Bending the Rules, It's A Way Of Life As We Know It

    Since there is not much new to report on my running or prostate cancer issues this week, and I worked a lot, I decided to write about something that's been in the news quite a bit lately. Since I'm a running nerd, my news feed may be a little different than the mainstream news. I'm talking about taking advantage of the "gray area" regarding prescription drugs and doping in athletics.
     Some athletes, coaches, and sportswriters have taken issue with the fact that the Nike Oregon Project coach, Alberto Salazar, may have bent the rules, or taken advantage of the "gray area" as far as administering supplements to his athletes. So far there has been no proof that he broke any rules. If anything, what has been shown, is that coach Salazar read the rules very carefully, and did everything he could to make his athletes as successful as legally possible. Some are calling this morally wrong, some call it cheating. I think it's just human nature.
     How often have we heard the phrase, If you aren't cheating, you aren't trying", or "It's not cheating if you don't get caught." Cheating, or breaking the rules, are second nature to us. It's part of our DNA. I wonder how many of these morally offended athletes, coaches, and sports writers have kids playing soccer? Do they raise the same issues when their kids pull on a jersey, or trip someone, to gain an advantage? Youth soccer players are taught at a very young age how to hide jersey pulling or obstruct a free kick. It's still cheating, or at the very least, taking advantage of the "gray area." Many times these little acts do have an outcome on the results of the game. We see the same thing every Sunday during the fall and winter watching NFL games. The defensive backs do everything they can to hold the opposing receivers, and not get caught. This is not cheating if you don't get caught. Offensive linemen do the same thing, holding the defensive player on virtually every play. The announcers often tell us when an offensive lineman gets caught, he needs to keep his hands inside, obscuring the hold from the officials. Again, not cheating if you don't get caught. Again, these rules violations often affect the outcome of the game. We, as fans, spectators, and coaches, accept this. Cheating is part of the game, part of life as we have been taught.
     Every day, the majority of people in California attempt to commute back and forth to work, dance practice, dinner, etc. etc. as fast as we can, when traffic permits. Often times, this includes driving well over the posted speed limit, violating the rules of the road. In fact, violating the rules of the road in California is so accepted and rampant, that if you try to drive the posted speed limit you suffer honks, glares, and the inevitable middle finger. Try driving to Vegas on a Friday evening and just do the posted speed limit. No one does that. Everyone is driving well over 80 MPH all the way to the Nevada state line. Everyone does this knowing if they get caught, they will suffer monetary consequences. Again, we're not cheating if we don't get caught.
     In the world of competitive running, whether it's at the world championship level, or your Saturday morning neighborhood 5k, we all want to do as best as we can. Given that human nature seems to will us to find a way to do our best at virtually any cost we seek ways to be faster. Now, it's obvious we can't cut courses, as most races, even cross country, are using chip timing. We all know the more and harder we train, the faster we will become. This is where the gray area comes into play. There are some supplements that will allow a quicker recovery, enabling workouts to become more intense, more often. Some of these supplements work better than others, some are illegal. The same ego that drives us to beat the other car to the exit, or to grab the jersey to prevent a goal, tells us to look for that edge that will get us up the hill, or around the track a little faster than our competitor. Some of this is illegal, some of it is working the "gray area." I think all of it is human nature, part of our DNA as competitive people, and will continue to happen unless we start changing everything about our lives, doing everything to the letter of the laws, whether we agree with them or not, and that's just not going to happen.
     Now while I'm happy just competing at my best, sometimes winning the occasional medal, I do it cleanly, without knowingly ingesting banned supplements. Of course, I don't go through the USADA website looking for gray areas to exploit, but I do take what my doctor tells me to take for my health and cancer recovery. If post race pizza and beer were the newest, latest and greatest training aid, I would be an Olympic champion.
     One thing I have learned looking through the various cancer treatments that are available, is there are gray areas there too. There are diets, experimental drugs, many things that fall out of the mainstream cancer treatment. Will one of them change cancer in you or me? Maybe, and someone, like Alberto Salazar, who meticulously researches everything on the subject, will figure out a way to make it happen.