Through the years and many sports, doping culture has been quite present. Whether it be cycling, mma or a variety of other events man has always been in pursuit of finding something to give him a competitive edge. In late 20th century and early 21st even doping control was often a question of measuring an IQ, Victor Conte once said. But through the modernization of protocols and advances in chemistry it has become much tougher and yet still fallible process.
Just released Netflix documentary Icarus stumbled upon a crucial figure in the entire scandal surrounding the Olympic games – doctor Grigory Rodchenkov. Rodachenkov himself is a former athlete who was once regularly injected by his own mother?!
What begins as a filmmakers attempt to test the st*roid effect on his own performance in a cycling race quickly becomes a fascinating tale of a Russian insider- former head of Russian Anti-doping center. Rodachenkov is quite a charismatic lead as he explains exactly how the systematic abuse in Russia came to be.
Rodachenkov revealed the procedure with which the contemporary version of KGB, FSB replaced both A and B samples of urine with clean ones resulting in a stunning number of Golden medals for Russia in Sochi.
Mr Rodchenko, a chemistry graduate, said he had created a cocktail of three anabolic steroids to be consumed with alcohol that helped athletes recover quickly from tough training regimes to be in peak condition for competition races.
What the Sochi operation shows, he says in his letter to Wada, is that the entire global anti-doping system is “broken beyond repair”.
While the moral and political implications of the scandal have yet to be really explored it is a riveting story of how fair play has all but disappeared from sports.
As Rodachenkov helps the filmmaker cheat the system, he says, “You are you what you are, I am what I am.” If Icarus’ vision of sports is true, it’s a whole lot of indifferent amorality that leaves us wondering are sports events just a competition of who can cheat better.
