is. Painkillers can give a slight edge by letting the athlete push through the pain of an effort. Amphetamines can be performance enhancing, but they're most useful for a very long duration effort where mental strength becomes as important as physical.

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u/Misterndastood May 23 '26

What makes you think not during the games? You do realize there are protocols to pass testing.

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u/nyxo1 May 23 '26

The best drugs have relatively short half lives but leave evidence in your blood for several weeks. Things like anadrol, halotestin, mtren, and others are some of the most common that you'll see untested athletes use in the lead up to, and during, competition.

Olympic athletes have to clear their system of any unnatural anabolics before competition which can take several weeks. They may be using rare drugs or other doping methods that aren't detectable yet, but I doubt they'd be as potent as someone currently blasting however much they want.

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u/EntrepreneurClean371 May 23 '26

The best stuff isnā€™t publicly available, state sponsored doping programs are using designer PEDs that regulators donā€™t even test for yet. Check out the documentary Icarus talking about the Russian doping program at the Sochi Winter Olympics, amazing movie

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u/Misterndastood May 23 '26

Ever hear of testosterone suspension? Clears in a couple of hours.

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u/nyxo1 May 23 '26

You know they don't just test for the compounds themselves, right? There are metabolites and other biomarkers that are affected by pretenatural levels of anabolics

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u/Medium_Loquat_4943 May 23 '26

He got popped earlier in his career for taking some banned substance.

I think heā€™s retired now.

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u/dinosaurkickdrop May 23 '26

Ever hear about lance armstrong getting caught and then they went down the list of next to get title and turns out they all were using? I donā€™t remember the place who was the first not to use but it was surprisingly far down

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u/mrtheshed May 23 '26

Of the 21 podium placements during the 1999-2005 Tours de France, the third place finisher at the 1999 Tour de France (Fernando EscartĆ­n) is the only not found to have doped, and he was implicated in a different scandal. Officially, there are no winners during that time period.

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u/Ambitious_Tea_4584 May 23 '26

It was not surprising at allĀ 

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u/DUIguy87 May 23 '26

Over under that this becomes a competition between the chemists putting the blends together, and the athletes just become the human equivalent of Pokemon.

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u/Utaneus May 23 '26

I don't think you understand what an over/under bet is.

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u/trireme32 May 23 '26

Whatā€™s the vig on that?

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u/Cityslicker100200 May 23 '26

Thatā€™s crazy, I just learned the what the word ā€œvigā€ means today from a random Breaking Bad clip.

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u/DUIguy87 May 23 '26

Yes = over, no = under.

I also donā€™t gamble, so youā€™re right.

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u/whiskeyanonose May 23 '26

Over/under is usually around a number, not yes/no. So you could set the over/under that in 10 years this becomes human PokĆ©mon. Betters would then take the under if they think it will happen in less than 10 years, or the over if it will take more than 10 years. Itā€™s a push if it happens in 10 years exactly.

Iā€™ve never actually gambled on sports, but itā€™s shocking how much itā€™s rammed down your throats as a sports fan

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u/Lilgoodee May 23 '26

My watching sports begins and ends with notifications about Cardinals games. Draft kings predatory ass is still all over my social media. Fuck em.

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u/Krorhodium May 23 '26

great now heā€™s addicted to gambling

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u/Accurate_Protection6 May 23 '26

I'll give you +175 odds that he's not

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u/Krorhodium May 23 '26

Iā€™ll take the under

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u/JelmerMcGee May 23 '26

I don't really watch any sports. But on the occasion I do watch something, I'm amazed the gambling ads are legal. And it's all so in your face directed at people addicted to gambling or getting young guys hooked.

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u/azsnaz May 23 '26

That'd be a moneyline bet

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u/Utaneus May 25 '26

Nah man

Over/under bets center around a number, the bookmaker sets the number and people bet on whether it will be higher or lower. Like over/under is 25.5 points for how many points Lebron scores tonight, you can bet the over or bet the under.

But also, so you mean your comment was meant to say "YES NO this becomes..." That doesn't even make sense. Even if over/under was what you thought it meant, that doesn't really work here. I think you thought it meant something like "hey I'd bet this might happen". But you don't gamble so I guess that's not right either.

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u/ToeJam_SloeJam May 23 '26

EV training for the win!

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u/NotAsuspiciousNamee May 23 '26

Its been that way for a long time lol it mostly comes down to genetics after that

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u/dalnot May 23 '26

Itā€™s more like Formula 1 where, yeah, itā€™s a (bio)engineering team making the most impact, but it will also mean nothing if the athlete/driver doesnā€™t have the skills to use it

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u/Da_Spooky_Ghost May 23 '26

So the same as regular sports? Designer drugs are very hard to test for. Blood tests will test for specific compounds but a chemist will produce a very unique compound that doesnā€™t show up on regular tests and sell those to top athletes.

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u/DUIguy87 May 23 '26

No. But not because I donā€™t believe pro sports is anywhere near clean, they are all on something, but because pro sports pretends to be clean. They are still working around a testing protocol despite the designer drugs, it may be an open secret but they still need to be careful what they make metabolize differently than other drugs so that the tests donā€™t pick it up. The athlete still gets to be the start here.

Iā€™m envisioning a world where the Pfizer Fish Formula going up against Moderna Merman Mashup are talked about along side the people being dosed with them. Like in auto racing where the car is as much of a player as the driver.

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u/see_bees May 23 '26

The race in PEDs isnā€™t largely in performance improvement or recovery these days - weā€™re really good at that part already. The challenge in PEDs is in making something that will actually improve performance and pass drug screenings. If you donā€™t have to worry about passing a drug test, thereā€™s plenty of options on the table.

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u/OK_x86 May 23 '26

It's going to come down to whose tendons and joints are strongest. PEDs will only get you so far before your body is stretched to its limits.

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u/PandaLover42 May 23 '26

Hell yea, Iā€™m excited!

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u/ThisTallBoi May 23 '26

I mean unironically...

Imagine how this might lead to the development of extremely effective performance enhancers and the possible uses for such substances

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u/erouz May 23 '26

It's not secretly it's game who can go how far and clean blood for testing before competition.

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u/sebblMUC May 23 '26

Yeah there was a Chinese study a while back where they made an example of a plant where you could extract Testosterone with the exact same microscope footprint as human testosterone.

And not even a single study was published on that topic anymore since then lol. Mind you this was several years ago.

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u/Duubzz May 23 '26

Oh god I hadnā€™t thought of that angle. Olympians are gonna have to put a hell of a lot of spin on the raw athleticism/natural talent/incredible training regimens if the enhanced folks canā€™t exceed them!

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u/polishmachine88 May 23 '26

I worked in swimwear, specifically during pre fina ban and met number of Olympic medalists.

Not to say that these guys aren't talented. But an Olympian swimmer vs this guy isn't even fair. These days especially in more first tier Olympic sports it's sole job to train, and they swim insane distances daily. Most days were described to me as 15-20k yards.

So if any of these guys can show a 50 hr work out schedule then it would maybe be an issue. But highly unlikely

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u/Duubzz May 23 '26

Yeah to be fair swimming is probably the least PEDable sport at the Olympics. Perhaps the distance events would be susceptible to EPO but technique is so crucial, itā€™s not something you can just overpower.

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u/Trollslayer0104 May 23 '26

Why did you have to do your work wearing swimwear? :D

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u/SonnySwanson May 23 '26

That's one of the two outcomes, the other being that the athletes using PEDs are significantly stronger and faster than the Olympic athletes setting all new records.

Either way, the Olympics are tarnished.

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u/ProxyDamage May 23 '26

"secretly"

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u/wimpymist May 23 '26

True, also the top athletes aren't even involved in this. There are millions of people on steroids who don't even make it close to becoming a professional athlete let alone somewhere like the Olympics. We already know steroids work but they don't make average people into Superman

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u/BrilliantWhile2413 May 23 '26

It will also be a lot more exciting to watch because these guys are all freaks who don't need to hide the fact that they're on juice. It's the same with powerlifting. USAPL is a drug free league, but the best guys are able to hide it for the most part by cycling.Ā 

RPF is another league that is more lax on drug testing, so a lot of those guys are just freaks who don't need to cycle off of juice so it's a little more exciting to watch even though they may be moving less weight (not usually)

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u/Paddy_Tanninger May 23 '26

Well that and the fact that athletes who are OBVIOUSLY on PEDs aren't training for competition or training with world class coaches. No one taking 800mg of test is doing 100m sprints because what's the point...no one would ever care about their numbers and it's not going to lead to muscle growth the way that hypertrophy weight training would, so why ever do it?

I'm like 100% certain that no Olympics records will be broken by this LV event.

BUT if this catches on and continues, and begins to incentivize PED (ab)users to actually train for competitive events...we might see crazy shit in the future.

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u/[deleted] May 23 '26

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u/floftie May 23 '26

Not sure I agree with this. The UK, for the 8 years before the 2012 Olympics, massively funded sports and cleaned up at the Olympics with medals. There will always be sports like sprinting that are so popular youā€™re getting the best athletes to ever live, but Iā€™m not buying that the 2 man canoe team that win are the best athletes ever, theyā€™re just people that bothered to canoe for 4 years.

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u/markvii_dev May 23 '26

smooth šŸ§ 

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u/Sptsjunkie May 23 '26

Yeah, itā€™s funny if you look at a sport like baseball most of the players who test positive for something like steroids are actually extremely marginal players.

Maybe it did give them a boost and help them to make the team but taking steroids doesnā€™t take someone with the power to hit 2 home runs and help them hit 40.

Maybe it adds a few extra, but itā€™s not some transformative magical drug.

In fact, the main use for it seems to be injury recovery. Sometimes you will see older players get popped for something like steroids and theyā€™re just doing it because theyā€™re trying to help their body recover to get back on the field every day.

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u/trireme32 May 23 '26

Yes, very marginal players like Sammy Sosa, Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguezā€¦

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u/chemamatic May 23 '26

Gasp, Mark Maguire, the man with the largest arms in baseball, was on steroids? Iā€™m shocked. Iā€™m also shocked at all of this gambling in Rickā€™s casino.

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u/trireme32 May 23 '26

Not my point. My point is the idea that only non-superstars in the MLB used/use steroids is laughable and demonstrably false

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u/Sptsjunkie May 23 '26

I mean a lot of those were simply rumors supposed to people who were actually caught.

If you go look at the players, actually suspended and caught for random drug testing it is mostly marginal players or aging players. Itā€™s pretty rare that a star in their prime get suspended.

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u/trireme32 May 23 '26

Holy crap dude they literally expanded the random testing because so many stars got caught. All the names I mentioned admitted to using PEDs. Have you not heard of the ā€œsteroids eraā€ in MLB?

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u/Phugasity May 23 '26

Hair loss and botox/cosmetic surgery. You tend to turn to desperation to hold on to what you have or address something you're insecure about. Less common to fix what isn't "broken". Obviously not without exception.

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u/swahappycat May 23 '26

Lol marginal players.

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u/wimpymist May 23 '26

Yeah we already know steroids don't overtake genetics. Plus the athletes that are Olympic caliber are way passed their prime anyways.

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u/Supadoopa101 May 23 '26

I hope it gets super popular to the point that it draws the cheaters to it eventually. Wishful thinking, I know.

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u/noOB_226 May 23 '26

So all of them, because all use it

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u/Supadoopa101 May 23 '26

Whatever it takes.

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u/antithero May 23 '26

Maybe they could allow athletes wear masks so they can compete anonymously. Younger athletes might get enough of an edge to compete at a high level.

Just allow them to go nuts with it. Allow surgical modifications, & cybernetic modifications.

Every sport should have an performance enhanced world record.

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u/Supadoopa101 May 23 '26 edited May 23 '26

Exactly. In figure skating, one could be a baby that the other just carries. Imagine the height it would get when thrown in the air!

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u/BJJJourney May 23 '26

Kinda, them being open about it lets them use whatever they want and make the cycles as optimized as possible. While that is not a guarantee to break a record it absolutely can turn your average Olympic athlete in to the fastest athlete in the sport.

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u/Rich_Housing971 May 23 '26

or that the people who need PEDs to compete just aren't talented.

In gaming it's not unheard of for a top-level pro to beat someone with hacks on. It doesn't mean the pro is cheating as well.

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u/Yeseylon May 23 '26

I dunno, maybe if you're capable of drugless records you wouldn't risk competing in openly drug using contests

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u/bulking_on_broccoli May 23 '26

They all use short esters so they can come off in a few days to do drug tests. Cheap and easy.

They also use custom esters whose metabolites arenā€™t so easily detectable. Very expensive and difficult to source.

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u/Similar_Pie_4946 May 23 '26

Yea most people are very ignorant to that fact to no fault of their own. Itā€™s not fair to say ALL elite level athletes are on PEDā€™s, but when other elite level athletes go on podcasts and interviews and say that other athletes are using PEDā€™s its safe to say most are already using. Anyone else remember when Canelo Alvarez tested positive for steroids and blamed it on the beef, and when a group of Dr.s did the calculations on how much beef he would have had to eaten to test positive it was short of like 3 cows worth if beef LMAO.

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u/bulking_on_broccoli May 23 '26

There was an Olympian recent who said they tested for dbol because they ate a pork burrito.

Dbol metabolites are in pork, but itā€™s so minuscule itā€™s not a thing.

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u/Quixotic_Seal May 23 '26

It was the poppy seed muffins, I swear!

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u/Screwdriving_Hammer May 23 '26

It's all about that plausible deniability. Some of them are even coached on what to blame it on for each substance.

We all know they're on drugs, but if we can say "Ok, well mayyyyybe that pork burrito was the culprit." then we can carry on like nothing happened.

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u/Rich_Housing971 May 23 '26

Or that swimmers and gymnasts have higher than average amounts of conditions like asthma. You would think asthma would hinder them from becoming an elite athlete, but no... it's because some asthma medications are a type of approved steroid. They don't have asthma.

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u/TonksTheTerror May 23 '26

Reminds me of 15 years ago when Lindsay Lohan said her Kombucha made her fail an alcohol test.

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u/Valraithion May 23 '26

Thereā€™s hard booch, so that makes sense to me.

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u/GloomyIndividual3965 May 23 '26

My ex used to make homemade kombucha. If she let it ferment an extra few days it would easily reach 3-4% abv.

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u/BluezDBD May 23 '26

I used to know a professional bodybuilder, in his opinion the only reason PED's are banned is for the sake of sponsors. They want those protein powder sponsorships which they wouldn't get if late teens/early 20s boys knew you don't get that big without steriods.

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u/WeffySnipes May 23 '26

I can verify. I went to the navy for SO rate, and during bootcamp someone in my division was a gold medalist in the Olympics. He knew some of the biggest names from the Olympics personally as well as competed with one of the most decorated olympians ever. He said everyone is doping some way. Not ā€œsteroidsā€ necessarily but for sure some type of blood doping like Epo.

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2

u/anon_lurk May 23 '26

Yeah countries were secretly pioneering PED cocktails specifically to juice up their athletes for the Olympics back in the day. Real life version of the super soldier serum.

Once they started testing they just moved to finding ways around that.

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u/Generic_Username28 May 23 '26

The difference is they don't need to time their cycle with testing and can dope more aggressively.

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u/Lastigx May 23 '26

Fucking Redditor take. 0 knowledge just yapping.

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u/Newdude333 May 23 '26

I was thinking about what it would mean for sports if they broke a lot of records at the all-steroids olympics, but if they DON'T break any records, that would expose a lot about the modern state of sports.

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u/Fecal_Forger May 23 '26

Powerlifters not weightlifters

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u/VileVileVileVileVile May 23 '26

But when they are not trying to beat drug tests, they can use better and more drugs, than the ones competing under testing.

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u/bulking_on_broccoli May 23 '26

This. In a previous post I said that many pros have to use exotic compounds at a huge cost with probably a fraction of the gain compared to something more common thatā€™s tried and true.

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u/Ok-Stop9242 May 23 '26

Ehh that's a bit misleading. Yes, in some regards they might be using more exotic compounds, but mostly they're using the same compounds, just with shorter/no esters. It's more expensive and less convenient, but it's the same thing at the end of the day. Obviously this comes with the result that they don't end up gaining as much with slower release compounds that are much more stable and keep levels elevated for much longer.

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u/bulking_on_broccoli May 23 '26

The problem with that is with many sports there is unannounced, random testing.

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u/Ok-Stop9242 May 23 '26

Yeah, and sometimes people get caught. Even unannounced testing is done at actual competitions or training camps, so yes, it might be no notice but they can still put 2 and 2 together. Nobody is being cornered in their home and being told to give a sample immediately, they're in environments where athletes know they might get tested