As I have stated many time: regardless of your stance on the Enhanced Games; its mere existence is pressing potential reforms in doping in Olympic Sport. In a recently published Atlantic article, this is addressed. Will they ever tackle the rampant TUE abuse?! One can only hope. A TUE is a Therapeutic Use Exemption. With one; athletes can take otherwise banned substances in and out of competition when deemed medically necessary. I can tell you, from 40+ years of Olympic and Paralympic coaching experience, there are countless cases of inhalers being used to open up bronchial airways resulting in a higher than natural level of oxygen. There are countless examples where athletes that do not actually have any symptoms of asthma, ADHD, or a host of other real ailments that require meds that are otherwise banned, are getting them, using them, and winning medals because of them. They know who they are, they carry their medals around like they legitimately earned them. Then, when called out, act the victim. We know so many examples of who they are.
Like I said; the Enhanced Games takes this subject to a new and controversial level. It’s not for everyone, but it is taking place in May in Las Vegas. The athletes will be held to every technical rule presently on the books for each sport and discipline, with one exception. They are in a highly supervised medical testing protocol using limited enhancements, and like it or not, they are moving the needle(pardon the pun) forward in high performance sport. Whether the Games succeed or fail on their own is to be seen, but maybe their biggest first success will be to shatter the Olympic world’s far outdated testing and detection efforts. The cheating is winning in Olympic Sport and that makes me sick. Meanwhile, The Enhanced Games has left the room, and decided to play in a new, honest, transparent sandbox. Full stop.
As for the morality argument made against Enhanced Games participation being made by peripheral sports business people: it’s abhorrent to make claims on ethics and morality against Enhancing performance completely outside Olympic sport when it actually just threatens their business models. I hope they rethink their public shaming going forward.
I actually can’t wait to not only see and learn from the performances at the Enhanced Games, I look forward to seeing WADA testing protocols getting completely disrupted, rethought, and relaunched so that the public can stop being deceived by the cheaters in the Olympic and Paralympic sport world.
Recognized or not: A World Record has already fallen by Enhanced Games & Greek Olympian Kristian Gkolomeev in April of 2025 at an Enhanced Games test event in the 50m freestyle. Proof of concept of this experiment was put in ink at that event. World Aquatics did not “recognize” it, but it happened.
Ironic isn’t it that an event openly and carefully allowing enhancements may end up being the catalyst to better testing where they are prohibited?!
Every Four Years™ 