[Senip]

Originally Posted by Reach

I completely recognize the fact that some MMA fighters are likely completely clean. Again, it's not like PEDs create talent or skill.

None of those guys have taken wet AAS compounds, which is probably what you associated with steroid usage.

HOWEVER, to be fair here, there are many types of PEDs and lot of these guys could be using the following and you would never ever know:

- hGH at a fairly low dose. The low dose is to avoid gaining water weight (or even excessive muscle weight) which would slow them down. It is mostly used to enhance recovery, allow them to tolerate more volume of work and MOSTLY for tendon strethening/repair. Fighters are like F1 racing cars: high performance but break VERY easily. A common approach is 4-6IU EOD.

- Insulin (mostly humalog or novolog). This is to facilitate recovery by enhancing glycogen resynthesis following training. It isn't used all the time; mostly after the most grueling training days (e.g. a day where they would have both high volume track work and strength training). Peptides are legal and anyone can get this shit at a pharmacy no questions asked. Very hard to detect on a piss test. Ez money.

- EPO. The role of EPO for improving endurance is well known. For that reason it is mostly associated with endurance athletes and it is often assumed that it doesn't give anything to the power/strength athlete. That is not true. EPO allows one to tolerate a greater overall volume of work and increases the rate of recovery. In performance athletics, drugs are mostly used to allow the athlete to train more often and with more volume.

EPO is also really fucking easy to get. I have some in my fridge and I've never taken any illegal drugs. I don't take it, but I'm just saying. XD

- Testosterone. Some synthetic steroids might be used far away from competition (if the athlete doesn't live in a country that conducts random testing) but testosterone is the most comonly used AAS to improve strength and power. It is much easier to pass the drug tests when using testosterone, especially since some natural compounds can decrease the testo/Epitesto ratio that is used to test for testostetone use. A lot of athletes can get away with 50mg of testosterone propionate or suspension every 3 days without testing positive... some races can even use much higher doses of testosterone than that because they lack the enzyme UGT2B17 which increases testosterone excretion in the urine. Approximately 60% of Asians have very low levels of this enzyme. More than 50% of the individuals having low levels of enzymes can take 300-400mg of testosterone per week and not test positive.


And doping tests are super easy to beat.

Many countries/federation do ''home tests'' for their athletes. So they know EXACTLY when they need to stop using XYZ substance and which one they can keep taking without testing positive. Each physiology is different so this gives top athletes (as it is very expensive) the insurance of being able to use without risking testing positive.

A lot of the people who design drug tests are hired by some countries/federation to explain how to beat the tests.

A urine test needs to know the exact chemical structure that they are testing for. It can either be a drug itself or it's metabolites. Any decent chemist can make slight modification to the structure of a drug to make it undetectable (e.g. the clear).

Plus, there's stuff like anavar and other things, where it's so mild that it just...won't show up, but it's still an edge.