World skiing body FIS aims to quash penis-enlargement sideshow

World skiing's governing body has moved swiftly to quash talk of ski jumpers injecting their penises with paraffin or hyaluronic acid to gain a competitive edge, but scientists and ski jumpers at the ​Winter Olympics say if true, it would make perfect sense.

The Olympics' strangest sideshow blew up when the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said on Thursday it would be on the lookout for any evidence male ski jumpers were artificially enlarging their penises in a bid to manipulate one of the sport's rules.

WADA's comment came after it was questioned about a report in Germany's Bild which said the newspaper had ​discovered insider talk of the practice being used to alter athletes' ski jump suit measurement point, thereby securing a larger, more aerodynamic suit for the duration of the season.

While the sport's governing International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) sought to ⁠dismiss the affair as "wild rumor" — it said there has "never been any indication, let alone evidence" that the ‍practice was being employed — Slovenia's ⁠Olympic silver medallist ski jumper Cene Prevc told Reuters the reports ​were not revelatory to him.

How on earth do you cheat in ski jumping?

"It is a topic that was spoken about quite a lot a month ago in the ski jumping world," Prevc, who won silver at the Beijing 2022 Olympics, said in an interview, adding that he had never done this, nor knew of anyone doing it.

Elite ski jumpers undergo a full ⁠body scan to ensure their skin-tight suits do not have extra material which would give them more lift as they soar through the air.

The crotch of a ski jumper's suit is allowed to run to the bottom of the athlete's genitals, meaning an enlarged penis would ‍give them more potentially