There is so much broscience when it comes to steroids. Also I feel like a lot of people who haven't reached a high-level of competition just really don't appreciate greatness. People can be really really really good at something without there being some chemical explanation. To some extent I agree with Kingfish and Raptor; allowing an avenue for athletes to compete untested would make things a lot cleaner. On the other hand I think each sport should be able to make the rules as it chooses; the IAAF changed it so you don't get a false start in the sprints anymore, if they want to enforce a rule that you have to test positive for substance X before racing, fine by me. What bothers me is any political pressure or testing groups which try to force sports to adhere to their rules, these groups profit when there are positive tests which is a huge conflict of interest.
From anecdotal evidence and from what I've read online it seems that steroids can take up to .2 seconds off a 100m for a male but with females they can take up to .4 seconds off a 100m time. I guess it also depends on how the person reacts. Like there are some people that can take steroids and just blow up because their body uses them really efficiently. A perfect example of this theory is Kevin Levrone. Than on the other hand you have people that don't react well to them (most top natural bodybuilders).
"Steroids will not make you crazy if the tendency isn't there already just as they won't make you a great athlete if you aren't already. Here's what they will do. If you run the 40 (yards) in 4.6, you can get it down to 4.4. If you bench 400 you can increase that to 450. If you have a vertical (jump) of 36 (inches) you might get to 40. But you have to be great to be greater, it's not as magical as many perceive."
Numbers like this are seriously hardcore examples of broscience. Steroids do one thing. They tip the scale for your body in favor of building muscle tissue. THAT IS IT. They don't make you faster by 0.2 seconds or lift 50 more pounds or jump higher... They do nothing of the sort. IF (and its a big if) what you need is to change the environment to build more muscle tissue, then steroids will help immensely. Otherwise they will do nothing or possibly even hurt your performance. Most male sprinters are not losing because they need to build more muscle; short sprints always come down to MaxV which is primarily a function of tendon elasticity, motor control, and the ability of the body to relax in the reach phase. Steroids do nothing here.
Also, don't forget you can put your body in an anabolic environment without adding androgens. The formula is simple. Eat more and lift more. Your body will build more muscle. It will also put on fat. That's why natural powerlifters are incredibly fat. Fred Hatfield (the only man with a legit 1000lb squat) admitted that he used steroids because he "didn't want to have to get too fat". The problem is even worse for the women. Look at the heavyweight female oly lifters. They are like 50% fat. The fewer androgens you have the less willing your body will be to build or maintain muscle unless it's in extreme positive energy balance. That's why athletes who don't have to fit into a weight class share stories where they are somewhat skeptical about the benefits of steroids. Throwers often claim they don't help:
http://espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=joyce/080804The bottom line is if your goal is adding as much muscle tissue as possible with zero fat you need steroids. Thus, the only sport where steroids are completely required is bodybuilding. Additionally pure strength sports which impose weight-class limits will be hard to compete in without steroids. If your a male sprinter who lacks muscle mass and can't put on any muscle while doing the system work required of a sprinter, then they might help you. The biggest post-steroids performance gain was probably Tim Montgomery who was always extremely weak and just too small to accelerate... I don't think Walter Dix's problem is that he needs more muscle tissue... Of course for women.... well most all of them fall into the Tim Montgomery category as far as steroids are concerned.
It's really a common misconception to think that because an elite athlete does something that it helps. Elite athletes are HIGHLY superstitious and competitive. Justin Gatlin uses cryotherapy, wears oxygen boots after training, wears special hologram bracelets that he thinks make him stronger, he drinks special alkaline ionized water, and he used an androgen cream that his trainer thought wouldn't cause a positive test. With the exception of the cream, all the other things have NO clear evidence that they work or are BS pseudo-science. Yet he isn't taking any chances. He uses everything he can and thinks it all works. Did the cream help him? Maybe. But probably not.
On one hand I can't imagine someone squeaky clean like Jeremy Lin taking PEDs. But how the hell is he so quick compared to all the other players out there. He's big and strong as well for his height and weight and something tells me it's not from doing squats and oats. In fact i doubt any NBA player has time for that stuff, so its prob just genetics plus drugs giving elite performances we enjoy today.
Seriously? You can't believe Jeremy Lin is clean? You think his quickness is so otherworldly it has to be from drugs? Newsflash. Jeremy Lin isn't an amazing athlete. Neither is Chris Paul. On any test of athleticism (eg. short sprint, short shuttle, vertical jump, weight lifts, etc) they don't display any amazing ability. But they are really really really good at basketball. Have you ever played with a NBA level player? They are ridiculously good. If you just play pickup basketball with a decent D1 player you will be shocked. With the type of defense that's played in pickup basketball they can just walk down the court and make a 3-pointer from the college line pretty much every time. Seriously they shoot like 80% unguarded. The players who don't even make the NBA are ridiculously good at handling the ball, shooting, etc. Jeremy Lin's technical ability is absolutely ridiculous. Your right that he doesn't get his quickness from squats but it's not from drugs either, it's from genetics and an absolutely ridiculous amount of time spent training at their sport.
For the most part team sports with long seasons don't have much of a problem with drugs. There just isn't time for a elite NBA player to use steroids. The are pretty much player basketball year round; the increased incidence of injury from steroids alone and the hard of time off to such a technical sport makes them not worth it alone.
*** The bottom line is elite male athletes in most dynamic sports are not usually the ones who lacked the ability to put on sufficient muscle. So unless muscle or muscle/fat ratio is absolutely paramount to performance, it's easy to overstate the benefit they provide. The real benefit is more likely to women in dynamic sports or those whose genetics leave them lacking sufficient muscle. Raptor would probably benefit the most from steroids. The one caveat is that this post was about steroids. Of course there are other PEDs. Stimulants have a modest but real benefit to training performance and other drugs have real benefits to endurance sports. There are rumors of drugs which would just drastically change sports performance all around, eg. locally injectible ATP. However, I think these are mostly rumors but if possible we should be on guard for the first 40 second 400m performance.
