Sports Drugs

Overview:
- Why athletes use drugs?
- How do the drugs affect our bodies?
- Side effects of the drugs
- Do these drugs affect everyone the same?

Reasons athletes may use performance-enhancing drugs:
- Build mass and strength of muscles and/or bones
- Increase delivery of oxygen to exercising tissues
- Mask pain
- Stimulate the body
- Relax
- Reduce weight
- Hide use of other drugs

Slide 3

Drugs Common in Sports
- Stimulants
- Depressants
- Steroids
- Beta-Blockers
- Diuretics

Stimulants
- Increase alertness
- Reduce fatigue
- Increase competitiveness & aggression
- Ex: Cocaine, caffeine, amphetamines
- Side Effects may include:
- Nervousness
- Shaking
- Irregular heartbeats
- High blood pressure
- Convulsions and even sudden death.

Depressants
- Reduces anxiety
- Slowing of time
- Relaxation
- Reduces pain
- Ex: valium, methadone, alcohol, marijuana

Steroids
- Increase strength & accelerate muscle growth
- Increase endurance
- Increase mental aggression
- Fast recovery
- Synthetic derivatives of testosterone
- Ex: Anadrol, primobolan, deca-durabolin


Beta-Blockers
- Commonly used for High BP to slow heart rate
- Steadies nerves for shooting/ accuracy sports (i.e. archery)
- Drugs used to slow HR & BP
- Blocks stimulatory responses

Diuretics
- Diuretics act on the kidney to increase the flow of urine
- Eliminate fluids from tissue
- Weight loss
- Mask the use of other drugs by diluting the concentration
- Used in sports where leanness is an important goal:
- Body building
- Wrestling
- Horse racing
- Image sports: figure skating, gymnastics, dance

- Possible Side Effects:
- Dehydration
- Dizziness
- Cramps
- Heart damage
- Kidney failure.

Anabolic Steroids (AAS)
- Class of lipid molecules with 4 carbon rings like cholesterol, estrogen, and testosterone
- Androgenic Steroids: cause expression of male secondary sex characteristics
- Anabolic Steroids: stimulate protein synthesis, causing increases in muscle size & strength

Anabolic Steroid Effects
- Increased muscle mass
- Increased confidence & aggressiveness
- Mood elevation
- Anger
- Tendon & bone damage
- Cystic acne
- Masculinization of women
- Breast enlargement in men
- Genital size reduction
- Liver cancer

Pharmacology of AAS
- Route of administration:
- Oral
- Injected (causes greater effect)
- Absorption:
- Through lining of stomach
- Through muscle
- All but 1% circulates in bloodstream
- Inside cell:
- Accelerates synthesis of proteins involved in muscle building
- Blocks normal catabolic processes (which break down excess muscle)
- In hypothalamus gland, production of testosterone & sperm decreases


Physical Effects of AAS
- Desired Effects:
- Increased weight gain & muscle mass
- Increased water retention
- Decrease body fat
- Improved performance in weight lifting, but not in aerobic exercise
- Side Effects (short term):
- Male pattern baldness
- Acne
- Edema in feet & legs
- Stunted growth
- Increase risk of cardiovascular disease
- Decreased sex drive
- Infertility
- Side Effects (long term):
- Decrease in high-density cholesterol; increase in low-density, clogging blood vessels & causing heart
attacks
- Hypertension increasing stroke
- Autoimmune condition
- Shorten life span
- Long-bone infusion in children
- Physical appearance changes
- Damage to organs including liver tumors & prostate cancer
- In males:
- Sore or swollen breast tissue
- Testicular shrinkage
- Hair loss
- Painful erections
- Impotence
- In females:
- Hair growth on face and body
- Deepening of voice
- Menstrual irregularities/ infertility
- Reduction of breast size
- Enlargement of external genitals (enlarged clitoris)

Psychological Effects of AAS
- Initial feeling of euphoria, increased sex drive, improvement in appetite
- Depression with discontinued use
- Difficulty controlling emotions, moodiness
- Aggressiveness

Tolerance & Dependence
- Tolerance begins with 1st dose
- Dose management techniques:
- Stacking: taking high doses of several types of AASs so tolerance to one type might be overcome by the
presence of another
- Cycling: alternating periods of use with equal or longer periods of abstinence to decrease tolerance
- Pyramiding: the gradual increase then decrease in doses during a single cycle

Medical Uses
- Many commercially-produced steroids
- Treat certain types of anemia
- Treat hereditary angioedema
- Used to replace therapy for males with congenital/acquired deficiency of testosterone production

Non-medical Uses
- In 1992 the black market trade was $4 million
- Between 1 and 3 million people using
Doses are 10 to 100 times greater than those for medical purposes

Increasing Oxygen to Tissues
- Erythropoietin (EPO)
- EPO stimulates the bone marrow stem cells to make red blood cells, which increase the delivery of oxygen
to the kidney
- Used by endurance athletes to increase their oxygen supply by as much as 7-10%
- Difficult to detect
- May thicken blood making it harder to flow causing heart attack or stroke

- Blood Doping
- Athlete has many units of blood removed a month or more before competition
- Technicians then use a centrifuge to separate the red blood cells from this sample
- Concentrated red blood cells are stored and transfused directly into the bloodstream a week or less before
competition
- These extra red blood cells carry more oxygen to the muscles giving the athlete an advantage over other
racers
- Side Effects
- EPO
- Kidney damage
- Jaundice
- Blood clots
- Possible heart attack or stroke
- Blood Doping
- Blood infections
- Heart problems
- Could increase blood viscosity & cause a decrease in cardiac output and blood flow velocity
therefore reducing aerobic capacity

Do these performance enhancing drugs produce the same effects on everyone?
- No
- Each body reacts differently to drugs
- Hard to predict the outcome
- Ex. Blood doping
- One person could gain aerobic capacity while another could actually decrease their aerobic capacity

Can we attribute success in performance to the use of these drugs?
- Its hard to tell what kind of an effect the drugs are having:
- Increase muscle mass?
- Increase stamina to train longer and harder?
- Increase confidence (placebo effect)?

Torino Olympics
- Olympic testing begins when the athletes villages open on Jan. 31 and runs through the closing ceremony on Feb.
26. The games themselves begin on Feb. 10.
- There will be 838 urine tests, compared to 700 in Salt Lake City
- For the first time 362 stand-alone blood tests
- In Salt Lake City, blood tests were used only as a screening method, with suspicious results followed up by
urine tests.
- Blood tests can detect human growth hormone (HGH), blood transfusions and banned oxygen carriers such as
HBOX.
- Urine tests will search for steroids and the endurance-enhancer EPO.

Failed Olympic Drug Tests
1. Russian biathlete Olga Pyleva
- tested positive for the stimulant carphedon
- thrown out of the Olympics and stripped of her silver medal for doping
- was suspended two years
- Said it was from an over-the-counter medication not listing carphedon as an ingredient for ankle injury
2. 12 Cross-country skiers
- Unusually high hemoglobin counts
- given 5 day suspension
- 8 were re-tested and 7 were reinstated