A Filmmaker's Journey Into the Heart of an Olympic Drug Scandal

"Icarus" director Bryan Fogel started his film project with a rather modest ambition: determine whether contemporary measures used to detect drug cheats in amateur athletics were actually effective. He would do this by taking an empirical approach. He planned to use supplemental testosterone and human growth hormone himself, substances that are, with some therapeutic exceptions, banned for use in amateur athletics, as he trained for cycling events. In seeking information regarding the testing protocols that he might face at the competitions he would enter, the filmmaker came into contact with Grigory Rodchenkov, then the head of Russia’s sole accredited anti-doping laboratory. As their collaboration on Fogel's project grew, the two in short order became friends. At this point, however, stories began to break in the news media about the existence of a vast, state-sponsored doping program in Russia. Rodchenkov, it turns out, played a central role in the doping effort,...