Why Prohibited List Decisions Rest On Three Criteria

The prohibited list is not a list of things that make athletes faster. It is the output of a defined test, and the structure of that test explains several entries that puzzle people.

Two of three criteria are required

A substance or method may be listed if it meets at least two of three criteria: potential to enhance performance, actual or potential health risk, and violation of the spirit of sport.

Because only two are needed, a substance with no performance benefit can be prohibited if it is harmful and considered contrary to the spirit of sport.

Conversely, something that clearly enhances performance may remain permitted if it fails the other two tests. Caffeine is the standing example of a stimulant left off.

The spirit of sport criterion is the contested one

It is a values judgement rather than a scientific finding, covering ethics, fair play, health and respect for rules. Critics argue it is too elastic to operate as a legal test.

Defenders point out that the alternative, a purely pharmacological list, would fail to capture practices that everyone recognises as cheating but that produce no measurable benefit.

In practice it is rarely decisive on its own, since a substance usually needs two criteria and the other two are more tractable.

Masking agents are banned on a different logic

Diuretics and similar substances do not improve performance and may impair it, but they can conceal the presence of other substances or dilute a sample.

They are listed because the detection system itself is the thing being protected. Undermining testing is treated as equivalent to doping.

This is also why methods, not only substances, appear on the list. Tampering with a sample and manipulating blood are prohibited as methods regardless of any substance involved.

In-competition and out-of-competition lists differ

Some substances are prohibited only in competition, because their performance effect is acute and their presence at other times is not relevant to fairness.

Others, particularly those that build capacity over months, are prohibited at all times. The distinction follows the mechanism of benefit rather than the severity of the substance.

Thresholds apply to a small number of substances, allowing incidental exposure below a defined concentration to avoid producing an adverse finding.

The list is revised on an annual cycle

Proposals are gathered from stakeholders, reviewed by expert groups and published in advance of the date they take effect, so athletes and physicians can adjust.

Monitoring programmes sit alongside the list, tracking substances of interest without prohibiting them, in order to gather usage data before any decision.

That staged approach means listing decisions are usually preceded by years of observation, and removals happen too, though far less often than additions.