As information becomes more transparent in the Internet age, it is an indisputable fact that professional bodybuilders use technology universally. I believe that many viewers who have watched bodybuilding competitions will have a question, why do they know that athletes use drugs in bodybuilding competitions, but they repeatedly prohibit it?
As we all know, "it is a three-point poison of medicine", and any drug that leaves the dose to talk about the effect is a hooligan. Bodybuilders use drugs must have side effects, in order to win, every year many bodybuilders because of the use of overdose and various accidents, known to die young bodybuilders there are many, but why this situation has not been stopped and improved so far, but feel more and more aggravated?
Golden Age vs Age of Behemoths
A survey shows that in the United States IFBB professional competition, about 95% of professional bikini athletes will use drugs, and in the United States domestic amateur events, there are actually 70%-75% of bikini athletes will use drugs.
Professional bodybuilders can understand the use of drugs, after all, in the environment of giant beasts, you can't get good results without medication, but is it a bit too much to use drugs in amateur competitions?
In fact, bodybuilding is not without precedent and history of banned drugs, for example: in the 70s, in order to include bodybuilding in the Olympic Games, the founder of The Olympiad Joe. The Wade brothers spent most of their lives working on this, and as a result, the only time they joined the Olympic Games, they were cancelled by the Olympic Committee before they played, and they could only be eliminated.
Moreover, bodybuilding is almost in line with the drug technology and keeps pace with the times, and the variety of drugs is more and more advanced.
Below, I will take the "grandfather" Ronnie as an example to analyze why bodybuilding has become what it is today.
The history of Ronnie's participation in the Olympiad can basically be said to be the process of gradual bestiality, of course, to admit, Ronnie in the natural state, is already very good, why did he use medicine? To use a phrase often said among bodybuilders, "Medication is to push the limits of human beings".
It is said that Ronnie once won the top 10 of the Olympiad in his natural bodybuilding state, Kevin taught him to drink, and Wheeler took him "into the pit" to become a terrier in the bodybuilding circle.
Every year in the Olympiad, Ronnie gained weight and muscle mass, gradually becoming a "Big Mac". But a person's skeleton determines the upper limit of his muscle mass, it is impossible to increase muscles endlessly, if you exceed the amount of muscle that your skeleton can carry, the body will become bloated, and the muscles will not be so tight and perfect, just like Ronnie in the following figure.
Just like a photo, if the original image is sharp, the pixels are very high, then, the appropriate magnification can still be very clear, but it is impossible to enlarge indefinitely, when enlarged to a certain size, the picture will become blurry and distorted, the muscles are the same, more than the amount of muscle they can carry, will also lose the due sense of beauty.
If you have read Ronnie's biography, you should know that he practiced weightlifting and strength lifting in his early years, he has a good strength base and muscle mass, he has a natural state, the arm circumference exceeded 50 cm, because he has a gene that lacks muscle growth, muscle suppressor is a protein that restricts the growth of tissue muscles, people who lack this gene will grow muscles like crazy, this gene is very rare in the population, so there are many people who practice bodybuilding, Ronnie has only one, and people who cannot use drugs can become champions.
It turned out that Ronnie didn't like bodybuilding, and since he knew about bodybuilding, he knew that those who practiced bodybuilding were taking drugs, and he felt that this was very unhealthy, so he had been far away from these people.
But then why did Ronnie fall in love with bodybuilding again? Even see bodybuilding as his life.
The reason is simple, he tasted the sweetness of bodybuilding and enjoyed the taste of success, especially when he won the Olympiad, he fell on the ground and cried, and the joy of success was far more memorable than the dopamine and endorphins obtained through hard training.
If it weren't for his "BoLe" (a gym owner) who found him and decided that he would definitely become a bodybuilding champion and send free gym training, perhaps, Ronnie would not have "entered the pit", and his whole life might have been an ordinary policeman, not the much-anticipated 8-time Olympiad champion, becoming an idol of many bodybuilding fans.
Among them, the benefits and losses, the trade-offs and pros and cons, each different person, may have different choices, maybe everyone will have different answers, but everyone's choice is worthy of respect, after all, everyone's life is their own, not someone else's.
Most people know the positive side effects of medication, but their medication is a last resort, everyone needs health, but professional bodybuilders use drugs not for health.
The photo above is Ronnie. In a photo of Kurman winning the 1991 World Amateur Bodybuilding Championships, he said: "The race was tested on drugs, which was also a random drug test, and the reason I was chosen was because during the weighting process, someone thought I looked too big to look like natural fitness at all. But, of course, I won the race and won my professional card, which I got when I competed the following year. I have a lot of stories to tell about this competition, and I can write a book to tell them. ”
If it wasn't for Wheeler, Ronnie probably wouldn't have known how to use the drug, and as a result, now both of them are crippled, tragic!
Why is it that even professional bodybuilders who know the dangers of medication cannot avoid the harm of medication, let alone amateurs? "Medication is risky", but bodybuilding has developed for so many years, why not ban medication?
I would like to have the following factors:
1. Audience factors:
Who is the bodybuilding competition for? In addition to the referee, that is, the audience, the audience must want to see something that is not usually seen, and people have some curiosity. The world is not without amateur natural bodybuilding competitions, but the muscle mass of natural bodybuilding is limited and cannot bring people a shocking visual feeling.
Moreover, the audiences who can go to the Olympiad to watch the game are not the same audience, they are often bodybuilding enthusiasts, just like what "car club", "audio club", "photography club", they are a very fanatical group of people, they prefer to see the real "muscle monster".
2. Referee factors:
The referee is the master of the game, they decide who can win the bodybuilding championship, often the winner of the new Olympiad champion, it represents a kind of wind direction of the referee, if the big is the standard, you will see Yates, Ronnie, the big Remy These typical, if the line is the standard, then there will be Shaun. Redden's very small number of champions.
But the Orsay has developed to such an extent that the line school is almost gone, and those who are smarter should know that they should develop in a general direction.
3. Opponent factors:
Bodybuilding as a competitive game, not with yourself, but with the opponent, you know, play bodybuilding this group of people, male hormone bursting, but also the most able to endure hardship, the most able to endure pain, very competitive group of people, your opponent will force you to move forward, you want to stop can not. When you are surrounded by giant beasts, you can't do it without medication, and drugs are easy to become addictive, and once addicted, they will form dependence, and finally they will be "kidnapped" by drugs.
As we all know, bodybuilding is a marathon race, the competition is not a day, two days of outbreak, but a year, two years, or even 10 years of self-discipline life. Diet, training, rest must be done to the extreme, there is a joke: "If you are not a werewolf, you really can't play bodybuilding." ”
4. Athlete factors:
Bodybuilding seems to be comparing with opponents, but in essence, it is still compared with yourself, and you must make progress every year, even in the later stage of bodybuilding, the space for annual progress is getting smaller and smaller. Bodybuilders know, especially the Olympiad champions, that they know that the referees definitely want to see themselves differently every year, giving them a bigger visual shock, like "Ronnie turns around and the game ends".
Famous bodybuilders have sponsors, supplementers behind them, they know that they must achieve good results, sponsors will continue to sponsor themselves, the world is very realistic, you are valuable to others, others will continue to support you.
5. Drug company factors:
Drug companies are the biggest pushers behind them, they sponsor competitions, sponsor athletes, because there are interests, if the drug is banned, drug companies have no market, no longer sponsor competitions, athletes do not participate, spectators do not come to see the competition, bodybuilding can not continue to operate. Therefore, the current dilemma situation of "ship difficulty turning around" has been formed.
In summary, it is the above 5 reasons that have created the current situation of bodybuilding today, not caused by one or two single factors, but a combination of form.
However, not only bodybuilding competitions, but also many other sports, especially competitive competitions, often also use drugs, but they often have strict drug supervision and review mechanisms, and if someone violates the use of drugs, it will be severely punished, such as banning, canceling results, and even severe punishment for lifetime bans, so athletes do not dare to take risks easily.
Some people joke that medication and drug prohibition are like the relationship between cat and mouse, with policies at the top and countermeasures at the bottom, and each other is evolving.
In fact, Mr. Olympia's bodybuilding competition has also made changes over the years, such as: adding physical fitness and classical bodybuilding projects, that is, respecting the aesthetics of the public, making adjustments in the general direction, and making bodybuilding as much as possible to adjust to the health aspect.
The dilemma and changes in bodybuilding may still require the participation of more people to solve it together.