Alex Hutchinson calls out CANOVA over study confirming EPO works on Kenyan runners

nobody gonna mention kipchoge's name?

he is from kenya and he also run fast marathon

I agree it's simple.

Same as it ever was... wrote:

artojas wrote:

Talent = regional level

Hard work = regional level

Talent + hard work = world class

Talent + hard work + microdosing = world class elite

Talent + hard + full EPO = WR attempt level.

Simple and true for 99,9% distance runners.

Tell that to rekrunner.

Great post & well said m!ndweak!

Rek & JonO are in their own little fantasy world - same old song & dance. And Canova continues to minimize the effects EPO has on top Kenyan elites...all part of the damage control due to all the recent pops, IMO (just wait till the next big name comes out. Lol).

IkeaOay wrote:

Renato Canova wrote:

3) I changed this assertion last year, after coaching the Norwegian athletes SONDRE MOEN to beat the European Record in Marathon (2:05'48"), coming from 2:12 of previous PB, AFTER 270 days of altitude during 2017 (including Kenya in Iten, Italy in Sestriere and Switzerland in St. Moritz). Now, my assertion is that "EPO DOESN'T WORK FOR TOP ATHLETES LIVING AND TRAINING IN ALTITUDE FOR LONG CONTINUOUS PERIODS, IF THEY USE PROPER TRAINING".

How do you know this? Have you ran a trial on him with poor results?

In principle a coach could know this if he put some top athletes on EPO and observed what happened. If Renato hasn't tried this or doesn't know of some other training group's secret study, then he's just guessing. That's fine but why shout it in all caps?

JonO. wrote:

artojas wrote:

Oh, the "know it all" Canova. Did you conduct the experiment where you trained athletes, measured their times, then gave them EPO and measured their times again to compare?

Then in no way you can tell that EPO doesn't work on somebody.

Maybe Sondre is a 2:03 runner on EPO, you don't know. Nobody knows.

Bluesky's post shows you all the data you need to know apart from power output. That's where I can help you. The power outputs are in the normal range, EPO is NOT a performance enhancer.

Maybe you need to use bolder text to "prove" your point.

Sounds really technical. "Somewhat below" That'll really nail down the data. Do you even Science, bro?

Team Sky also dopes like fiends. So you're probably not using exactly the same data.

Well said Canova!

You are correct once again, and proving actual facts facts not theory from practical onsite application.

Most of the writers of these articles write about what they assume or think is right with a personal bias in seeking attention for their published article. Drugs are a great attention getter.

I'd like to see what quality runners were in the EPO study.

In another study, they showed with competitive Kenyan runners no correlation between VO2 max or running economy and running performance, but very significant correlation between running performance and upper leg length, overall leg length, and ratio of leg length to overall height.

https://journals.lww.com/acsm-msse/FullText/2014/05001/Dissociation_between_Running_Economy_and_Running.2220.aspx

Mile high wrote:

Well said Canova!

You are correct once again, and proving actual facts facts not theory from practical onsite application.

Most of the writers of these articles write about what they assume or think is right with a personal bias in seeking attention for their published article. Drugs are a great attention getter.

Hi, Jon.

artojas wrote:

Oh, the "know it all" Canova. Did you conduct the experiment where you trained athletes, measured their times, then gave them EPO and measured their times again to compare?

Then in no way you can tell that EPO doesn't work on somebody.

Maybe Sondre is a 2:03 runner on EPO, you don't know. Nobody knows.

It may or may not work in high altitude adjusted world class athletes. One would have to take these trained world class athletes, exercise challenge them both before and after EPO, with the response to the challenge evaluated based on physiological parameters as well as actual performances, with all variables controlled, IE point in the training cycle, altitude, temperature, humidity, distance (if a track run) shoes, etc. They would in effect, act as their own control group. Comparing between two disparate groups of athletes of varying abilities, probably in different parts of their training cycle and inferring cause and effect is tough, if not impossible. Additionally, when running as we all know, the same conditions and training can result in vary different performances, even when all variables that are known to affect performance are well controlled. Thats why its hard to find a well done study looking at athletes and the effects of change by any one variable that affects performance. I recall a conversation with Frank Shorter I had quite a few years ago. When he found out I was a physiologist he laughed and said that he bet I was wondering how he could run so fast with the VO2 max that he had, as he was told repeatedly he shouldn't run that fast and be as successful as he was. The physiologists are black and white, performance capability is based on pure science. Thats not the way it is, as we all know. I also have no way of knowing, based on the available data, whether EPO works or not in world class runners who are already high altitude acclimated, and have been their entire lives. And if so, what those performance and physiological improvements might be. There are no published studies that I'm aware of to date that answer those questions, and given the difficulties in study design there probably won't be anytime soon.

If I was a betting man however, I'd bet that Mr. Canova is right.

Shorter phoned in his test and admitted it , Pre raged against the machine. They probably actually had similar numbers.

Lets talk motives here;

Some Canova possibilities:

- He knows epo works and it is just a smokescreen with all the posts. It is good business if others don't suspect you and also others don't think they need to dope to compete with you.

- Although it seems he has recently changed his stance so that only those born and living at his specific area of the world are immune to epo. So maybe it then follows that he knows epo works and is just trying to keep everyone in iten from using it outside of his top guys.

- He doesn't really understand his athletes are doping and is blind like a parent who never thinks their child did that horrible thing they actually did. Insisting that it wouldn't work anyway further insulates them from wrong doing even if caught.

Some John Orange possibilities:

- He is a crackpot style flat earther who truly thinks he is the only person on the planet that "really" understands physiology.

- He is an IAAF shill whose job is to convince athletes to not dope by spreading misinformation.

- He is a basic troll with too much time on his hands.

i will add one to the canova:

-he claims with such authority that EPO doesnt work on the very very very best, cause in the 90s he was administering them scientifically, checking blood values etc and monitoring progress , and his findings showed him that it only worked to get out of shape athletes back to 90% top aerobic fitness.

how he can say so much of what EPO does yet never ONCE has he explained how he knows so much about it. only 2 possibilites

A) full of sh*t

or

B) has all sorts of knowledge from TRIAL AND ERROR, like any other dope pusher

and yes JonO and rek are both self righteous trolls, its not hard to see that they are somehow compensated for their trolling efforts. elK might be a racist and annoying at times, but at least he doesnt CLAIM day in and day out that he is smarter than Phd researching medical experts...the others? spraying their OPINION IN ALL CAPS BECAUSE EVERYONE KNOWS ITS THE PERSON WHO YELLS THE LOUDEST WINS THE ARGUMENT

one could ask

-renato, please show me your data on the tests you've conducted on top tier kenyans using EPO...oh wait you never have so...shut the f*ck up

-JonO, please show us how you are smarter than all these Phd research scientists, oh wait you use a anonymous handle and didnt graduate with a Phd in physiology from harvard, stanford or princeton

-rek, please show us REAL statistics, using a large data set, of YOUR tests on hobby joggers, sub elite, elite and top TIER runners of all races, with EPO and multiple placebos, double blind and have it conducted at the same time by an outside tester....oh wait you will just mock me and tell us all you have already shown your proof with your magna opus

EPO has been around and used and is continually used cause its track (pun) record speaks way louder than the reks, jons and renatos of the athletics world

Renato claimed he had thousands of data points on blood with elite athletes which provided that doping could not work. When challenged the very very small sample of data he provided showed that he had confirmed dopers in his camp. It also showed that he recommended multiple vitamins and supplements for his runners. As far as the actual data, it really didn't prove anything. All of his Chinese athletes had suspicious blood test results on at least one test and he later stated that TWO of the tests in the sample were invalid due to poor lab equipment. One would think that if you were sending out data to prove that doping could not work it would be important to point out the data set included those of dopers and that some of the data points were unreliable. None of these athletes were born, living, and training at altitude or of the top quality. These data were sent out prior to Renato "revising" his theory post Sondre Moen.

m!ndweak wrote:

i will add one to the canova:

-he claims with such authority that EPO doesnt work on the very very very best, cause in the 90s he was administering them scientifically, checking blood values etc and monitoring progress , and his findings showed him that it only worked to get out of shape athletes back to 90% top aerobic fitness.

how he can say so much of what EPO does yet never ONCE has he explained how he knows so much about it. only 2 possibilites

A) full of sh*t

or

B) has all sorts of knowledge from TRIAL AND ERROR, like any other dope pusher

Renato Canova wrote:

5) The research doesn't have, as subjects, any athlete belonging to the category I consider in my statement.

The runners of the research had a test of 3000m before taking EPO. The average for Kenyans was 9'35", for Scottish 11'.

No. You evidently haven't looked into this new work. The authors tested 63' half marathoners and 2:12 marathoners. Ok, most of us here are faster, but still, those weren't beginners.

Interestingly, they improved their 3000 m times by 4.6% after 4 weeks of EPO, although the Hct increase was less than 10%. As we know since Ashenden 2011, that modest increase would not have triggered the ABP alarm, i.e. IAAF would not have considered these dopers as "likely doping".

casual obsever wrote:

Renato Canova wrote:

5) The research doesn't have, as subjects, any athlete belonging to the category I consider in my statement.

The runners of the research had a test of 3000m before taking EPO. The average for Kenyans was 9'35", for Scottish 11'.

No. You evidently haven't looked into this new work. The authors tested 63' half marathoners and 2:12 marathoners. Ok, most of us here are faster, but still, those weren't beginners.

Interestingly, they improved their 3000 m times by 4.6% after 4 weeks of EPO, although the Hct increase was less than 10%. As we know since Ashenden 2011, that modest increase would not have triggered the ABP alarm, i.e. IAAF would not have considered these dopers as "likely doping".

again its coming to light that the Hct isnt the main player in all of this, no its the INCREASE in SIZE and NUMBER of mitochondria.

allowing a runner to use all the oxygen in each breath and exhale all the C02 in each breath, while running at what SHOULD be AT pace but instead its comfortably aerobic.

casual obsever wrote:

Renato Canova wrote:

5) The research doesn't have, as subjects, any athlete belonging to the category I consider in my statement.

The runners of the research had a test of 3000m before taking EPO. The average for Kenyans was 9'35", for Scottish 11'.

No. You evidently haven't looked into this new work. The authors tested 63' half marathoners and 2:12 marathoners. Ok, most of us here are faster, but still, those weren't beginners.

Interestingly, they improved their 3000 m times by 4.6% after 4 weeks of EPO, although the Hct increase was less than 10%. As we know since Ashenden 2011, that modest increase would not have triggered the ABP alarm, i.e. IAAF would not have considered these dopers as "likely doping".

dont let rek see that 4.6% he will troll super hard lolz

Direct link to the abstract of the new article:

https://journals.lww.com/acsm-msse/Abstract/publishahead/Effects_of_EPO_on_Blood_Parameters_and_Running.96809.aspx

I will have to go down to the library to read the full article.

Notably look at the conclusion that EPO worked just as well for those living and training at altitude as it did for those living and training at sea level.

I'm sure it is just a coincidence...

m!ndweak wrote:

how he [Canova] can say so much of what EPO does yet never ONCE has he explained how he knows so much about it.

My understanding is that Canova's confidence that EPO doesn't work on the highest level athletes who are correctly trained at altitude comes from three points he repeatedly makes:

1) some of the greatest performances have been achieved by clean athletes

2) some high-level performances have been achieved by athletes with relatively modest hematocrits

3) physiological systems other than oxygen delivery are likely more important in limiting performance at the highest levels.

It's worth noting that all three of these points can be true without proving Canova's conclusion. Regarding (1), how do we know that some of the greatest performances couldn't have been greater still with a little help from EPO? Regarding (3), small differences in performance matter. Oxygen delivery doesn't need to be the most important physiological factor for a EPO to cause a slight boost in performance. (2) is a case of confusing correlation with causation. For example training improves performance but tends to suppress hematocrit leading to a possible negative correlation between performance and hematocrit. This in no way implies that artificially increasing hematocrit will not improve performance.