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Welcome to English Podcasts with Chris and Sue. Hi Sue. Hi there Chris. So I'm going to surprise you today, right? Because I was totally surprised myself about a few days ago.

I was talking to somebody who was telling me about something called the Enhanced Games, of which I knew absolutely nothing about, and this person was telling me, and I thought I must talk to you about it. Is it a business game?

No. Is it augmented reality? No. But I'm all ears.

Right, okay. So it is an alternative to the Olympic Games. Oh look, I wish listeners could see your face. Okay, it is.

My mouth is wide open. Yeah, it's an alternative to the Olympic Games where drugs are allowed. Yes. So performance enhancing drugs, which is apparently called PEDs, Peds.

I'm not quite sure I like that. Anyway, I'm just going to call them drugs for the purpose of this conversation. OK, now the idea is it's going to be in, guess where? America, America, America, guess where Las Vegas, OK, big showtime, right, big showtime.

Who's organizing it? Well, it is, I've got the names here. The project is spearheaded by Dr. Aaron DeSosa, apparently an Australian born entrepreneur.

A doctor of what? Well, I haven't actually checked into that. And also his associate is a guy who, Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal.

Okay. Anyway, these guys have got loads and loads and loads of money. Right.

So rather than give someone a gold medal, they give them... What are they gonna give? A spliff.

What are they gonna give them? No, one million dollars. Oh God, your face, your face. No, but it seems really weird.

I mean, in a way, you know that like you see a lot in, well in lots of sports, but notably in cycling, the Tour de France, there was Véranque and company,

was the guy Lance Armstrong. Yeah Lance Armstrong who got stripped of seven titles. There was a guy that died in his hotel room taking drugs. There's others. I remember the guy Ben, some from your other, he was a sprinter from Canada. Oh, with the very bloodshot eyes because he was so drugged up. He was one of the first ones to be to win a gold medal and then get stripped

and a lot of Russians have and whatever. But in a way, if you sort of take a backseat, look at it, I think in a way, yeah, why not let them do what they want. But I think that this is almost encouraging people

to take weird stuff to enhance their performance, which I think morally is wrong. And I just think it's weird. Well, I think in terms of...

It's like destroy your brain and your body and you can win a million dollars. I think it's really bad for your health. But sure, sure.

Because apparently looking on their website of the enhanced games, which I looked at it, and it's all very, very serious and there's gonna be doctors

who are going to be assessing the athletes. Let's call them that athletes health. I mean, who's gonna go there? Well, this is a very good question.

already it gives a huge bad reputational look on stuff. I mean can I just give you a little story? You may. You spoke about Lance Armstrong. I'm a big fan of the Tour de France. I love the Tour de France and whenever it's in France I'll go this year to one. I didn't go to one last year but I will go to one this year at least once. It's going to be in Toulouse. There's also

two in Toulouse. There's an arrival and but I'm not so keen on these because loads of crowds and everything. But I was at, I was in a place called Revelle, which is in southwest of Toulouse, not too far from the mountains, near the Montagnanois. And there was lots of like, rumors going around, especially from the French,

that you know, Lance Armstrong had been taking drugs and everything. And a lot of these sort of American reporters were saying, oh it's just bad blood from the French. And the French were actually onto something retrospectively they were onto something they knew something was on anyway there was a motorcycle journalist stopped by me and

he said he said where'd you come from and I said well I just live in this village here and he could hear my accent he knew I was English or American or whatever and he says what do you think about last time strong I said I asked just bad blood from the French they're just bad losers you know the

guy's brilliant I mean how the hell can he be taking drugs because you know he stated before and after the race is no way. And I felt a real bit silly because afterwards it was seen that he'd won his seven titles, being totally drugged up

to the eyeballs and going through huge lengths to go to hotels, getting blood transfusions and God knows what else, with the approbation of doctors, just to cheat his way through it.

And I felt really stupid after this. Well, I've had similar, I mean, I also love the Tour de France And I would tell you that Chris Froome has never taken a drug. It is yet to be proved that he has.

I said about Armstrong. But I mean, I would, you know... Chris Froome isn't going to be writing, is he? No, no, he's way too old.

But when he was winning, but it's... Coven dishes, well, I think. Because you said to me, who would sign up for this? Exactly.

Do you have any names? I do. Now then. Real athletes who are going into Olympics and things, they wouldn't touch this with a barge pole. No, because they'd never be able to go anywhere else after.

No, so in fact the person who I was talking to, he was a young guy. Just to say, sorry to cut you off. But just say that a million dollars, when you compare it to the Diamond League of Athletics, it's not that much really.

But this is the thing of who's going to take part. Okay. So the person I was speaking to... Are you taking part?

Well, I may. I could do with a few drugs to enhance my performance. Anyway, whatever. So the guy I was talking to, a young guy, an amateur athlete

doing his thing, he actually signed up for it. And so people like this, if they are, I mean, he said he wasn't going to go through with it in the end, but he didn't want to see what the process was.

And so if anybody who is a pretty good amateur athlete, they could take drugs under whose control I have no idea.