Young Wrexham

Drugs and Sport

Sport is about competing and performing to the best of your ability, cleanly and fairly. In recent years, competitive sports people have used drugs to boost their performances and give them an unfair advantage over rivals. Many subsequently discovered to have done this have been stripped of championship medals. Some have been banned from competing in their sports for the rest of their lives.

The use of drugs is cheating, it undermines the fundamental spirit of sport and severely damages the integrity, image and value of sport. If you can't win without using banned substances or methods, then you are simply not good enough to win.

Participating in sport drug-free can help to improve quality of life beyond sport by enhancing important life skills and knowledge, including dedication, fairness and a greater respect for one's own health and well-being. Competing in sport drug-free should be important to all athletes, but those who compete in high performance sport have additional responsibilities they must follow to make sure they compete fairly and don't break the rules.

Start Clean

• Start Clean is a drug-free sport education programme for young people in the UK, which aims to raise awareness and understanding of the value of participating in drug-free sport
• Young athletes competing at the top level should be aware of the rules of anti-doping and what they need to do to ensure they compete drug-free
• They must also be careful that they don't make a mistake in taking a banned substance
• Many common medications contain prohibited substances so you should always check if your medication is banned or permitted. You can do this via the Drug Information Database

The Global Drug Information Database (Global DID)

• The Global Drug Information Database (Global DID) is an online service that provides athletes and their support personnel with fast and accurate information about which drugs and other substances are prohibited under the rules of sport
• Visitors can search the Global DID for sport-specific information on products sold in the United Kingdom and Canada
• The site also contains information on the classes of substances that are prohibited in sport, therapeutic use exemptions and tips for athletes who train and compete abroad
• There is a prohibited list of substances and methods that applies to athletes that compete in sport
• The prohibited list contains example of the substances that are prohibited in sport and athletes should be familiar with the different classes of substances and methods that they should not use