Creating a physique that can win at the highest level of professional bodybuilding requires superhuman self-discipline, intense training and genetic good fortune. Increasingly, say the people familiar with the culture and its consequences, it cannot be done without illicit drugs and a willingness to push a body to – or past – its limits.
More than a dozen scientists, trainers, judges and competitors interviewed for this report say that just earning a pro card, an amateur’s ticket to the professional ranks, is very difficult without anabolic steroids. Winning a marquee title drug-free? Several people laughed at the question.
