Investigate the role of technology in performance enhancement, including training monitoring tools, performance-enhancing drugs and anti-doping, technological doping, and the ethical and equity issues these raise across athlete populations

What this sub-topic is asking

NESA wants you to explain how technology is used in elite and developmental sport, the anti-doping framework that draws the line between acceptable and prohibited enhancement, and the ethical and equity questions that emerge when expensive technology, performance-enhancing drugs, or specialised equipment confer advantages. Strong responses pair specific named technologies and policies with reasoned ethical analysis.

The answer

Technology in sport spans monitoring (helping the coach and athlete train smarter), performance enhancement (legitimate equipment and nutrition), prohibited substances and methods (covered by the World Anti-Doping Code), and the broader equity question of who has access to what.

Training monitoring technologies

Modern sport uses technology to measure load, recovery, technique and physiology. Common categories:

• GPS units and accelerometers. Worn by team-sport athletes during training and games. Measure distance, speed, accelerations, decelerations. Inform load management and conditioning planning.
• Heart-rate and HRV monitors. Chest straps and wrist monitors measure heart rate continuously. Heart-rate variability (HRV) is used as a proxy for autonomic recovery; lower HRV correlates with under-recovery.
• Force plates. Measure ground reaction force during jumps, sprint starts and lifts. Used to monitor neuromuscular readiness and to flag fatigue or asymmetry.
• Video analysis. Sport-specific software (named generically) lets coaches review and tag match footage for tactical and technique work.
• Wearable sensors. Sleep monitors, body-temperature monitors, biochemical wearables (e.g. continuous lactate or glucose monitors in development).
• Athlete management systems. Software platforms aggregate training, wellness, injury and performance data across an athlete or squad.

These technologies are legal and widely used at elite level. Access to them is a major equity issue (covered below).

Performance-enhancing drugs and anti-doping

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) maintains the World Anti-Doping Code and publishes the annually-updated Prohibited List. In Australia, the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA, now part of Sport Integrity Australia) implements the code domestically.

The Prohibited List categorises substances and methods by:

• Substances prohibited at all times. Anabolic agents (testosterone, anabolic steroids), hormones and growth factors (EPO, growth hormone), beta-2 agonists (with permitted thresholds for inhaled asthma medication), hormone modulators, diuretics and masking agents.
• Substances prohibited in competition only. Stimulants (amphetamines), narcotics, cannabinoids, glucocorticoids by certain routes.
• Substances prohibited in particular sports. Beta-blockers in shooting and archery.
• Prohibited methods. Blood manipulation (blood doping, autologous transfusion, EPO use to raise haematocrit), gene doping, chemical and physical manipulation of samples.

Why each is prohibited: combination of demonstrated performance enhancement, demonstrated health risk to athlete, and contravention of "the spirit of sport". A substance must meet at least 2 of these 3 to be banned.

Anti-doping testing uses urine and blood samples, in and out of competition. The Athlete Biological Passport monitors blood and steroid markers over time to detect patterns consistent with doping even when no positive test is returned.

Blood manipulation and EPO

EPO (erythropoietin) stimulates red blood cell production. Increased red cell count raises oxygen-carrying capacity and endurance performance. EPO use was widespread in endurance cycling in the 1990s and 2000s before testing improved.

Direct EPO detection (urine and serum tests) and indirect detection (the Biological Passport) have substantially reduced overt EPO use in elite endurance sport. The history is a clear case study: a powerful enhancer with serious health risks (blood viscosity, cardiovascular strain) became practical to detect, the policy framework caught up, and the sport's outcomes shifted (though challenges remain).

Gene doping

Gene doping is the use of gene therapy techniques to enhance athletic performance (e.g. introducing genes for muscle growth, endurance factors). Currently it is technologically nascent at competitive scale, but WADA has explicitly included gene doping in the Prohibited List. Detection is an active research area.

Technological doping

Some technologies are legal in some sports but contentious because they confer clear advantages:

• Specialised running shoes. Carbon-plate running shoes (released into the running market from around 2017 onward) measurably improve marathon times by approximately 1 to 4 percent for trained runners. World Athletics has subsequently regulated shoe stack height and plate composition. The "shoe doping" debate illustrates how a legal technology can reshape competitive outcomes.
• Swim suits. The LZR Racer-type polyurethane swim suits of 2008-2009 generated dozens of world records before being banned by FINA in 2010.
• Specialised time-trial bicycles, skinsuits and helmets. Permitted within UCI rules; access remains expensive.
• Altitude tents and chambers. Permitted by WADA; expensive and equity-limiting.

The pattern: a technology enters the market, federations either ban or regulate to maintain competitive integrity, but the gap between athletes with and without access can be substantial in the interim.

Ethics and equity

Several distinct ethical questions:

• Athlete welfare. Performance-enhancing drugs carry health risks; the framework protects athletes from coerced or peer-pressure use.
• Fair competition. The "spirit of sport" rationale: spectators and competitors expect outcomes to reflect training, skill and effort, not pharmacological advantage.
• Informed consent. Anti-doping rules of strict liability mean athletes are responsible for everything in their body, even from contaminated supplements. This raises difficult cases.
• Equity of access. Expensive monitoring technology, specialised footwear, altitude chambers, sport-science support are concentrated in well-funded national programs. Developing-nation athletes compete at structural disadvantage. This is an ongoing equity question without an obvious policy solution.
• Gender and research bias. Most sport-science research has historically been conducted on male athletes; female-specific dosing, training and recovery findings are under-researched.

The HMS framing rewards students who acknowledge competing considerations rather than treating "anti-doping" or "technology" as univocally good or bad.

Examples in context

Example 1. The Athlete Biological Passport. Introduced by WADA in 2009 (initially in cycling), the Biological Passport monitors blood and steroid markers over an athlete's career. Departures from individual baselines trigger investigation even without a positive substance test. It is widely credited with reducing EPO use in elite endurance cycling and is a worked example of how anti-doping policy adapts to technological challenges.

Example 2. The LZR Racer swimsuit (2008-2009) and FINA's response. Polyurethane full-body swimsuits introduced major aerodynamic and buoyancy advantages. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the 2009 Rome World Championships, dozens of world records were broken. FINA banned non-textile suits effective January 2010 and added thigh and shoulder coverage limits. The episode is a touchstone example of "technological doping" and the policy response.

Try this

Q1. Identify three categories of substance or method on WADA's Prohibited List and give one example of each. [3 marks]

• Cue. Substances prohibited at all times: anabolic steroids, EPO, growth hormone. Substances prohibited in competition only: stimulants (amphetamines), narcotics. Prohibited methods: blood doping (autologous transfusion, EPO use), gene doping, sample manipulation.

Q2. Evaluate the equity implications of carbon-plate running shoes for elite marathoners. [5 marks]

• Cue. Carbon-plate shoes confer measurable advantages (around 1 to 4 percent running economy) and were initially expensive (AUD 350+). Well-funded athletes accessed them first; developing-nation athletes had limited access in early years. World Athletics regulation (2020 stack-height limit, requirement of commercial availability) addresses but does not eliminate the equity gap. Comparison to LZR swimsuits: similar dynamic of advantage-then-regulation. The equity issue remains for any new technology between market entry and broad accessibility.

Q3. A junior athlete uses a contaminated supplement and tests positive for a banned substance. Explain the principle of strict liability and discuss whether it is fair in this case. [5 marks]

• Cue. Strict liability holds the athlete responsible for any prohibited substance in their body, regardless of how it got there. Rationale: closes the "I didn't know" defence that would make anti-doping policy unenforceable. Criticism: punishes athletes who took reasonable precautions; advanced verification of supplements is not universally available. Tribunals may reduce sanctions if the athlete proves no significant fault or negligence. The principle is widely seen as necessary for the policy to function, but produces hard cases.