unbelievable.... wang junxia went to Colorado

I love wang wrote:Wang isn't listed in the 5000 although obviously she ran at worst 14:45+ - which would put her in the all-time top 20. guess they didn't have enough watches on her at the 5000?

I love wang wrote:

all-time 3000 list

Wang Junxia, 8:06.11WR, Sept. 13, 1993, Beijing

Qu Yunxia, 8:12.16, Sept. 13, 1993, Beijing

Wang Junxia, 8:12.19WR, Sept. 12, 1993, Beijing (heats)

Qu Yunxia, 8:12.27, Sept. 12, 1993, Beijing (heats)

Zhang Linii, 8:16.50, Sept. 13, 1993, Beijing

Ma Liyan, 8:19.78, Sept. 12, 1993, Beijing (heats)

Ma Liyan, 8:21.26, Sept. 13, 1993, Beijing

maybe the track was short? like 312 or so??

fascinating thread which I missed first time around. she was a student in Colorado and noboby realised, amazing

in response to stu lipson;

I suspect the track was 380 metres, I did some calculations on this. Wang Junxia won the world championships the month before in Stuttart I think her time was 31.50. she definately was a great athlete who didnt need drugs to be the best in the world. I think its a shame that her records are so suspicious because it makes her look like a cheat.

At the time in Beijing there was a huge publicity drive to bring attention to the city in the bid for the Olympics. there was also a considerable drive to correct centuries of female oppression by promoting athletes and other sports.

its just a shame that Chinese women runners were ridiculed, because the times they ran on that Beijing track were well beyond the times they ever ran in any other race anywhere.

I suspect that Wang Junxia was capable of sub 31 minutes for 10k on a true 400m track and she may well have been capable of eventually challenging Ingrid Kristiansen's then world record of 30.13 we will never know

course the track wasnt short - it was in the national bloody stadium for gods sake - and just as you cant ratify a world record without passing a drugs test - the track has to be certified.

they ran the time, make no mistake about it.

it was 1993, EPO had had a few yrs in cycling, and would just be moving over into Athletics.......

Junxia ran 30.49 in Stuttgart World Champs.

sorry my stats were wrong, but the tack in Beijing was surely short. epo does not give that kind of improvement.

dont you think all the other nationa who have competed on that track at the asian games or whatever might have noticed. dont talk rubbish - the track was and is 400m - it was on tv for gods sake - dont you think some astute observers might have noticed.

and EPO gives precisely that sort of improvement - especially as no-one in athletics testing knew of it at the time and there was no test till 7 yrs later - the fact they performed at world record level for days in a row has one comparison - the Tour de france, but of course now you'll tell us that the tour is not dirty as hell as well - get real. they could take as much EPO as they wanted and no theyd never get caught for it.

no, track was not short. My friend ran on the track in bejing and he averaged about 70 sec per 400m in an 8x400m session. he went there to make sure it wasn't short.

JonnyO wrote:

sorry my stats were wrong, but the tack in Beijing was surely short. epo does not give that kind of improvement.

Where's this article?

In response to the track being short, realized that in 1993, wang ran the last 5k of her WC 10k race faster than the existing WR. Faster, i think, than the current wr.

Is it possible that there was a (deliberate or not) inaccuracy in timing? Unless someone obtains a tape of the whole thing, start-to-finish, how can we be sure?

JonnyO wrote:

sorry my stats were wrong, but the tack in Beijing was surely short. epo does not give that kind of improvement.

Ok, here's the article.

Didn't her coach make the runners sleep in graveyards to make them fear nothing? How did 'Ma's Army' train?! I've heard some stories...but please share some.

great runner, shame about the controversy.

I'll explain tomorrow, 2.20 a.m. in England, past bedtime for Jonny

How old is this article? because i'm sure when she set them world records in 1993 she was 20 years old. As for her training schedule, i have read her coach was into 'crash' training - very intense training for a short period of time i.e her group used to run approximately 40km a day.

don't be daft wrote:

dont you think all the other nationa who have competed on that track at the asian games or whatever might have noticed. dont talk rubbish - the track was and is 400m - it was on tv for gods sake - dont you think some astute observers might have noticed.

and EPO gives precisely that sort of improvement - especially as no-one in athletics testing knew of it at the time and there was no test till 7 yrs later - the fact they performed at world record level for days in a row has one comparison - the Tour de france, but of course now you'll tell us that the tour is not dirty as hell as well - get real. they could take as much EPO as they wanted and no theyd never get caught for it.

why dont you stop being such a coward and post under your usual letsrun name so I know who I'm talking to?

of course the track is 400 metres now. it was probably 400 metres the morning after all those unbelievable times were set.

am I posting a ridiculous conspiracy theory?

not as riciculous as the times that Wang Junxia ran

so, you think you know more about the Tour de France and EPO than me do you? I doubt that very much.

er, this is the name I use - havent posted before as its all usually rubbish, but some of the things being stated here are silly.

tell us what you know about the tour and EPO - i'm not an expert, just an interested observer. i am genuinely interested if you can provide any insight. Tell us what you do and where you get this insight from?

the races were shown on the TV at the time - clips were on the beeb and I'm sure the whole races are available somewhere in the archives.

the times were ridiculous, no-one disputes that,and Wang did run the second 5k in 14.27 apparently. Look at the times from the World champs that yr - some of the closing splits were bonkers there - Wangs last 3k in the 10k was well swift, as was the last 1k or so of the 3k. And that track was definately 400m unless the rest of the world didnt notice!

with the benefit of hindsight all the evidence points towards EPO usage, with maybe a bit of HGH thrown in for good measure (dont forget all the chinese swimmers busted at airports with HGH in their luggage a few yrs later)

the benefits of EPO use are known to be a consistent level of high performance, plus the ability to close races with very fast finishes - both highly obvious in this case.

I was a cycling reporter from 91-94 just local races, but I was an ambitious writer. the more i heard about epo from professional riders the more i despised the incestuous corruption of European cycling. from the 1975 Tour de France onwards I was completely obsessed with the race.

i had always run for fitness, so switching sports in 1996 was not too difficult. running is a lot easier than cycling.

i would like to see a video of any of Wang Junxia's races that we are discussing, if you can follow her for just one full lap in any of the races it would be easy to measure the lap distance in Beijing by comparing her stride length, stride frequency and lap time with the race in Stuttgart.

I dont mind being wrong, in fact I am fascinated by the subject of how she did those times because Stuttgart was one month before and surely if she was on EPO she would have been on it in Stuttgart. EPO abusers take the drug for many weeks to the gain full effect. I would love to see video evidence from Beijing '93.