Could you cheat?

OK, I am a few days behind on this - but I finally got around to watching the Panarama programme "Catch me if you can". Now I am sure you are all aware of this intriguing and fascinating piece of investigative journalism by the time you read this, however for those of you that aren't I will write a quick summary and urged you to seek it out on the BBc IPlayer!

The programme follows Scottish journalist - and amateur athlete - Mark Daly, in his quest to uncover holes in the WADA blood passport system. Astonishingly, without any medical help or guidance of professionals, he manages to 'beat the system' and improve his performance through taking EPO. Not only that, but he also documents and looks at a series of allegations of drug use and systematic cheating by a number of athletes over past decades, and suggests that athletics super-coach Alberto Salazar - who trains amongst others, Mo Farah - may be involved in cheating the sport.

Watching the documentary on Sunday afternoon, after completing my own training run, I found it difficult to comprehend how easy it was, and also how rife a problem it would appear that the abuse of the system could be.

Then, on the back of viewing a programme about catching out the cheats in sport, I turned over to Sky Sports 2 and watched one of the hardest working, and cleanest sportsmen in the world in his quest to break another world record. Yes, Bradley Wiggins smashed the hour time trial and set a new record of close to 55 kilometres. The contrast between the immense feeling of joy I had spectating history in the making, and the allegations of Panarama couldn't have been more stark.

It got me thinking, and convinced me that I had to write a blog as a way of rambling on about my feelings on the issue of doping.

To really understand the rationale behind an athletes decision to become a doper, I suppose you have to try and put yourself in their mind frame - what possible justifications could they have? Let's have a look:

• Steroids, or other drugs, will make me stronger - Wrong. If you take drugs, it does not make you a stronger person. In fact, it couldn't be further from the truth. By taking a banned substance you are admitting that you are in fact a very weak person, with no will power to improve the hard way.
• I'm only a cheat if I get caught - This is the one that I really, really struggle to et my head around. How can somebody cheat so blatantly, and then stand in front of a camera and try to pull the wool over everybody's eyes and deny the lot? To be the sort of person that would do this must mean that they have some sort of different psyché to the rest of us. I know for sure that I could never bring myself to hide in full view of the public behind a web of lies!
• I only cheat because I want success more than everyone else - Wrong again. In my opinion anybody that can take these sort of shortcuts to success doesn't want it any more than the next person, in fact it shows that they want it less than others. I say this because those who really want to improve enough to win things and be successful are prepared to put in then hard yards and all the painful hours in training. Those that cheat simply can't be bothered to suffer as much as the rest to reach the level that they aspire to.

I have been running now for nearly 4 years and have taken a great deal of pride in how far I have come along so far. I have worked tirelessly and continue to try my hardest every week to push myself out of my comfort zone and keep improving. Never in my wildest dreams could I ever bring myself to cheat - eventually they all get caught out anyway - but even so, deep down they must realise that all their 'gains' and improvements are false? They are not real achievements and surely the cheats must even realise this themselves deep down?!

I would much sooner take the pain and the time and all the miles training to get as good as I can, rather than take a few injections and speed up the process. I may never win an Olympic medal, but atleast I will know that all my achievements are real and can't be taken away from me.

In fact, going back to the documentary, Mark Daly found a very interesting quote in an archive article from the Times back in the 1980's which said something along the lines of "if you line up in the blocks and you aren't on something, then you might aswell be in plimsoles, whilst the rest are wearing spikes"...

...in which case, can't we just bring the plimsoles back please? I wonder if I could find myself a pair in orange...