Racing against doping.
Many substances are abused in sport, some detectable and some not. The high financial rewards of sporting success are driving increasing investment in clandestine efforts to create new undetectable doping products and practices. Some prohibited substances, such as erythropoietin (EPO), an endurance drug, and human growth hormone (hGH), a strength and recovery drug, are naturally present in the human body; therefore their use is very difficult to detect. Widespread abuse of these and other performance-enhancing drugs is suspected, though the true scale is unknown. The result for sport is an uneven playing field, an environment where athletic success is shadowed by suspicions of cheating, and a significant degradation of the ideals that sport imparts on society.
ADR is ‘fighting to save the soul of sport’ by focusing its primary mission on the scientific pursuit of new advances in anti-doping. In order for drug testing to address doping effectively, the technology must exist to identify all current and future forms. Resources for research and development in this field have traditionally lagged far behind those of the cheaters. ADR seeks to change this dynamic by establishing a $20 million research endowment.