It was a dark afternoon in the gym and I was halfway through my workout. I was slowly, but surely, losing sweat, However, the gorilla spawned bodybuilder who had been there for the same amount of time and was doing double the work was as dry as the desert. It hit me that this man was definitely on anabolic steroids. Yet if performance enhancing drugs bring such an advantage to the playing field why are they illegal? Well, the truth is that the risk evolved with taking steroids are immense. Furthermore, It prevents many sports from being played fairly. Finally, drugs of this type can lead to serious addiction problems. When I first started working out many people that took steroids would tell me “It is completely safe; Nothing has ever been proven!” Unfortunately after reading many studies I realised, these people were uneducated on the cold hard facts. Abusing performing enhancing drugs put athletes, as young as thirty years old, at risk of serious cardiovascular diseases such as heart attacks and strokes. This is primarily caused by the change in lipoprotein levels. The body consist of two different lipoproteins, high density and low density lipoproteins. High density lipoproteins are used by the body to efficiently carry fat and cholesterol through the blood stream to the cells to be used as energy. However, when low density lipoproteins are used, the fat and cholesterol they are carrying is dropped in the veins and arteries. When high levels of anabolic steroids are consumed it increases the levels of low density lipoproteins and decreases the level of high density lipoproteins. This causes fat and cholesterol deposits to form and eventually these deposits clog up the blood passages and put the person at risk of cardiovascular disease. Additionally, performance enhancing drugs taxes a person's liver. This is caused by the need to continuously filter out contaminants from the body. These contaminants can be as extreme as mot