June 30, 2025 • 35 mins
A conversation with Aron D'Souza, PhD. He is the President of the Enhanced Games. The Enhanced Games are a privately funded sporting body that seeks to allow athletes to compete under performance enhancement under lucrative compensation arrangements.
Dr. D'Souza discusses the main proposition and goals of the Enhanced Games and he provides his position on the conflicts of interests that exist in traditional sport.
We talk about the recent world record that was broken by Kristian Gkolomeev in the 50 meter freestyle and the potential for athletes to reap prize money for reaching world records.
We discuss the degree and prevalence of enhancement in existing sport.
Finally Dr. D'Souza lays out his thoughts about the future of sport and were Enhanced Games will be in just a few years.
About Aron D'Souza, PhD:
https://arondsouza.com/
About Enhanced:
https://www.enhanced.com/
https://www.enhanced.com/the-team
Enhanced on Instagram
@enhanced_games
Follow Us:
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Twitter: https://twitter.com/EventHorizonTv
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Dr. D'Souza discusses the main proposition and goals of the Enhanced Games and he provides his position on the conflicts of interests that exist in traditional sport.
We talk about the recent world record that was broken by Kristian Gkolomeev in the 50 meter freestyle and the potential for athletes to reap prize money for reaching world records.
We discuss the degree and prevalence of enhancement in existing sport.
Finally Dr. D'Souza lays out his thoughts about the future of sport and were Enhanced Games will be in just a few years.
About Aron D'Souza, PhD:
https://arondsouza.com/
About Enhanced:
https://www.enhanced.com/
https://www.enhanced.com/the-team
Enhanced on Instagram
@enhanced_games
Follow Us:
Facebook: https://Facebook.com/EventHorizon.Tv
Twitter: https://twitter.com/EventHorizonTv
Instagram: https://instagram.com/eventhorizon.tv
YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/EventHorizonTv
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The intersection of endurance, sport, health, fitness, and life, following
the evidence where it leads with the science of self
propelled motion. This is the Endurance Experience podcast, powered by
Event Horizon dot TV and hosted by Tony Rich.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Today I'm speaking with doctor Aaron Desuza. He is the
president of the Enhanced Games. He is educated at Oxford
and holds a PhD in intellectual property law. He's the
author of three books, and he is also an athlete himself,
(00:45):
playing rugby while at Oxford. So, the Enhanced Games is
a privately funded sports endeavor where athletes openly take performance
enhancing substances. The lore for the Enhanced Games is really
big paychecks. They just dished out a one million dollar
(01:07):
prize to a swimmer for breaking a long standing record
in the fifty meter freestyle. You'll see in the conversation
that doctor Desuza has indicated that the oversight of the
substances are done in such a way to ensure health
(01:31):
and efficacy of the athletes. And so, just to preface
this conversation, I am a certified coach with the governing body,
and so as such I always promote clean sport and
athletes should continue to follow World Anti Doping Agency policies
and rules and all the rules of their governing bodies.
(01:54):
So I have this conversation with doctor Desusan not as
an endorsement of any practice or the Enhanced Games. Really,
I really do it out of an abundance of curiosity.
When I heard about the Enhanced Games in the media recently,
(02:16):
I had so many questions and I look at this
sort of like an examination. Really, if you're not paying
attention to this, this could be something that could really
get legs right, given the amount of money that is
(02:38):
out there and the potential for athletes to chase that money,
which is a really powerful motivator. So I talked to
doctor Desuza about the Enhanced Games, the core proposition of it.
(03:00):
We talk about the World Anti Doping agencies three pronged
criterion for banned substances and what he believes about it.
Doctor de Suza talks about water and the IOC and
the apparent conflicts of interests. We talk about the prevalence
(03:23):
of performance enhancing substance that's currently baked into quote unquote
clean sport. Very interesting conversation and more say in my
brief afterward. So my conversation with the president of the
Enhanced Games, doctor Aaron Desuza. Doctor Aaron Desuza, thanks for joining.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Me, Thanks for having me on the show.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
So Enhanced. I heard a lot about Enhanced in the
meetia recently, and it really was basically on every feed
and it's gotten some high profile press and some of
the media, major media public publications, and I've seen some
(04:17):
positive response, some negative response. And you guys actually did
Joe Rogan as well, right, you guys were wrong with
him for a couple of hours. So let's, you know,
just pretend our listener community just dropped in from another
planet and they just heard about the Enhanced Games. Tell
(04:40):
our listeners the general premise behind it, how did it start,
the team behind it, and if you can't talk about
some of the responses and reaction you've gotten thus far, well.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
The Enhanced Games is a simple concept. We believe in
science and we believe in technology, and we believe science
and technology we should be fully integrated into sports. That
is a view that is very different from the traditional dysfunctional,
corrupt people who run international sports like the Internationallympic Committee
(05:15):
and FIFA and many other governing bodies and The idea
of the Enhanced Games is simple. It didn't come from me.
It came from leading bioethesis professors at Oxford University. Articles
in Nature and Wired magazine have argued for more than
(05:36):
twenty years about the inclusion of performance enhancements in sport,
and I only made it into a reality. And I
did that by finding you know, my theory of social
change is very simple. Change only happens when someone puts
suit on and goes to work every day trying to
solve a problem. So we announced the concept of the
(05:58):
Enhanced Games about two years ago. Since then, we have
broken the most important world record in swimming. We've secured
a host city in Las Vegas to host the first
Games in May and twenty six. We've raised funding from
the biggest investors in the world, including Peter Teel, krishnange Meyer,
and Blaji Shan of Austin. We have support from the
(06:20):
Trump family Donald Trump Juniors a major investor in our company.
And we've just gone from strength to strength. And you know,
we are building not just the future of sport, but
a whole new version of humanity. We are literally building
the world's for superhumans.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Wow, Okay, and so you've probably seen the reaction from
the IOC and WADA. They did an entire response, well
not an entire response. They issued a statement on their
(06:59):
it was their extreme. But for many years, Water has
had a criterion UH for inclusion on the on the
banned substance list. It's it's a very simple three category criterion.
Something is added to the banned substance list if it
(07:22):
has the potential to enhance performance. That's pretty straightforward. The
second criterion is it represents an actual or potential health
risk to the athlete. And then the third criterion is
it violates the spirit of the sport. That's sort of
(07:44):
vague and subjective. But the second one, how does enhance
games going to control for the potential health hazard component?
Are you going to be supported by teams of doctors?
(08:06):
How do you how do you execute the case?
Speaker 3 (08:09):
So every athlete who competes in the Enhanced Games, whether
they're natural or enhanced, asks to undertake a full system
health checkout, So they need blood work at cardiograms MRIs
to ensure that they're healthy and safe to compete. UH.
This ensures that no athlete is putting their health at
risk and of their subject continuous health monitoring. However, going
(08:31):
back to WATA standard, let me let's let's discuss health risk. Right.
Who are the two longest serving sponsors of Team USA
at the Olympics?
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Do you know? Yeah, I'm not aware.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Coca Cola and McDonald's, two organizations that have done more
damage to public health than any other entities in the
totality of human history. Coca McDonald's are probably responsible for
over one hundred million deaths. They are the principal sponsors
of Team USA. In Europe, the largest sponsors of organized
(09:07):
sport are alcohol and gambling companies, two organizations again that
have done unbelievable damage to public health. And so for
the IOC and WATA to come out and to me
and suggests that what we're doing is unhealthy, I say,
look at yourself, right, you are literally sponsored by the
companies doing the most damage to public health in the
(09:28):
entire world, and the scientific literature does not support your claims.
So Professor David Nottt at Imperial College London has publishing
in the Lancet in twenty twelve did the most comprehensive
analysis of the all cause risks associated with recreational and
performance drugs and the highest risk drug was alcohol. Number
(09:49):
two was heroin. Cannabis and tobacco to other socially acceptable compounds,
have a much higher risk than self administered anabolic steroids.
Yet we view these as being highly problematic in the
international sports community. And so I would point to creatine
as an example. So in nineteen ninety five, when creatine
(10:13):
first came out, it was reported on by the sports
federations as being a super steroid, being so dangerous that
it couldn't even be considered. They gave anecdotal reports of
people dying from the use of creatine. Yet today creatine
is seen as a almost essential supplement, particularly for brain help.
(10:37):
It is available on Amazon, at Whole Foods, at Joe
and the Juice, and has become a mainstay of our society.
And let's analogize this another way. The sports federations are
saying that performance enhancements violates the spirit of sport. This
(10:57):
would be like Arvard or Oxford University saying that. And
this is what they said to me when I was
a student at Oxford twenty years ago, that there was
something very special about handwriting and that all of our
exams had to be handwritten because that was part of
the intrinsic history of the organization, right. And if we
(11:21):
don't allow handwriting, if we course handwriting, then we won't
allow the typewriter. And if we don't have the typewriter,
we would never get the computer. And we didn't get
the computer, we wouldn't get artificial intelligence. And that is
what has happened in sports, an artificial technology cap imposed
by WATA that has had society wide implications. So the
(11:42):
fact that WATA has effectively halted the development of performance
enhancements has meant that human beings are not aging as
healthy as we should be, society is not performing at
the optimal levels because the small group of Swiss beercrats
have stopped the core innovation mechanism of human performance.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Yeah, I think you're onto something in that the question
of what should be banned is a sort of moving
target over time. Science is always changing and adapting in principle, Yeah, everything.
(12:29):
There are many things that quote unquote enhanced performance. If
a you know, a marathon, or is in a in
a race, taking gatorade, uh.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
Wearing shoes, Wearing shoes as a performance.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
We've been having We've been having an argument over the
last five, five, five, eight years about so called super shoes, right, uh,
and then the super shoes were were regulated, and then
so equipment rules. I mean then it's still larger conversation
(13:05):
about what is actually unfair with respect to well what
humans can.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Yeah. So I believe that the Olympics are beautiful because
they're the ultimate avenue of human competition. But the IOC
has never had competition itself, and so we are creating
choice for athletes and for viewers and for sponsors. If
you believe in a natural world of sports, go to
(13:34):
the Olympics. But to the IOC, I say, be natural, right,
get rid of the super shoes, Get rid of the
shoes at all, right, get rid of professionalism. Right to
go back to what the spirit of sport meant when
Baron Pierre to Corporatan invented the phrase in eighteen ninety six,
it meant an amateur athlete. Right, So from eighteen ninety
(13:57):
six until nineteen ninety two, if you had ever taken
a dollar professional compensation, it was viewed as being against
the spirit of sport, undermining the integrity of sport. It
was cheating, It was ungentlemanly, and it was banned and
you know, look what they did to Jim Thorpe. And
(14:17):
the IOC does not have a moral like to stand on.
And so this we've had this argument in sports before,
and professional athletes went out of over amateur athletes. Why
because professional athletes are a lot more interesting, They're better,
they're faster, they're stronger, they have longer careers. And athletes
want to be professionals. They want to make money, right,
(14:40):
and no one cares about amateur athletics anymore. And I
think the same is going to happen. Professionals overtook amateurs,
Enhanced athletes will overtake natural athletes.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
So you think that that will that will happen, So
this concept will eventually serp the quote unquote the natural
way of competing is that is that the end goal
for the team.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
Or no, Our end goal is much larger. Our end
goal is to create a world in which everyone has
the opportunity to live enhanced. Our goal is not to
replace the Olympics. Our goal is to create a world
in which everyone has the opportunity to live enhanced. Our
mission is not just to create super athletes, it's to
(15:33):
create superhumans. And I believe that aging is a disease
that we can treat, cure, and eventually solve. I think
the greatest gift that I will give to the world
is when not a twenty one year old breaks the
same bolts world record, but a thirty year old, forty
year old, maybe even a fifty year old, because that
will fundamentally change what we understand about the nature of
(15:54):
our society. And I think the natural consequence of that
is that the Olympics will become a smaller, less less
important global event because they can't just keep going around
bankrupt in countries posting this one hundred billion dollar event.
It's a total waste of tax payer money. And I
(16:15):
think it will come down to something that's very deeply
wired in human psychology, which is we only want to
see the best of human performance. No one watches F two,
everyone watches F one. No one watches minor league ball,
everyone watches major league ball. Why because we only want
to see the very best. And so at the enhanced Games,
we have the fastest athletes in human history. Who's going
(16:37):
to want to watch the old slow Olympics? Then?
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Right? Interesting, So let's talk about that. Some of the
results that you've gotten thus far, so now you have
the Yeah, you have an athlete in swimming that has, yes,
broke the.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Fifty free style world record, the most important record in swimming.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
Right, And that record was twenty eighty nine. And how
far off was the was the previous world record.
Speaker 3 (17:13):
Two one hundreds of a second, but it stood for
sixteen years, right, right? And so you know what I
point to is that and Cedar or Schabello, the previous
folder of the world record, I believe was twenty two
years old when he said it, and Christian Glomev was
thirty one when he broke it, so Christian was arguably
ten years past his prime as a swimmer. It is
(17:35):
now the fastest in human history. That's the promise of
performance medicine. Right. The same bolts world record is sixteen
years old. Now the mile world record is twenty five
years old. Twenty five years ago we had Nokia telephones,
and now we have iPhones with artificial intelligence built in.
(17:57):
I don't want to live in a world where human
progress stops. I want to live in a world of
unlimited technological potential, where we can solve the greatest problems
in our society. Right, we're talking to each other by
zoom right now, right, this would have been unimaginable two
decades ago. Yeah, sports, because the policies of the International
(18:20):
Olympic Committee have a technology cap right. They are anti innovation,
they are anti science, and they are anti progress. And
we have rejected that narrative and the world believes in
human potential through science. And I think the end result
will be, you know, the Olympics will be like Blockbuster
(18:43):
and word Netflix, or they're like Taxicabs and war Uber
and they will just fade away into the past. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
And it's very interesting right now because there are some
people that believe that there are enhanced athletes already interwoven
into quote unquote natural sport because they believe that they're
just good at timing and evading the disciss Well.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
According according to the research conducted by WATA from professors
at Harvard University, forty four percent of elite track and
field athletes have used banded intencements in the last year
four Now I get this. According to a recent study
published by war of Athletics, the legacy governing body, up
(19:35):
to ninety nine percent of male track and field athletes
have used EPO, which is a banned substance. So it's
not that there are some athletes doing this. It's basically
all the champions are. Of the ten fastest people in
one hundred meter, eight of them have had a doping violation.
(19:55):
Of the top five times in history, only the same
bold does not have a doping violation attached. So tell me,
is it is it that Sam Bolt is just a
genetic anomaly or did he just beat the tests? That's
a good question.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
There many people have asked that ask that question. But
then there's you know, for instance, the one of the
longest standing records in track and field is the is
the Flow Joe record Flow Joe Record. I think it
was ten forty nine and this was pre water, pre Usada.
(20:40):
I don't want to get into the controversy, but there
are many people that have indicated that that was allegedly enhanced.
Although you know, Flo Joe denied that, and then there
was there was some rumblings then, and I think there
was some question as to whether or not her husband
(21:02):
was involved. But yeah, they all denied it. But even
Gail Divers and some of the fastest female sprinters ever
have suggested that they believe vehemently that that's an enhanced record,
and then you have the concept of what's called a
fossilized record, a record that has been achieved with advantage
(21:27):
and no one else can touch it, so it becomes
a fossilized record. So I don't know, perhaps this will show,
you know, if you have an enhanced human and then
they can now touch those fossilized record Maybe that is
an indirect measure as to whether or not it was
(21:51):
an enhanced record.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Yeah, I think so. And ultimately, who wants to be
a Neanderthal when Homo sapiens exist? Or who wants to
be a human one point zero when superhumans exist? And
I think that it will be a case that everyone,
(22:13):
almost everyone will desire to become superhuman. I've made a
study of the time it takes from science fiction to
become scientific reality. So Jules Byrne wrote a Journey to
the Moon in eighteen fifty nine, and it took one
hundred and ten years from this absolute work of science
(22:34):
fiction to become a scientific reality where Neil Armstrong was
stepping foot on the moon hal nine thousand and two
thousand and one of Space Odyssey takes about fifty years
to get to Alexa Jetsons with the robot vacuum cleaner.
Takes about fifty years to get to the Rumba and
the X Men Marvel universe, where we are in a
(22:54):
world where there are individuals with superpowers. It's about fifty
years old now, and so I think it's right time
in an era where people like Ben Lamb at Colossal
are bringing the dire Wolf from an extinct specie back
to life, and it's working on the Wooly mammoth to
(23:15):
where we have GLP one drugs that are that will
cure obesity in our lifetime. To really believe that now
is the time for super humanity. And yes, the Olympics
can be the guardians of old, slow, natural sports, but
we will be the proponents of fast, modern enhanced humans
(23:39):
and push our civilization to a whole new level.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
Okay, yeah, this will be interesting to see how this unfolds.
A seat with your popcorn at a minimum is going
to be needed. So, how many many athletes are there now, right?
And is it right now? Primarily swimmers? How many other
(24:06):
athletes are about to join the enhanced.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Well, so the ask the question of why swimmers have
signed up in such great numbers for the enhanced games.
It's because swimming is the second most participated sport in
the world after running, right, Yeah, swimming, The average swimmer
probably only earns thirty or forty thousand dollars a year.
(24:33):
The best swimmers in the world might only be making
a few hundred thousand dollars a year. Certainly there are
nowhere near the league of baseball players, basketball players, football players.
Why is this is because world aquatics, in their own
corruption and dysfunction, to protect their own broken old monopoly,
have done everything they can to stifle competition. There was
(24:56):
the International Swimming League, backed by the Ukrainian billionaire Constantine
Grammatikov and one hundred million dollars to build a new
swimming league, and Water Aquatics did everything they could to
stifle that. Water Aquatics is doing the same thing to us,
and we are fighting back. And why are they scared?
Because swimmers are demanding payment. And when we awarded one
(25:19):
hundred a million dollars to Christian Galoma for breaking one
hundred fifty free style world record, every swimmer in the
world woke up and said, wait a minute, I want
to get paid like that, and I deserve to get paid,
And so We spend a lot of time now talking
about performance enhancement, but we haven't talked about the economics
of sport. It's so unfair that the IOC president literally
(25:40):
lives into palace in Switzerland, flies around the world in
private jets, has an entourage befitting ahead of state, Yet
the average US Olympian only earns thirty thousand dollars a year.
The finest specimens of our specie are exploited and underpaid
by the broken Olympic system.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
So okay, so the lure of money is strong. Who
do you anticipate next? Do you think runners and what
I call the racer? I think I think racers. This
is something primed for the racer. So a racer I
(26:20):
can see absolutely they're not paid a lot when you
look at them compared to NBA, NFL. What about what
other sports do you think would be amiable to this, Well.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
We're focused on the objective sports with the lowest infrastructural costs,
so swimming, track and weightlifting. At the first games. However,
like if you're the best badminton player in the world,
or you're the best shot putter, you're the best shooters,
these people earn literal nothing. And I believe that we
(26:55):
could capture virtually all the Olympic sports by offering a
better compensation model because we have a better underlying business model,
which is we are not reliant upon selling media rights
and ticket sales and filling out stadiums. We make our
money by selling drugs. Right. We have an online telehealth
platform which is our principal monetizer, because we aim to
(27:19):
become the principal distribution platform for human enhancement products.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Yeah, and people don't realize that Olympians don't really get paid.
I think you get something like twenty five grand if
you get a if you get a gold medal, that
you get something like twenty five grand.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Twenty five grand if you're in the United.
Speaker 2 (27:45):
States, if you're in the United States.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Yeah. So one thing that I'm immensely proud of is
that World Athletics, because of the pressure of payment from
the Enhanced Games, paid fifty thousand dollars for a gold
medal Parislympics. What Aquatics steadfastly refuse to pay anything. And
they have consistently fought back against athlete compensation. Why because
(28:11):
all these old fogies who run these legacy legacy governing
bodies all come from an ara of amateurism. They still
believe that athletes should not be paid, that it's ungentlemanly
to be paid. And it's a great system of slavery
because if you're not paying the value creators, i e.
The athletes, who gets the money the bureaucrats, the bureaucrats
(28:34):
on those ons which one right, they're the ones who
are buying business class everywhere. They're they're staying in five
star hotels while the athletes are sleeping on cardboard beds
without air conditioning.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Yeah, exactly. I mean you train, you train so much
every day as an athlete to get to the Olympics,
to try to get tenths of a second fact faster,
thousands of a second faster. And not everybody gets sponsorships.
(29:08):
Only a very small percentage of even the fastest olympians
gets lucrative sponsorship portfolio. Sometimes there are people still working
nine to five jobs and then trying to be the
best in the world and they don't get paid.
Speaker 3 (29:26):
So people just and you know, I'm not critical of
the NBA, the NFL, you know, the NFL commissioner. I
think it's paid like thirty million dollars a year is
a fleet of private jets. That's okay because the player
is earning even more than the commissioner. But in the
system where the bureaucrats earn more than the athletes, there's
something really wrong. And you know, the world is very
(29:50):
critical of CEOs who get overpaid relative to their workers.
But this is exactly the system, the system of bondage
that has beeneered by the International Olympic Committee, and it's
morally undefensible. And how do they maintain it. They maintain
it by having this monopoly structure and squashing any competitors.
(30:13):
And you know, we are the world's first, you know,
we're the world's first credible competitor to the internationally the committee.
For one hundred and twenty years, no one has ever
tried to take these people on, and we've managed to,
you know, and we have now the support of the
biggest investors in the world, the most powerful political family
in the world, and they're running scared.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Yeah wow, Well, you've been very generous with your time.
Before you go in five years, what are people going
to be saying about enhanced.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Oh, we're going in five years. I hope that we
live in a world where everyone has the opportunity to
become enhanced, whether you're an athlete or not, every person
has the right to become enhanced and to overcome our
biological limits.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Wow. All right, So your website is enhanced dot com.
Where can people find you on on social media.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
And at enhanced on Twitter and on and Enhanced Games
on Instagram And if any of your listeners want to
reach out, you can find me Aaron Desuza on Instagram
Sunday message always re bot to you personally.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
All right, thanks again, thanks again to doctor Aaron Desuza,
President of the Enhanced Games. My time was limited with them,
so maybe I can have them back at some point
in the future. I had so many more questions that
I wanted to touch on and drilled down on, and
(31:51):
so maybe as this develops over the coming months, I
could talk with them again just to see what is
going to happen. How many athletes are going to seek
out that big bag of money and jump onto this.
(32:13):
And then there is the undercurrent of the battle and
conflict between Enhanced Games and IOC and water. Listen to
the statement that the IOC put out on their x feed.
(32:34):
As athletes, we believe that the Enhanced Games, or any
events encouraging the use of performance enhancing substances and methods
are a betrayal of everything that we stand for. Most importantly,
these events undermine the integrity of sport and the responsibility
athletes hold as role models in society. Promoting performance enhancing
(32:57):
substances and methods sends a dangerous message, especially to a
current and future generation of athletes. Such substances can lead
to serious long term health consequences, even death, and even
encouraging athletes to use them is utterly irresponsible and immoral.
(33:17):
No level of sporting success is worth such a cost.
We stand firmly together for the values of fair play,
ethical behavior, and respect, principles that have shaped our journey
and that we believe should guide and inspire the next
generation of athletes. We will do everything we can to
(33:38):
protect the integrity of sport for generations to come. Siesh
battle lines are drawn, so obviously there is a bit
of a conflict brewing here. The IOC just got a
new president. They are under the microscope for a number
(33:59):
of things right now, including the protection of the female category.
That is something that they also came out recently and
made a strong statement about So they're coming out and
making some very strong statements and about the enhanced games.
(34:20):
I will certainly keep an eye on how this develops,
and ideally maybe I can follow up in a few
months with what's happening since Thanks again for listening.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Follow Event Horizon Endurance Sport on Instagram, Facebook, Threads, and
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To become a member of our Endurance Institute, or for
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(34:58):
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the evidence where it leads with the science of self
propelled motion. This is the Endurance Experience podcast, powered by
Event Horizon dot TV and hosted by Tony Rich.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Today I'm speaking with doctor Aaron Desuza. He is the
president of the Enhanced Games. He is educated at Oxford
and holds a PhD in intellectual property law. He's the
author of three books, and he is also an athlete himself,
(00:45):
playing rugby while at Oxford. So, the Enhanced Games is
a privately funded sports endeavor where athletes openly take performance
enhancing substances. The lore for the Enhanced Games is really
big paychecks. They just dished out a one million dollar
(01:07):
prize to a swimmer for breaking a long standing record
in the fifty meter freestyle. You'll see in the conversation
that doctor Desuza has indicated that the oversight of the
substances are done in such a way to ensure health
(01:31):
and efficacy of the athletes. And so, just to preface
this conversation, I am a certified coach with the governing body,
and so as such I always promote clean sport and
athletes should continue to follow World Anti Doping Agency policies
and rules and all the rules of their governing bodies.
(01:54):
So I have this conversation with doctor Desusan not as
an endorsement of any practice or the Enhanced Games. Really,
I really do it out of an abundance of curiosity.
When I heard about the Enhanced Games in the media recently,
(02:16):
I had so many questions and I look at this
sort of like an examination. Really, if you're not paying
attention to this, this could be something that could really
get legs right, given the amount of money that is
(02:38):
out there and the potential for athletes to chase that money,
which is a really powerful motivator. So I talked to
doctor Desuza about the Enhanced Games, the core proposition of it.
(03:00):
We talk about the World Anti Doping agencies three pronged
criterion for banned substances and what he believes about it.
Doctor de Suza talks about water and the IOC and
the apparent conflicts of interests. We talk about the prevalence
(03:23):
of performance enhancing substance that's currently baked into quote unquote
clean sport. Very interesting conversation and more say in my
brief afterward. So my conversation with the president of the
Enhanced Games, doctor Aaron Desuza. Doctor Aaron Desuza, thanks for joining.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Me, Thanks for having me on the show.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
So Enhanced. I heard a lot about Enhanced in the
meetia recently, and it really was basically on every feed
and it's gotten some high profile press and some of
the media, major media public publications, and I've seen some
(04:17):
positive response, some negative response. And you guys actually did
Joe Rogan as well, right, you guys were wrong with
him for a couple of hours. So let's, you know,
just pretend our listener community just dropped in from another
planet and they just heard about the Enhanced Games. Tell
(04:40):
our listeners the general premise behind it, how did it start,
the team behind it, and if you can't talk about
some of the responses and reaction you've gotten thus far, well.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
The Enhanced Games is a simple concept. We believe in
science and we believe in technology, and we believe science
and technology we should be fully integrated into sports. That
is a view that is very different from the traditional dysfunctional,
corrupt people who run international sports like the Internationallympic Committee
(05:15):
and FIFA and many other governing bodies and The idea
of the Enhanced Games is simple. It didn't come from me.
It came from leading bioethesis professors at Oxford University. Articles
in Nature and Wired magazine have argued for more than
(05:36):
twenty years about the inclusion of performance enhancements in sport,
and I only made it into a reality. And I
did that by finding you know, my theory of social
change is very simple. Change only happens when someone puts
suit on and goes to work every day trying to
solve a problem. So we announced the concept of the
(05:58):
Enhanced Games about two years ago. Since then, we have
broken the most important world record in swimming. We've secured
a host city in Las Vegas to host the first
Games in May and twenty six. We've raised funding from
the biggest investors in the world, including Peter Teel, krishnange Meyer,
and Blaji Shan of Austin. We have support from the
(06:20):
Trump family Donald Trump Juniors a major investor in our company.
And we've just gone from strength to strength. And you know,
we are building not just the future of sport, but
a whole new version of humanity. We are literally building
the world's for superhumans.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Wow, Okay, and so you've probably seen the reaction from
the IOC and WADA. They did an entire response, well
not an entire response. They issued a statement on their
(06:59):
it was their extreme. But for many years, Water has
had a criterion UH for inclusion on the on the
banned substance list. It's it's a very simple three category criterion.
Something is added to the banned substance list if it
(07:22):
has the potential to enhance performance. That's pretty straightforward. The
second criterion is it represents an actual or potential health
risk to the athlete. And then the third criterion is
it violates the spirit of the sport. That's sort of
(07:44):
vague and subjective. But the second one, how does enhance
games going to control for the potential health hazard component?
Are you going to be supported by teams of doctors?
(08:06):
How do you how do you execute the case?
Speaker 3 (08:09):
So every athlete who competes in the Enhanced Games, whether
they're natural or enhanced, asks to undertake a full system
health checkout, So they need blood work at cardiograms MRIs
to ensure that they're healthy and safe to compete. UH.
This ensures that no athlete is putting their health at
risk and of their subject continuous health monitoring. However, going
(08:31):
back to WATA standard, let me let's let's discuss health risk. Right.
Who are the two longest serving sponsors of Team USA
at the Olympics?
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Do you know? Yeah, I'm not aware.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Coca Cola and McDonald's, two organizations that have done more
damage to public health than any other entities in the
totality of human history. Coca McDonald's are probably responsible for
over one hundred million deaths. They are the principal sponsors
of Team USA. In Europe, the largest sponsors of organized
(09:07):
sport are alcohol and gambling companies, two organizations again that
have done unbelievable damage to public health. And so for
the IOC and WATA to come out and to me
and suggests that what we're doing is unhealthy, I say,
look at yourself, right, you are literally sponsored by the
companies doing the most damage to public health in the
(09:28):
entire world, and the scientific literature does not support your claims.
So Professor David Nottt at Imperial College London has publishing
in the Lancet in twenty twelve did the most comprehensive
analysis of the all cause risks associated with recreational and
performance drugs and the highest risk drug was alcohol. Number
(09:49):
two was heroin. Cannabis and tobacco to other socially acceptable compounds,
have a much higher risk than self administered anabolic steroids.
Yet we view these as being highly problematic in the
international sports community. And so I would point to creatine
as an example. So in nineteen ninety five, when creatine
(10:13):
first came out, it was reported on by the sports
federations as being a super steroid, being so dangerous that
it couldn't even be considered. They gave anecdotal reports of
people dying from the use of creatine. Yet today creatine
is seen as a almost essential supplement, particularly for brain help.
(10:37):
It is available on Amazon, at Whole Foods, at Joe
and the Juice, and has become a mainstay of our society.
And let's analogize this another way. The sports federations are
saying that performance enhancements violates the spirit of sport. This
(10:57):
would be like Arvard or Oxford University saying that. And
this is what they said to me when I was
a student at Oxford twenty years ago, that there was
something very special about handwriting and that all of our
exams had to be handwritten because that was part of
the intrinsic history of the organization, right. And if we
(11:21):
don't allow handwriting, if we course handwriting, then we won't
allow the typewriter. And if we don't have the typewriter,
we would never get the computer. And we didn't get
the computer, we wouldn't get artificial intelligence. And that is
what has happened in sports, an artificial technology cap imposed
by WATA that has had society wide implications. So the
(11:42):
fact that WATA has effectively halted the development of performance
enhancements has meant that human beings are not aging as
healthy as we should be, society is not performing at
the optimal levels because the small group of Swiss beercrats
have stopped the core innovation mechanism of human performance.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Yeah, I think you're onto something in that the question
of what should be banned is a sort of moving
target over time. Science is always changing and adapting in principle, Yeah, everything.
(12:29):
There are many things that quote unquote enhanced performance. If
a you know, a marathon, or is in a in
a race, taking gatorade, uh.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
Wearing shoes, Wearing shoes as a performance.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
We've been having We've been having an argument over the
last five, five, five, eight years about so called super shoes, right, uh,
and then the super shoes were were regulated, and then
so equipment rules. I mean then it's still larger conversation
(13:05):
about what is actually unfair with respect to well what
humans can.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Yeah. So I believe that the Olympics are beautiful because
they're the ultimate avenue of human competition. But the IOC
has never had competition itself, and so we are creating
choice for athletes and for viewers and for sponsors. If
you believe in a natural world of sports, go to
(13:34):
the Olympics. But to the IOC, I say, be natural, right,
get rid of the super shoes, Get rid of the
shoes at all, right, get rid of professionalism. Right to
go back to what the spirit of sport meant when
Baron Pierre to Corporatan invented the phrase in eighteen ninety six,
it meant an amateur athlete. Right, So from eighteen ninety
(13:57):
six until nineteen ninety two, if you had ever taken
a dollar professional compensation, it was viewed as being against
the spirit of sport, undermining the integrity of sport. It
was cheating, It was ungentlemanly, and it was banned and
you know, look what they did to Jim Thorpe. And
(14:17):
the IOC does not have a moral like to stand on.
And so this we've had this argument in sports before,
and professional athletes went out of over amateur athletes. Why
because professional athletes are a lot more interesting, They're better,
they're faster, they're stronger, they have longer careers. And athletes
want to be professionals. They want to make money, right,
(14:40):
and no one cares about amateur athletics anymore. And I
think the same is going to happen. Professionals overtook amateurs,
Enhanced athletes will overtake natural athletes.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
So you think that that will that will happen, So
this concept will eventually serp the quote unquote the natural
way of competing is that is that the end goal
for the team.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
Or no, Our end goal is much larger. Our end
goal is to create a world in which everyone has
the opportunity to live enhanced. Our goal is not to
replace the Olympics. Our goal is to create a world
in which everyone has the opportunity to live enhanced. Our
mission is not just to create super athletes, it's to
(15:33):
create superhumans. And I believe that aging is a disease
that we can treat, cure, and eventually solve. I think
the greatest gift that I will give to the world
is when not a twenty one year old breaks the
same bolts world record, but a thirty year old, forty
year old, maybe even a fifty year old, because that
will fundamentally change what we understand about the nature of
(15:54):
our society. And I think the natural consequence of that
is that the Olympics will become a smaller, less less
important global event because they can't just keep going around
bankrupt in countries posting this one hundred billion dollar event.
It's a total waste of tax payer money. And I
(16:15):
think it will come down to something that's very deeply
wired in human psychology, which is we only want to
see the best of human performance. No one watches F two,
everyone watches F one. No one watches minor league ball,
everyone watches major league ball. Why because we only want
to see the very best. And so at the enhanced Games,
we have the fastest athletes in human history. Who's going
(16:37):
to want to watch the old slow Olympics? Then?
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Right? Interesting, So let's talk about that. Some of the
results that you've gotten thus far, so now you have
the Yeah, you have an athlete in swimming that has, yes,
broke the.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Fifty free style world record, the most important record in swimming.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
Right, And that record was twenty eighty nine. And how
far off was the was the previous world record.
Speaker 3 (17:13):
Two one hundreds of a second, but it stood for
sixteen years, right, right? And so you know what I
point to is that and Cedar or Schabello, the previous
folder of the world record, I believe was twenty two
years old when he said it, and Christian Glomev was
thirty one when he broke it, so Christian was arguably
ten years past his prime as a swimmer. It is
(17:35):
now the fastest in human history. That's the promise of
performance medicine. Right. The same bolts world record is sixteen
years old. Now the mile world record is twenty five
years old. Twenty five years ago we had Nokia telephones,
and now we have iPhones with artificial intelligence built in.
(17:57):
I don't want to live in a world where human
progress stops. I want to live in a world of
unlimited technological potential, where we can solve the greatest problems
in our society. Right, we're talking to each other by
zoom right now, right, this would have been unimaginable two
decades ago. Yeah, sports, because the policies of the International
(18:20):
Olympic Committee have a technology cap right. They are anti innovation,
they are anti science, and they are anti progress. And
we have rejected that narrative and the world believes in
human potential through science. And I think the end result
will be, you know, the Olympics will be like Blockbuster
(18:43):
and word Netflix, or they're like Taxicabs and war Uber
and they will just fade away into the past. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
And it's very interesting right now because there are some
people that believe that there are enhanced athletes already interwoven
into quote unquote natural sport because they believe that they're
just good at timing and evading the disciss Well.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
According according to the research conducted by WATA from professors
at Harvard University, forty four percent of elite track and
field athletes have used banded intencements in the last year
four Now I get this. According to a recent study
published by war of Athletics, the legacy governing body, up
(19:35):
to ninety nine percent of male track and field athletes
have used EPO, which is a banned substance. So it's
not that there are some athletes doing this. It's basically
all the champions are. Of the ten fastest people in
one hundred meter, eight of them have had a doping violation.
(19:55):
Of the top five times in history, only the same
bold does not have a doping violation attached. So tell me,
is it is it that Sam Bolt is just a
genetic anomaly or did he just beat the tests? That's
a good question.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
There many people have asked that ask that question. But
then there's you know, for instance, the one of the
longest standing records in track and field is the is
the Flow Joe record Flow Joe Record. I think it
was ten forty nine and this was pre water, pre Usada.
(20:40):
I don't want to get into the controversy, but there
are many people that have indicated that that was allegedly enhanced.
Although you know, Flo Joe denied that, and then there
was there was some rumblings then, and I think there
was some question as to whether or not her husband
(21:02):
was involved. But yeah, they all denied it. But even
Gail Divers and some of the fastest female sprinters ever
have suggested that they believe vehemently that that's an enhanced record,
and then you have the concept of what's called a
fossilized record, a record that has been achieved with advantage
(21:27):
and no one else can touch it, so it becomes
a fossilized record. So I don't know, perhaps this will show,
you know, if you have an enhanced human and then
they can now touch those fossilized record Maybe that is
an indirect measure as to whether or not it was
(21:51):
an enhanced record.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Yeah, I think so. And ultimately, who wants to be
a Neanderthal when Homo sapiens exist? Or who wants to
be a human one point zero when superhumans exist? And
I think that it will be a case that everyone,
(22:13):
almost everyone will desire to become superhuman. I've made a
study of the time it takes from science fiction to
become scientific reality. So Jules Byrne wrote a Journey to
the Moon in eighteen fifty nine, and it took one
hundred and ten years from this absolute work of science
(22:34):
fiction to become a scientific reality where Neil Armstrong was
stepping foot on the moon hal nine thousand and two
thousand and one of Space Odyssey takes about fifty years
to get to Alexa Jetsons with the robot vacuum cleaner.
Takes about fifty years to get to the Rumba and
the X Men Marvel universe, where we are in a
(22:54):
world where there are individuals with superpowers. It's about fifty
years old now, and so I think it's right time
in an era where people like Ben Lamb at Colossal
are bringing the dire Wolf from an extinct specie back
to life, and it's working on the Wooly mammoth to
(23:15):
where we have GLP one drugs that are that will
cure obesity in our lifetime. To really believe that now
is the time for super humanity. And yes, the Olympics
can be the guardians of old, slow, natural sports, but
we will be the proponents of fast, modern enhanced humans
(23:39):
and push our civilization to a whole new level.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
Okay, yeah, this will be interesting to see how this unfolds.
A seat with your popcorn at a minimum is going
to be needed. So, how many many athletes are there now, right?
And is it right now? Primarily swimmers? How many other
(24:06):
athletes are about to join the enhanced.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Well, so the ask the question of why swimmers have
signed up in such great numbers for the enhanced games.
It's because swimming is the second most participated sport in
the world after running, right, Yeah, swimming, The average swimmer
probably only earns thirty or forty thousand dollars a year.
(24:33):
The best swimmers in the world might only be making
a few hundred thousand dollars a year. Certainly there are
nowhere near the league of baseball players, basketball players, football players.
Why is this is because world aquatics, in their own
corruption and dysfunction, to protect their own broken old monopoly,
have done everything they can to stifle competition. There was
(24:56):
the International Swimming League, backed by the Ukrainian billionaire Constantine
Grammatikov and one hundred million dollars to build a new
swimming league, and Water Aquatics did everything they could to
stifle that. Water Aquatics is doing the same thing to us,
and we are fighting back. And why are they scared?
Because swimmers are demanding payment. And when we awarded one
(25:19):
hundred a million dollars to Christian Galoma for breaking one
hundred fifty free style world record, every swimmer in the
world woke up and said, wait a minute, I want
to get paid like that, and I deserve to get paid,
And so We spend a lot of time now talking
about performance enhancement, but we haven't talked about the economics
of sport. It's so unfair that the IOC president literally
(25:40):
lives into palace in Switzerland, flies around the world in
private jets, has an entourage befitting ahead of state, Yet
the average US Olympian only earns thirty thousand dollars a year.
The finest specimens of our specie are exploited and underpaid
by the broken Olympic system.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
So okay, so the lure of money is strong. Who
do you anticipate next? Do you think runners and what
I call the racer? I think I think racers. This
is something primed for the racer. So a racer I
(26:20):
can see absolutely they're not paid a lot when you
look at them compared to NBA, NFL. What about what
other sports do you think would be amiable to this, Well.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
We're focused on the objective sports with the lowest infrastructural costs,
so swimming, track and weightlifting. At the first games. However,
like if you're the best badminton player in the world,
or you're the best shot putter, you're the best shooters,
these people earn literal nothing. And I believe that we
(26:55):
could capture virtually all the Olympic sports by offering a
better compensation model because we have a better underlying business model,
which is we are not reliant upon selling media rights
and ticket sales and filling out stadiums. We make our
money by selling drugs. Right. We have an online telehealth
platform which is our principal monetizer, because we aim to
(27:19):
become the principal distribution platform for human enhancement products.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Yeah, and people don't realize that Olympians don't really get paid.
I think you get something like twenty five grand if
you get a if you get a gold medal, that
you get something like twenty five grand.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Twenty five grand if you're in the United.
Speaker 2 (27:45):
States, if you're in the United States.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Yeah. So one thing that I'm immensely proud of is
that World Athletics, because of the pressure of payment from
the Enhanced Games, paid fifty thousand dollars for a gold
medal Parislympics. What Aquatics steadfastly refuse to pay anything. And
they have consistently fought back against athlete compensation. Why because
(28:11):
all these old fogies who run these legacy legacy governing
bodies all come from an ara of amateurism. They still
believe that athletes should not be paid, that it's ungentlemanly
to be paid. And it's a great system of slavery
because if you're not paying the value creators, i e.
The athletes, who gets the money the bureaucrats, the bureaucrats
(28:34):
on those ons which one right, they're the ones who
are buying business class everywhere. They're they're staying in five
star hotels while the athletes are sleeping on cardboard beds
without air conditioning.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Yeah, exactly. I mean you train, you train so much
every day as an athlete to get to the Olympics,
to try to get tenths of a second fact faster,
thousands of a second faster. And not everybody gets sponsorships.
(29:08):
Only a very small percentage of even the fastest olympians
gets lucrative sponsorship portfolio. Sometimes there are people still working
nine to five jobs and then trying to be the
best in the world and they don't get paid.
Speaker 3 (29:26):
So people just and you know, I'm not critical of
the NBA, the NFL, you know, the NFL commissioner. I
think it's paid like thirty million dollars a year is
a fleet of private jets. That's okay because the player
is earning even more than the commissioner. But in the
system where the bureaucrats earn more than the athletes, there's
something really wrong. And you know, the world is very
(29:50):
critical of CEOs who get overpaid relative to their workers.
But this is exactly the system, the system of bondage
that has beeneered by the International Olympic Committee, and it's
morally undefensible. And how do they maintain it. They maintain
it by having this monopoly structure and squashing any competitors.
(30:13):
And you know, we are the world's first, you know,
we're the world's first credible competitor to the internationally the committee.
For one hundred and twenty years, no one has ever
tried to take these people on, and we've managed to,
you know, and we have now the support of the
biggest investors in the world, the most powerful political family
in the world, and they're running scared.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Yeah wow, Well, you've been very generous with your time.
Before you go in five years, what are people going
to be saying about enhanced.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Oh, we're going in five years. I hope that we
live in a world where everyone has the opportunity to
become enhanced, whether you're an athlete or not, every person
has the right to become enhanced and to overcome our
biological limits.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Wow. All right, So your website is enhanced dot com.
Where can people find you on on social media.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
And at enhanced on Twitter and on and Enhanced Games
on Instagram And if any of your listeners want to
reach out, you can find me Aaron Desuza on Instagram
Sunday message always re bot to you personally.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
All right, thanks again, thanks again to doctor Aaron Desuza,
President of the Enhanced Games. My time was limited with them,
so maybe I can have them back at some point
in the future. I had so many more questions that
I wanted to touch on and drilled down on, and
(31:51):
so maybe as this develops over the coming months, I
could talk with them again just to see what is
going to happen. How many athletes are going to seek
out that big bag of money and jump onto this.
(32:13):
And then there is the undercurrent of the battle and
conflict between Enhanced Games and IOC and water. Listen to
the statement that the IOC put out on their x feed.
(32:34):
As athletes, we believe that the Enhanced Games, or any
events encouraging the use of performance enhancing substances and methods
are a betrayal of everything that we stand for. Most importantly,
these events undermine the integrity of sport and the responsibility
athletes hold as role models in society. Promoting performance enhancing
(32:57):
substances and methods sends a dangerous message, especially to a
current and future generation of athletes. Such substances can lead
to serious long term health consequences, even death, and even
encouraging athletes to use them is utterly irresponsible and immoral.
(33:17):
No level of sporting success is worth such a cost.
We stand firmly together for the values of fair play,
ethical behavior, and respect, principles that have shaped our journey
and that we believe should guide and inspire the next
generation of athletes. We will do everything we can to
(33:38):
protect the integrity of sport for generations to come. Siesh
battle lines are drawn, so obviously there is a bit
of a conflict brewing here. The IOC just got a
new president. They are under the microscope for a number
(33:59):
of things right now, including the protection of the female category.
That is something that they also came out recently and
made a strong statement about So they're coming out and
making some very strong statements and about the enhanced games.
(34:20):
I will certainly keep an eye on how this develops,
and ideally maybe I can follow up in a few
months with what's happening since Thanks again for listening.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Follow Event Horizon Endurance Sport on Instagram, Facebook, Threads, and
x for training and nutrition programs and on demand learning.
To become a member of our Endurance Institute, or for
complete archives of podcasts, log on to our website. Event
(34:58):
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