Faster, Higher, Richer—But at What Cost?

A while ago, I wrote about the fascination with chasing immortality. People are spending fortunes on an unwinnable battle because our end date is set, and there’s not much we can do about it. In that post, I mentioned the Enhanced Games — a competition where athletes can win $1 million for breaking world records using performance-enhancing substances.

This past weekend, I read an essay in The Wall Street Journal titled “Faster, Higher, Stronger – and Pumped Full of Drugs.” The essay highlighted a Greek swimmer, Kristian Gkolomeev, who broke the 50-meter freestyle record previously held by the Brazilian César Cielo, who set the mark of 20.91 seconds in 2009. Gkolomeev completed the distance in 20.89 seconds, but since he used performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs), his record is not official.

César Cielo was about to turn 23 when he set the world record, while Gkolomeev is 32. The drugs helped close the age gap and shave off 0.02 seconds—or 20 milliseconds. Not really worth it, considering he just lost the ability to represent his country in the next Olympic Games or any professional competition governed by world swimming organizations. At least he earned $1 million, which was his motivation after 14 years as a pro, during which he made about $200,000 total.

He said that he’ll be competing next May in the Enhanced Games in Las Vegas1, where the organizers plan to feature swimming, track, and weightlifting events. If Gkolomeev wins again, he’ll collect another $1 million. The essay also mentioned that U.S. world champion sprinter Fred Kerley will compete in the track events during the games.

I understand that people will do all kinds of things to earn enough money to sustain themselves and their families. I don’t really blame the athletes testing the waters with performance-enhancing drugs in hopes of winning millions of dollars in the Enhanced Games, but I do question the ethics of the people promoting this cause.

According to the essay, the Enhanced Games have no corporate sponsors or broadcast deals. Their revenue streams are based on selling training plans and supplements. I’m sure there’s more to the story. Back in my April post, I mentioned a German billionaire who contributed to a $101 million fund supporting scientific initiatives to slow aging and is backing the Enhanced Games. I also read that 1789 Capital, an American venture capital firm where Donald Trump Jr. is currently a partner, is investing in the games. The 1789 Capital website says, “Funding the Next Chapter of American Exceptionalism.”2 I’m not sure that’s the kind of exceptionalism I want to see, but I guess many people do.

There are all kinds of ethical questions raised by PEDs regarding fairness, health risks, role models in society, and integrity. But I also wonder how many young people will see this and think, “Hey, that’s a nice way to make money. I’m just going to drop out of high school or college and pursue this.” These young people might be putting their lives in danger, trying different drugs in order to become superhuman and rich.

Are we reaching a point where choosing the “easy wrong over the hard right” has become a way of life and a business model—where wealthy individuals use their resources to continue exploiting those in search of a better future? Is that really the next chapter of American exceptionalism?

  1. https://www.enhanced.com/events#event-details ↩︎
  2. https://1789capital.vc ↩︎

93 thoughts on “Faster, Higher, Richer—But at What Cost?”

  1. Greek swimmer Kristian Gkolomeev just shaved 20 milliseconds off a 50m freestyle record using PEDs—but lost Olympic eligibility. Chasing $1M in the Enhanced Games, he’s betting on drugs over legacy. Ethics, health, and fairness… is this the future of sports?

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  4. I do not want immortality. Once I die, I hope to battle God for his kneecaps. Rat bastard took mine, so I’m stealing them back. Go buckeyes.

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  8. Oh, what a sad story this is. I agree with and understand your point about people trying to make money, but we don’t know what effect these PEDs will have on people long term, do we? I just can’t fathom potentially compromising my fertility and future family for athletic glory.

    We humans have been doing this for a longggg time, as evidenced by the history of gladiators, and probably history before that. I just wish that we, meaning all of humanity, would evolve out of this stupidity.

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  9. There are two major issues at play here, but both revolve around priorities.

    First, we see the issue of prioritizing accomplishing a feat to creating healthy, sustainable forms. It’s an issue ingrained in our fitness culture as a whole, but this type of monetization teaches kids that it’s ok and even societally preferred that we sacrifice our longevity in favor of completing a task.

    Second is the issue of selling entertainment as opposed to values. Good information is almost always tougher to market because it simply isn’t as fun. It’s easier to be bad, promote extreme, and encourage dispute because these negative acts generate attention and promote conversation, yielding opportunities to profit.

    It’s particularly interesting you start with the concept of chasing immortality because I find that many of the people promoting these lifestyles and habits forego their long run best self in favor of short term feats that yield irreparable damage.

    Thanks for the article!

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    1. You’re very welcome, and thank you for reading and commenting. This is a great point, “It’s easier to be bad, promote extreme, and encourage dispute because these negative acts generate attention and promote conversation, yielding opportunities to profit.” Thank you for sharing that, because I think this is one of the main issues surrounding this subject. Regarding your last point, some of the people providing funding and promoting this event are experimenting with different methods to extend their lives. One, in particular, spends millions every year in pursuit of immortality.

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  11. Most professional sports deal with skills and fitness focii that people in certain lifestyles or certain occupations needed in order to survive. The ones with the best skill or endurance lived the best life or helped make their community more successful.

    Now the focus is competition, money and fame. A total turn around from earlier purpose and focus.

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    1. I totally agree with your comment. It’s completely different from what the Greeks intended when they held their first games. Part of the problem is us, the consumers, who will pay anything to watch a particular event. So they keep testing how much more we’re willing to spend, to the point where it’s becoming ridiculous how much money teams are willing to pay for players to keep fans happy.

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  12. PEDs are very dangerous. They damage the user physically and mentally. When I worked in mental health, we received a patient on the inpatient psychiatric unit who was so violent and psychotic, medication rarely calmed him down. He was a handful that disrupted the unit and jeopardized the safety of staff and patients alike. We ended up sending him to the Arizona State Hospital, which was the only place equipped to handle him. His father owned a gym, and he liked to work out with weights, and it was finally determined that he was using steroids to beef himself up. He pulled out of it eventually, but it was an extremely dangerous situation.

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    1. Thank you for sharing the impact on mental health, Dawn. That’s a subject that isn’t mentioned enough when discussing PEDs. My first exposure to the topic was through a documentary about its effects on professional wrestlers. Some of them were losing their minds, became super aggressive, and some even committed suicide. Horrible!

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  13. You ask important questions, Edward. My children, who all have advanced degrees, were discussing if AI and the number of jobs it will take over, makes an education worth the cost. So many questions of ethics and value these days.

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    1. Thank you, Mary, and what a great discussion. I was reading an article about that topic this morning. AI will definitely reduce the number of jobs associated with administrative tasks such as secretaries, clerks, administrative assistants, and schedulers. However, healthcare providers, teachers, scientists, and other highly specialized professionals will still be needed. Data presented by AI needs to be analyzed, and even the queries used to obtain information from AI systems require human interaction. The article reminded me of Microsoft Excel, everyone used it to create beautiful tables, but only experts knew how to truly use the program. Humans will always be needed to make AI work, and that will create many new and different kinds of jobs. People need to adapt to change and move into AI enabled jobs.

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        1. Mine was running, and I found out pretty quickly as I was getting older that running every day was not smart. The body suffers when we overextend ourselves. Thank you for sharing your experiences, Robbie.

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            1. True, but the pressure is on because some people start talking about players being old in the NBA, for example, when a player is in their early 30s. If that’s considered old, then I’m ancient. 😂

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  16. I think it’s going to be that way unfortunately. Everywhere I look it’s fake news, AI doesn’t help either. Also the media is controlled by the billionaires so there’s a slant to the narratives being portrayed. Americans need to do a deep dive into everything to gain the truth.

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  17. It’s quite befuddling to me that the people promoting, contributing to, or investing in the Enhanced Games are so oblivious to the consequences of the ‘athletes’ – particularly the ones who don’t win the big bucks no matter how much PEDs they use. The list of dangerous physical and psychological effects is lengthy. It’s maddening that the answer your last paragraph questions are – some folks will choose ‘easy wrong’, some businesses run on this model, and some wealthy people seem to get a joy out of the suffering of others. Thank goodness it’s not all of us, only some, yet it’s deeply disappointing.

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    1. I’m thinking that most professional athletes are going to reject the whole Enhanced Games idea. My main concern is the kids coming out of high school who might be tempted to go that route in search of easy money. I’m sure the promoters and supporters of these games don’t really care about the athletes and have agreements to avoid liability in case something happens. Very disappointing indeed. Thank you for your comment, Rose.

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  18. I too thought about the influence this has on younger athletes while reading your article. These decisions certainly blur the lines. Thank you for sharing this interesting and potentially dangerous trend.

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        1. Terrible! The whole thing around Lance Armstrong’s decision was really sad. His family, reputation, and life as an athlete were all destroyed by the urge to be the best at all costs. Thank you for sharing those examples, they perfectly capture the issue.

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  22. A lot to consider here, Edward! In a world that demands immediate results, the “easy wrong” way seems to be the readily apparent answer. And this actually seems “clever” in a society lacking values and morals and where illusion, deceit, and manipulation abound. Again, discernment (something you touched on in your previous post) is key. Yet in a lower consciousness collective, that’s hard to find. The only way is to bring awareness to this abnormal, inhumane way, like you are doing here, and hope it will illuminate somehow the minds and the settings. Another great post, my friend. Always insightful and a call to a greater truth for humankind. Ultimately, we need better humans, not faster, higher, and richer at all costs. With deep appreciation and gratitude, sending light and blessings your way ✨🙏🍀

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    1. Thank you, my friend. I couldn’t agree more about the need for better humans. I think necessity is pushing people to forget boundaries in their pursuit of happiness, which they equate with being rich, instead of the true happiness as you and I understand it. Confusing the true meaning of happiness allows wealthy manipulators to exploit that confusion to make more money. It’s indeed a sad and vicious cycle that doesn’t promote a healthy humanity. As always, I truly appreciate your presence here and your great insights. 🙏🏼

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  23. Good grief – this feels like the opposite of inspiring. Exceptionalism only in exceptionally dumb. I agree that the promoters of this bear the responsibility for exploiting anyone that participates. Gah!

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    1. Sadly, I know you are right, but I’m holding on to hope that things will change at some point. I think this is starting with sports, but it will expand to other areas. If they can find a way to push these drugs to the point that they are undetectable, then I can see them promoting their use to nurses so they can stay awake and energized for 48 or 72 hours, as well as to the military and others.

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  29. Great post, Edward. The lengths people go to are quiet unbelievable while closing their eyes to the effects it has worldwide. How about Victor Conte dying and the whole steroid scandal. They should level the playing ground and do away with all of this to assure this isn’t part of the equation, IMHO. xo

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    1. I agree with you, Brad. But the experimentation part is my issue, well, besides the ton of money that the rich are making off these athletes. They are pouring millions into research, and it’s only a matter of time before they find the right drug protocol to avoid detection. I get the sense that they are using these athletes for that purpose.

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  32. Interesting topic, as always Edward. I’d say my current lens is environmental sustainability. How does this development help us improve the environment? I think it does not even improve human life long term. Drugs are a short term answer. The enhanced games do not interest me. They are artificial and useless. (Next I’ll say how I really feel. ; )

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    1. Thank you, Rebecca, and I’m looking forward to reading what you really think about this. 😂 The problem with these people is that they’re also exploiting natural resources by funding the mining of rare minerals and building data centers that consume vast amounts of electricity. So not only are they putting human lives in danger, but they’re also endangering our planet.

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        2. Your rhetorical question at the end is perfect. I wonder if the darkness of the world of young people also encourages them to rile the dice in their future.

          That said, I am a man without ambition at this stage of things, except to show kindness and love, and do some modest good.

          Though I accomplished more than I expected or imagined, Beethoven, Shakespeare, and Rembrandt seemed well beyond my gifts.Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel Prize winning psychologist, thought aiming too high was more than likely fail. He recommended relationships as a better part of what would benefit ourselves and others.

          Thanks for another thoughtful essay, Edward.

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          1. Thank you very much, Dr. Stein. Those are wise words, and showing kindness, love, and doing good are also my aims as I pass the half-century mark. Your point about “darkness…rile the dice in their future” is interesting. At a minimum, we as a society are selling the notion of an easy life, where a young person deserves a six-figure salary as soon as they graduate from college, regardless of their degree, plus a house, a car, and everything else that took us almost a lifetime to achieve. Something is wrong somewhere, but I can’t pinpoint what it is. Maybe it is everything that encompasses the “darkness of the world.”

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  33. So much to dissect here Edward. American Exceptionalism. Ugh. Athletes prostituting their lives to the nth degree. Ugh. The pure ethics of it all. Triple Ugh. The funny thing about is that I do think about fandom has its limit. I can’t see everyday fans caring much about the Enhanced Games. Maybe some billionaire idiots, but I can’t say I have much desire to see any of these parties chase their five minutes of fame. I’ll pass.

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    1. I agree with you, Brian. I don’t think everyday fans are going to pay much attention to this. It reminds me of when the WWE created the XFL football league, which lasted about a year. This is going to be another pastime for the rich. My concern is the young people. If they already put their lives in danger for the perfect selfie for their TikTok and Instagram followers, can you imagine how much this thing could drive them to do?

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