As Ben Pakulski contemplates the future of steroids in bodybuilding and powerlifting, he evokes the 2011 Bradley Cooper movie Limitless. In the film, Coopers character, a struggling writer, takes a pill that expands the limits of his mental capabilities. Its certainly not as simple as Hollywood made it out to be, but for Pakulski, a former IFBB Pro League bodybuilder who hosts the popular Muscle Expert Podcast, the central premise of the film provides at least a loose template for what the future might look like. Imagine a performance enhancing drug that can heal wounds or soothe sore muscles almost instantly, or imagine a pill that can directly trigger muscle growth and fat loss. Thats what some athletes and bodybuilders are looking for in steroids.
As science and genetics develop, Pakulski and other experts believe that the steroids of today, which have lingered in the background of competitive powerlifting and bodybuilding for decades, will soon be a thing of the past. Today, these drugs broadly target muscle-building pathways in the body and often come with crippling hormonal side effects that doctors like Thomas OConnor, aka the Anabolic Doc, have to confront in his office multiple times per day. Those compounds, which date back to the mid20th century, are always going to be around, OConnor says, because they work, phenomenally, and theyre accessible on the internet.
The future, however, points toward more specialized drugs, which can be tailored to the bodys specific needs. Right now, those next-gen performance enhancing drugs include SARMs (selective androgen receptor modulators), which are essentially anabolic compounds that promise fewer steroid-related side effects; designer steroids, which are specially formulated by chemists in labs; peptides, which are molecules that activate hormone pathways in the body; and also testosterone replacement therapy, nootropic compounds designed to maximize brain function, and eveneventuallythe idea of editing genes to maximize performance.
How safe are all these things? Thats something we cant really say for certain at this point, in part because the science is still in its early stages, and in part because its difficult to study them too closely because theyre still viewed as tabooparticularly within competitive sports. And the potential for abuse, especially among amateurs who may not have the proper knowledge or the professional guidance, is still a serious concern.
Some of these new things have created a lower barrier for abuse, says one well-known powerlifter and strength coach, who prefers to remain anonymous. Its kind of like they get their toes wet with this stuff, and it becomes a gateway into them taking something more potent.
In an effort to understand what the future might look like, we spoke to several experts about what they see on the horizonand how best to understand the benefits and the risks.
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The Future of Steroids and Performance Enhancers - Muscle & Fitness
