In 2023, Aron D’Souza, founder and CEO of the company Enhanced, unveiled his plan for a global sporting competition in which athletes could take any performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) that they wanted to. He called it the “Enhanced Games” and described it as the future of human performance. The idea had been floated around theoretically for years prior, but nobody had made any moves to put it into action until then. Now, three years later, this competition is officially set to take place in Las Vegas, Nev. on March 21.
Some have referred to it as ‘the Olympics on steroids’; others have more bluntly called it a ‘dope show’. Either way, the competition and its founder have quickly become a center of controversy in the sporting world.
The games will function as a four-day competition, with athletes competing in three different sports: weight lifting, swimming and track and field. Unlike a typical athletic competition, however, they come with a twist: athletes are invited, even encouraged, to take PEDs. They are sponsored in large part by Donald Trump Jr., who has donated millions of dollars from the 1789 Capital fund.
The games are self-advertised as “a global annual competition that celebrates human potential through safe, transparent enhancement.”
The company produces and sells a variety of PED products advertised as improving strength and performance, such as testosterone and other steroids. Athletes who participate in this competition are not required to use any drugs, but if they chose to, only FDA-approved products are permitted.
During the four-day athletic event, dozens of athletes will compete in weight-lifting, track and field and swimming competitions. The list of athletes includes numerous notable names, including swimmer Cody Miller, a former Olympian, as well as former Olympic runner Fred Kerley.
These athletes have faced serious backlash, as other athletes and sporting organizations worry that the Enhanced Games sends a dangerous message to young athletes: PEDs are safe, or at least, the harms can be minimized.
However, it has quickly become clear that Enhanced’s ambitions do not stop with the sporting world. These games are more than an athletic competition– they are a massive commercial endeavor to normalize and promote PEDs to the general public.
“Findings indicate that the Enhanced Games leverages sport as a vehicle to market [Testosterone Replacement Therapy] (TRT).. This underscores its ambitions to extend beyond the sporting arena, positioning the organisation as a commercial actor within the broader biomedical, wellness, and longevity sector,” a study by sports and health professors Luke Cox and Imran stated. As they expand, they endorse and provide drugs such as TRT that have ordinarily been closely regulated.
One of the biggest controversies surrounding the games is the common fear that they will encourage younger athletes to take or explore PEDs and diminish their potential risk in the public eye. PEDs can have serious negative effects on individuals, including mood changes (often referred to as ‘roid rage’) and detriment to organs such as the heart and liver. The 50 athletes competing have been idols for the youth in their respective sports, and by participating in such an event, they may inadvertently encourage their fans to explore PEDs.
The athletes who choose to participate in the games, regardless of whether or not they take PEDs, sacrifice years of credibility and dedication in order to compete. Many anti-doping organizations have spoken out about this, and other organizations have expressed their disapproval in other ways. World Aquatics, for example, has stated that any athlete who participates in the Enhanced Games, regardless of whether or not they participate in doping, will be banned from all future World Aquatics events. The organization did this because they view participation as endorsement, even if the athlete does not use any type of PED.
Naturally, the question is why they would ever choose to do that, and the answer is what it most often is when it comes to things like this: money.
The simple reason for participation is that professional athletes do not get paid enough. Caeleb Dressel, who does not support the games, strongly expressed this sentiment but understands that swimmers especially are hard-pressed to make a living off of their sport alone. The Enhanced Games seem to be a solution, as D’Souza is offering a million dollar prize for the athletes who break world records. This is a huge motivating factor. This may explain why so many swimmers are participating in the games, as both Miller and Ryan have cited economic reasons as their main deciding factor.
The problem with that is that it inadvertently sends the message that personal risk is worth financial reward. It isn’t. The first issue is that anabolic steroids, the ones most overused and abused by athletes, are not well-researched. While the short-term gains are great, there are dozens of negative long-term effects. Naturally, because the games are sponsored by a company that specializes in PEDs, they tend to draw more attention to the upsides than the downsides. It is true: anabolic steroids can help athletes gain muscle quickly, and may assist with faster recovery times. However, they also cause a variety of issues, from mental impact to weakened or damaged reproductive capabilities.
A study from ‘Body Image’ Drugs: A Growing Psychosomatic Problem” Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics examined the impact of anabolic steroids on the brain and found that “anabolic steroids, for example, may cause manic or hypomanic symptoms, sometimes leading to criminal behavior, violence or even homicide]. Withdrawal from anabolic steroids can induce prominent depression, sometimes associated with suicidal ideation or even completed suicide” (Kanayama, Gen, et al).
James Magnussen, former Irish Olympian, recently went viral for his drastic transformation as a result of steroid use. The 34-year-old swimmer has put on pounds of bulky muscle and almost appears comically large. From the outside, his gains seem impressive. He is swimming faster and getting stronger, things he has proudly posted about on Instagram for his followers to see. As of May of last year, he reported that he had experienced no negative impacts. Magnussen has amassed quite the social media following as a result of his prominence in the athletic world, which means that hundreds of thousands of people view his posts and are exposed to the idea of doping as positive and safe. This sets a dangerous precedent as it neglects the risk of high-pressure experimental doping. Athletes like Magnussen paint doping in a positive light, arguing for its safety despite the inherent danger.
The Enhanced Games are doing more than showing what happens to athletes when they compete using PEDs. They are advertising steroid use to younger athletes, normalizing PEDs and creating a commercial platform by running these games through a company which specializes in PEDs. This creates a dangerous perspective on the harms of PED use, as younger athletes see the changes that steroid users undergo and start to idealize them.
