Every four years, we get to witness an incredible spectacle where top athletes from around the world gather to compete in the Olympic Games. These athletes work incredibly hard to qualify, pushing through injuries, jet lag, and all kinds of weather just to earn a spot on their team.
Every tiny fraction of a second or centimeter can make the difference between standing on the podium or missing out entirely. So, athletes and their coaches are always on the lookout for anything that might give them a slight edge over their rivals.
As technology advances, it becomes a bigger part of every part of our lives, and sports are no different. But there’s a big question here: when does using technology in sports go too far and turn into “technological doping”?
Technological doping is kind of a grey area where technology boosts an athlete’s performance beyond what they could naturally achieve, possibly giving them an edge that’s not exactly fair. Remember the 2008 Olympics when swimmers wearing those Speedo LZR Racer suits smashed 13 world records? Those suits were eventually banned because of the unfair advantages they provided.
Still, it’s tough to figure out what’s just a natural progression in sporting equipment (like the use of carbon fiber in kayaks) versus something that actually gives athletes abilities they wouldn’t normally have.
Nowadays, about 500 million people worldwide are rocking some form of wearable tech like smartwatches or rings. So many of us use these gadgets because they give us clear data about our health and fitness – stuff like steps taken, hours of sleep, or calories burned.
Imagine an athlete and coach gearing up for the Olympics. They’ll be using all sorts of data to monitor performance long before the actual event. Take a sprinter, for example. They might use smart insoles to figure out how long their foot stays on the ground during a sprint. These measurements relate directly to how fast they can run.
Now, picture a scenario where this athlete gets to try out a new shoe prototype. They notice that their ground contact time drops while their speed picks up. So, does this mean the shoe’s responsible for the improvement? Or is it all in their head? Tough call.
First off, you’d need to examine what materials the shoe’s made from. Is there something out of the ordinary, like a super-charged spring to propel the wearer forward? If that’s cleared, scientists might run tests in a lab to see how these shoes hold up compared to the ones other athletes typically wear.
Even if the new shoes show better performance in tests, it doesn’t automatically mean they’ll be banned from competition. Take the Nike Vaporflys, for instance: Kenyan runner Eliud Kipchoge wore them when he smashed the two-hour marathon barrier in 2019. Though research showed the Vaporflys performed better than others, there wasn’t a clear biomechanical reason why.
Scientists figured these shoes helped with running economy, but they also found that not everyone benefited equally. It seemed to depend on how each person ran. Because of this, sports organizations like World Athletics have set rules to keep the playing field fair.
The real ethical issue with technological doping is fairness. If one athlete can outperform another just because they have access to expensive wearable tech, it might undermine the true spirit of sport. Fair access to such technology is critical so that technological advancements improve the sport overall and not just favor the few.
To tackle this, sports bodies like World Athletics and World Aquatics need expert opinions to assess wearable tech fairly. Many already follow this practice. Regular testing should be done to understand how new technologies affect performance and ensure they don’t boost abilities unfairly.
By combining expert advice and thorough testing, we can keep competitions fair and uphold the integrity of sports.