This month an eSports player admitted to using Adderall to enhance performance at an ESL Counter-Strike: GO competition, touching off controversy; the league has officially announced that it’s going to formulate an anti-performance-enhancing drug program alongside two international anti-doping associations, the German NADA and Canadian WADA.
The two agencies will form a performance-enhancing drug prevention program along with ESL that is “fair” and “feasible,” the league said in a press statement.
Before the policy is implemented, however, the league is already pledging action: Randomized performance-enhancing drug skin tests are set for the ESL One Cologne event this August. The league says its goal is to perform similar tests at every Intel Extreme Masters, ESL One, and ESL ESEA Pro League competition.
However, the formal program won’t just be about testing and punishment: the goal is to provide the “structural support” players need to deal with the “physical and emotional pressure” of competing.