Fastest, Highest, Strongest: A Critique of High-Performance Sport by Rob Beamish & Ian Ritchie
Explores the use of drugs and other performance-enhancing practices in sport, tracing the development of the situation through its socio-political history. This work presents a critique of the use of athletes as representatives of political regimes, and the constant striving for medals that has altered the ethos of the Olympic Games.
This was an interesting and thought-provoking read on high performance sport and mostly on doping. Doping is a highly emotional issue and going through its history with a new lens took me out of my comfort zone − and it was fascinating. Beamish seems to have a very clear opinion that anti-doping policies are a…