When you hear about an athlete dying suddenly and the autopsy reports that he had a heart attack with multiple dead areas in the heart and dilated cardiomyopathy, think of cocaine. Many top athletes take cocaine because they think that it improves their game. In 1884, Sigmund Freud, the father of psychiatry, showed that within minutes of snorting cocaine, a person can contract his muscles with more force and react faster to external stimuli. For example, a basketball player can dribble around an opponent and respond faster to moves to block him.
Cocaine is a potent stimulant that makes an athlete more alert.
It makes him feel that he can accomplish more and makes him willing to suffer more. A basketball player on cocaine may attempt to take shots further out from the basket than he usually does. A football player may play until he loses consciousness. These effects can last up to 3 hours. A recent study in the International Journal of Cardiology shows that exercising after taking cocaine markedly increases a person's chances of developing irregular heart beats and dying.