You probably read the question and immediately answered ‘no’; and if you did, you’re not alone. The vast majority of the people I’ve spoken to over the past few weeks didn’t even stop to think about it. They had an innate idea that doping meant cheating and lying and was therefore wrong - with no way around it. This image was strengthened further two weeks ago by Lance Armstrong’s doping confession. A storm of anger and disappointment was unleashed by the story (even in Varsity). At the same time it showed how little people actually know about what doping entails, as for many it has come to be seen as a practice involving ‘magical’ substances that give an athlete superhuman powers.

But this is where our emotions and moral beliefs blind our vision: despite being powerful, these substances do not make an athlete superhuman. For the drugs used by Armstrong, such as EPO or testosterone, thicken the blood, raising the red blood cell counts, which increases the amount of oxygen delivered to muscles, thus improving endurance and recovery. The one thing they don’t do is take the pain away. On the contrary, they make the sport more painful because they enable athletes to push their bodies for longer. In his autobiography, former Tour de France contester Tyler Hamilton wrote that EPO actually makes sport fairer, because it grants ‘the ability to suffer more; to push yourself farther and harder than you’d ever imagined, in both racing and training’. It does not take away the spirit of the sport, on the contrary - it allows those athletes who are willing to take the pain to push until the end.

As controversial as it sounds, I think doping can make sport fairer. We all want to think that sport is about athletic prowess and sheer determination, but we forget how inherently unfair it already is. We overlook the importance of genetic predisposition, which prevents some athletes from reaching the top regardless of how much they want it or fight for it. We don’t think about how different athletes benefit from facilities, training regimes and sports gear of different standards, although they can make all the difference between winning the race and finishing last. We don’t think there is anything wrong with some of the other means used to promote recovery, such as taking nutritional supplements or training at altitude. But caffeine and Nurofen Cold&Flu (which caused the gymnastics gold winner at the Sydney Olympics to be stripped off her medal), which are ubiquitous in our daily lives, were banned until a few years ago. Doping should be seen in the same light as any of these other techniques for gaining an edge over the opponent rather than subjected to arbitrary lines between substances.

Doping bans are meant to be in the interest of athletes’ health and the potential health complications caused by certain substances seem to justify them. But athletes who dope already choose to face these risks anyway, only without medical supervision. We could take the just deserts approach and say they deserve to suffer the consequences as punishment for cheating in the first place. But that would put at risk a lot more athletes than you might think. A study conducted in the ‘90s by Professor Goldman on athletes of Olympic standard asked whether they would take a drug that would guarantee sporting success but would result in their death in five years’ time. More than half of the respondents said ‘yes’. This proves that we can never set the penalties high enough to completely deter doping - the competitive edge is too high and getting away with it is just too valuable.

One of the major arguments against legalising doping is the fear that doing so would force athletes who wished to compete clean to give up or give in. Instead, these people suggest, we should educate the athletes and the public about the benefits of competing clean, as well as develop state-of-the-art tests that leave nothing unnoticed.

This plan is fundamentally flawed however as the benefits of being ‘clean’ are not compelling enough and scientists are constantly playing catch-up with their tests, as new ways of enhancing performance keep developing further. The fairest solution to both athletes and the public is therefore to only ban performance-enhancing drugs that continue to pose health risks even when taking under medical supervision and legalise everything else. This would decrease the health risks posed by doping illegally with minimal medical support and also allow all athletes access to the same level of performance enhancing drugs, levelling the playing field. Unpopular as this might be from a moral standpoint, doping is not as straightforward a matter as it may initially seem and the rules need to evolve to take account of that. So next time you have a conversation about it don’t be too quick to judge. Awe-inspiring skill and determination can be found within all athletes, not just those who pass the doping tests.