Professional Cycling For the Fans - How do you fix the doping problem?

Perhaps I'm naive about this, but I'm not impressed that cyclists by themselves would be particularly effective dopers. Can you really think of a rider who would know what drugs to use, what doses, how, when, and all of that without the help of a physician (especially to avoid detection)? I'm not saying that the riders are innocent victims, but most of the scandals I've heard about seem to revolve around a Ferrairi, Fuentes, etc. and if you really nailed those guys, the DS'es and maybe even sponsors, I wonder if it wouldn't at least cut down on the ubiquity of drugs. These cyclists seem to rely an awful lot on the enablers from what I can tell...


I see a lot of media articles quoting mainstream doctors about what effects testosterone would have and many of them state that it would do no good for a one-day recovery. The reason they say this is that there is (obviously) no published research using actual human athletes. The experiences in the effectiveness of testo are passed from cyclist to cyclist. The use of testo patches for recovery wouldn't be so widespread if there wasn't real world evidence that it worked. There may or may not be doctors involved. Athletes tend to be superstitious and the advantages may or may not be in their mind.

I still believe that compared to the unbelievably training and preparation these athletes go through, in addition to the mental toughness required, the doping advantage is negligible. And that's what's so sad. They think it gives them an edge so they can't help themselves - they're that competitive.

:(
I'm tempted to advocate public stoning for the first offence, but I'm not sure if the stone supply is large enough.

It would suck to be wrongly convicted under any system but even more so under your system. I am not so sure that the punishment here fits the crime as it is a bit draconian.


What sports even pursues dopers aggressively besides the Olympics..
The Olympics is a pretty big umbrella, only a few really big or entirely regional sports are not covered under the IOC/WADA.



Perhaps I'm naive about this, but I'm not impressed that cyclists by themselves would be particularly effective dopers. Can you really think of a rider who would know what drugs to use, what doses, how, when, and all of that without the help of a physician (especially to avoid detection)? I'm not saying that the riders are innocent victims, but most of the scandals I've heard about seem to revolve around a Ferrairi, Fuentes, etc. and if you really nailed those guys, the DS'es and maybe even sponsors, I wonder if it wouldn't at least cut down on the ubiquity of drugs. These cyclists seem to rely an awful lot on the enablers from what I can tell...
Without doctors many more dopers would die (kind of self correcting). Many athletes are rather uneducated and would not have the knowledge to dope without enablers, however, there is plenty of motivation for people to help the athletes dope. Some are motivated purely by the vast amounts of money a successful athlete can earn (an pay to the enabler to help them dope). Many of the doctors are caught in an ethical quagmire stemming from there "do no harm" promise. The ethical debate revolves around preventing the greater harm to the patient (dying vs helping someone cheat). Additionally, doctors are safe for the athletes as enablers as the doctor-patient privilege is pretty universal.

The DS'es and sponsors tolerate it because the reward for having a successful athlete outweighs the risk of getting caught. They also maintain plausible deniability in order to stay out of trouble personally. The problem with punishing any of the individual enablers is that another is always willing to step up to fill their place because there are a lot of people in the world that think that they can outsmart the doping controls (and do routinely).