Malcolm Gladwell on Galen Rupp - "There's no way he dopes. It's impossible." - and More

The average LRC is obviously way smarter than Malcolm Gladwell.

Moderation deleted the posts about MG needing to worry about his income, while LRC basement dwellers lack that lifeworry.

I don't follow his logic at all.

Let's not make this about Galen but any athlete.

1) If you follow the sport, the only person you should say "there is no way X dopes" is yourself. Paula Radcliffe told me that a long time ago and it is great advice. You can really think someone doesn't dope, but to say "there's no way X dopes" is crazy.

2) If there was "no way" anyone dopes, they wouldn't be tested by USADA. Either that or a) it's just for show testing or b) to keep them from doping in the future.

3) The biological passport is helping but microdosing is the way you dope. We just had a raid in Spain and after staking out the place for week and reportedly timing the raid to be as most effective as possible and finding EPO, NO ONE tested positive. We can believe a) no one was using the drugs or b) it's hard to test positive if you are doping correctly.

4) I would love to see his list of athletes who "no way they dope". Anyone and everyone can be doping.

So you're saying Paula was a doper?

The Dingo^3 wrote:

His argument is that Rupp was tested "50 times last year".

He also says - "Ben Johnson was a doper, but clean runners today are running way faster than Ben Johnson did in 1988."

Um, which runners are clean breaking 9.8 these days? Gatlin? Bolt? Gay? Blake? This surprised me more than his comments about Rupp.

All of this coming from Bill Simmons' podcast with Gladwell, interesting listen -

https://soundcloud.com/the-bill-simmons-podcast/ep-118-olympics-with-malcolm-gladwell

Overall he paints a pretty rosy picture of the state of doping in T&F compared to what most LRCs would say.

Not very far into the podcast but one of the speakers said that suddenly breaking out and improving at age 28 is a pretty sure sign of doping.

That sure sounds familiar.

I love how any support for a NOP athlete brings the brojos out of the woodwork with their undies in a bundle. Can't let that slide! Gotta shut it down!

Meanwhile, silence on the fact that Paula is the most obvious doper in the history of distance running.

DTbigwaveorwhatever wrote:

I love how any support for a NOP athlete brings the brojos out of the woodwork with their undies in a bundle. Can't let that slide! Gotta shut it down!

Meanwhile, silence on the fact that Paula is the most obvious doper in the history of distance running.

Maybe Rupp should let Wego pace him. Then all would be good.

I think it also depends on what they consider 'doping'. People are always looking for that edge. Guarantee athletes are taking some drugs/supplements for performance enhancement (even if the drug has no proof that it enhances performance) that are currently not on WADA's banned substance list yet. How many different 'experiments' has Salazar done? Is it odd that Rupp and a majority of Salazar's athletes get similar TUEs after training under him? What are the odds that these athletes suddenly need inhalers and thyroid meds? Is this even considered 'doping'?

Take meldonium for example. It was not banned until this past January and in many countries it was available over the counter. Now people are getting busted left and right for a drug that has not shown to definitively enhance performance (just the potential for performance enhancement). Were people taking this drug doping before the ban or only just after it. Is it doping if it can not be shown that it enhances performance?

Please tell me the time someone has to break to make them an "obvious" doper.

Are there different standards for Americans vs the rest of the world?

Paula and Galen should be treated the same. I think it is foolish to say you "know" either one of them dopes or doesn't dope. That is the whole point.

The history of doping has shown you can dope and not flunk tests. Microdosing is where it is at.

Way back I had said I would shut down the site if Paula was a doper. That would make her the biggest hypocrite of all-time. Worse than Lance. I have changed my stance on shutting down the site because the history of the sport shows anyone can dope no matter what they say. Paula's own words said you only know about yourself. Having said that I think Paula was clean.

It's real simple. Doping means taking a substance or using a method prohibited by WADA. That's the only thing that is a violation of the rules governing track and field. Nothing else is doping.

You can get into philosophical debates about whether drinking coffee should be considered "doping" as Ben True apparently thinks, but unless it violates the rules, it's not doping. All you are really saying is that drinking coffee SHOULD BE considered doping, but that's not the same as drinking coffee actually being doping.

It's no different that saying that sprint starts under .2 seconds are false starts. That's untrue. False starts are starts under .1 second. Maybe the rule should be changed. Maybe you have a philosophical disagreement with the rule. That doesn't change the definition of a false start.

The Dingo^3 wrote:

His argument is that Rupp was tested "50 times last year".

Interesting. The USADA says he was tested 21 times last year. The same in 2014. 28 in 2013.

I guess he knows way more than the rest of us!

wejo wrote:

... Having said that I think Paula was clean.

This shows an astounding ability to ignore concrete evidence. (BTW, the concrete evidence re: Paula is WAY more compelling than the circumstantial evidence re: Galen, however suspicious it might seem.)

wejo wrote:

Having said that I think Paula was clean.

Pay attention, folks, to use of the word 'clean', as in 'clean sport'. That seems to be the mind-bend-word opening through the justification portal, correct wejo?

Well, caffeine was banned during the time a certain website owner openly ingested the banned substance and experienced a shocking improvement in 10,000m performance. So is he a doper or not? Never failed a test but admits to taking a banned substance. Even advocated it for the effect.

wejo wrote:

Paula and Galen should be treated the same.

Do you honestly think you and Rojo have treated Paula and Galen the same?

So actovegin wasn't banned. But did 'Healing Hans' disclose if anything else was put into the syringes if so, or would that be disclosed to the athlete, per their choice, on a need-to-know basis (as long as they don't fail a test)?

wejo wrote:

Please tell me the time someone has to break to make them an "obvious" doper..

2:15 for the women's marathon is the gold standard ......

The Dingo^3 wrote:

His argument is that Rupp was tested "50 times last year".

If Gladwell said this, that's pathetic. It's easy to look the numbers up. If he had, he'd see that nobody was tested anywhere near that often last year. From a quick scan of the list, it looks like the only people test more than Rupp were some boxers. And the most they were tested was 29 times.

I don't know about you all, but in my world, 50 times is a lot more than 21 times.

question for you... wrote:

So actovegin wasn't banned. But did 'Healing Hans' disclose if anything else was put into the syringes if so, or would that be disclosed to the athlete, per their choice, on a need-to-know basis (as long as they don't fail a test)?

And lets carry this idea further; remember Kara G. thanking her team, including the (ahem, suspect*?) 'doctor' up at Park City, after her Bronze at Worlds? What was that about?

*wasn't the guy involved in EPO-efficacy tests (IIRC)? Maybe someone else reading can recall the details.