The United States will accept the first "Improved Games" without doping controls. What you need to know

The first ever "Enhanced Games" will be held in Las Vegas on May 24. Their participants will be allowed to use medications that can improve their results. The competitions will be held in four sports. Athletes who break the world record will receive $1 million. There will be one representative of Russia among the 42 athletes. What is interesting about such competitions and why they are actively criticized in the sports world can be found in the Izvestia article.

Why do "Improved Games" take place?

• Since people started playing sports and determining the strongest in competitions, there have been attempts to gain an advantage in various ways. Back in ancient Greece, athletes tried to build muscle mass not only through training, but with the help of various herbs and mushrooms. With the development of medicine, drugs began to appear that directly affect a person's physical qualities, which ensures victory over rivals. Such substances began to be called doping and banned, as they not only violate the principles of fair sport, but can also undermine the health of an athlete.

• The fight against doping has become an essential part of modern sports. Testing athletes for illegal drugs has become mandatory, and the penalty for taking them is prolonged disqualification. In 1999, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) was founded, which fights doping at the highest level of competitions. Despite all attempts to eliminate doping from sports, it still exists in one form or another, and hundreds of athletes are still trying to succeed with drugs at their own risk.

• The active fight against doping periodically raises the question of what sport would be like if all restrictions were lifted from athletes and they were given the opportunity to decide for themselves how to prepare for competitions. This led to the idea of holding "Enhanced Games", where athletes will be able to openly take substances prohibited by WADA. This will avoid ethical problems, as no one will have to deceive rivals and hide their training methods.

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• The competition is funded by a number of investors, including the venture capital fund 1789 Capital, which belongs to the son of US President Donald Trump Jr., and PayPal founder Peter Thiel. The direct organizer is Enhanced, which plans to use Improved Games as a platform for selling personalized medicines and supplements to improve physical qualities. In this case, athletes are living examples of the effectiveness of the advertised substances.

How will the competition be held

• The first ever "Enhanced Games" will be held on May 24 in Las Vegas. Although it was initially assumed that they would become a full-fledged analogue of the Olympic Games, the competitions will be held on a much more modest scale. The organizers managed to attract 42 athletes who will compete in four sports: athletics, swimming, weightlifting and extreme strength. In swimming, the program will be limited to six distances for men and two for women, and in athletics — the 100 m run.

• Although the organizers announced completely ban-free competitions, the athletes still had to comply with some requirements. They could only take drugs that were approved by U.S. law and were not considered narcotic. The doping took place as part of a 12-week training in Abu Dhabi under the supervision of doctors. Athletes should compete only in categories that correspond to their biological gender. At the same time, all technical restrictions related to equipment were lifted from the participants.

• The organizers promised the participants impressive prize money, which many of them could not expect at regular competitions. The prize for exceeding the world record set by clean athletes will range from $250,000 to $1 million. A victory in each individual discipline will bring $ 250 thousand, and participation itself is expected to cost from $20 thousand. Due to the small number of participants, the competition will be held without preliminary starts.

Who participates in the games

• Despite the fact that any contact with doping in world sports is severely condemned, the organizers managed to attract many famous athletes to their side who were not afraid to take part in such an ambiguous event. For some, the main motivation was the large prize money, others admitted to disagreement with the existing anti-doping system, others are already under disqualification or have completed their professional careers, so they are not afraid of possible sanctions. At the same time, four athletes promised to compete clean in order to prove that it is possible to win without doping.

• More than 30 participants of the "Improved Games" have competed at the Olympic Games, world Championships or continental championships in the past. Some of them rose to the Olympic podium. Olympic champion Cody Miller from the USA, three-time Olympic medalist James Magnussen from Australia, vice-champion of the Paris Olympics in the individual 50 m crawl Ben Proud from Great Britain, World Championships medalists in individual distances Christian Golomeev from Greece and Andrey Govorov from Ukraine will compete in swimming. Two-time Olympic swimming champion Hunter Armstrong from the USA will compete without doping.

• The main star in athletics will be two-time Olympic medalist in the 100 m Fred Curley from the USA. In his career, he has been disqualified for missing doping tests and arrested for battery, which has already severely damaged his reputation in the world of sports. Two Olympic medalists will compete in weightlifting: Nigerian Mariam Usman and Colombian Leidi Solis. Icelander Haftor Bjornsson, known for his role as Grigor Klingan in the TV series "Game of Thrones", will compete in the power extreme.

• One of the participants will be Evgeny Somov, a Russian swimmer, participant of the Olympic Games in Paris in 2024. He will compete in breaststroke swimming at distances of 50 m and 100 m, securing at least $ 100 thousand for participation. Explaining his decision to compete at the "Improved Games", he noted that for him these competitions are a show, as well as an opportunity to show the maximum result that he can be capable of.

What are the consequences for the participants

• The idea of holding "Improved Games" has been strongly condemned by almost all sports organizations. In a joint statement with WADA, the International Olympic Committee called the competition immoral and dangerous. Sebastian Coe, President of the World Athletics Federation, called the competitors idiots and threatened them with long-term disqualifications. The World Aquatics Federation has explicitly announced that all those involved in the Doping Games, including coaches, will be suspended from its competitions. In response, the founders of Improved Games sued a New York court for $800 million for an "illegal pressure campaign" waged by traditional sports organizations.

• There are no legal grounds for suspending athletes from future "clean" competitions. In order for an athlete to be disqualified, his violation of the anti-doping rules must be fully proven. To do this, he must pass a positive doping test or refuse to take tests. Athletes have the right to take a break from their careers in order to avoid being targeted by anti-doping authorities at that time. Neither the participants themselves nor the organizers disclose information about which drugs are taken or whether they are used at all.