Blood testing in the sport of boxing is absolutely crucial for numerous reasons. None more important than the safety of athletes. Unfortunately, these drug tests are being minimized by only associating them with Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao. But, these drug tests are much bigger than the sport’s top 2 stars. They are crucial to preserving and restoring the integrity of this sport. They are crucial for preserving life and limb. Let’s examine further:
How much do USADA drug tests cost? Safety and Cheating The most important reason for blood testing is to protect the safety of the athletes. Whether it’s an athlete that cheats or a clean athlete, blood tests can be used to screen for numerous items in effort to protect the individual. In the specific case of PEDs, blood testing is superior than urine testing alone. Urine is unable to detect big-time performance enhancers like HGH. Let’s pretend that there are numerous boxers that use PEDs (which is not too far-fetched). In the current drug testing landscape, the state commissions don’t even test for HGH, EPO, and other PEDs because they don’t do any blood tests. How are you going to protect the clean athlete when you don’t even try to catch the cheaters who take the PEDs that can only be detected with blood tests? When speaking with USADA’s Travis Tygart, he had the following to say about the current drug testing procedures: “Don’t go half way. Going half way only penalizes clean athletes. Either test for everything or don’t test at all. There’s no in between.” Even if the state commission don’t actually go through with the blood tests, Tygart suggests they should at least give fighters the option of blood tests: “At least let the fighters have the right to do blood testing. You don’t have to spend any money on this. At least the athletes will know there’s a chance of blood tests and a chance of getting caught.”
