Is 7:32- 3000m man- SERGIO SANCHEZ (Esp) the Real Deal?

Are you F*cking kidding me? "Ritz had in in him this whole time so he is legit but the spaniard who had right around the same PRs as ritz and made a similar ridiculous leap cannot possibly be clean".

I'm not saying I think he's clean or drugged, just that you can't hold him to a different standard just because you've never heard of him. If he was a 13:15-13:20 US runner you would have been seeing his results for the last 5 years and maybe thinking that he's due to drop a big one. Maybe he was injured all the time... had a bad setback.. wrong coach.. wrong training.. you just can't know.

[quote]Suspect numero uno wrote:

I think the Spaniards are looking at the U.S performances and thinking "they're doing it too so why can't we". Except what they don't realize is that guys like Ritz and Teg always had it in them to run under 13:00min CLEAN. (Ritz 3rd in WJXC and Teg got fifth). They are where they should be. This guy has never shown throughout his whole career that he could run those times but yet he does it all in one year. quote]

I wouldn't be surprised if Bolt himself were caught. But "They are where they should be" Why? Just because they are american guys? We can just take other numbers (but real ones) from the IAAF website:

Ritz:

2009 (27 y/o) 2:10:00 1:00:00 27:22.28

2008 (26 y/o) 2:11:59 1:01:38 28:05.31

Teg:

2009 (27 y/o) 12:58.56

2008 (26 y/o) 13:25.71

Sánchez:

2009 (27 y/o) 7:45.51

2008 (26 y/o) 7:49.84

Who did cheat last year?

When was the last time the European indoor 3,000 meter record was faster than that of the Americas record?

AFRICA 7:24.90 Daniel Komen

ASIA 7:39.77 Saif Saaeed Shaheen

EUROPE 7:32.41 Sergio Sánchez

AMERICAS 7:32.43 Bernard Lagat

OCEANIA 7:34.50 Craig Mottram

SOUTH AMERICA 7:49.46 Jacinto Navarrete

tromala wrote:

I wouldn't be surprised if Bolt himself were caught. But "They are where they should be" Why? Just because they are american guys? We can just take other numbers (but real ones) from the IAAF website:

Ritz:

2009 (27 y/o) 2:10:00 1:00:00 27:22.28

2008 (26 y/o) 2:11:59 1:01:38 28:05.31

Teg:

2009 (27 y/o) 12:58.56

2008 (26 y/o) 13:25.71

Sánchez:

2009 (27 y/o) 7:45.51

2008 (26 y/o) 7:49.84

Who did cheat last year?

You've intentionally skewed data to prove a point. The 2008 performances for Ritz and Teg are neither PBs nor are they representative of their then fitness, as 2008 was an Olympic year and throwing down a fast time was not as important as Olympic performance.

Sanchez's quantum leap in performance is suspect because of his nation's checkered past in regard to PEDs and because none of his past performances indicate he has the talent to run 7:32. As has already been mentioned in this thread, Ritz and Teg showed great promise at an early age and, despite some bumps along the way, their progression has been relatively linear and unextraordinary.

If "training like the Kenyans" is enough to take 3:38/7:45 guys down to 7:32, then we would be seeing a hell of a lot more of those kinds of performances. Occam's Razor tells me Sanchez is doped.

the reality of it wrote:

Spainiards/Italians are right behind Morrocans on the most suspected drug users list.

Maybe you should give a look to the actual data:

Russia wins. Ukrain and Marocco is just behind. Spain and Italy -as Germany or France- are very far behind Greece, Bulgaria, Brasil, etc. BTW: USA is not doing bad at all.

asdfasdfasdfsdfsdf wrote:

Are you F*cking kidding me? "Ritz had in in him this whole time so he is legit but the spaniard who had right around the same PRs as ritz and made a similar ridiculous leap cannot possibly be clean".

I'm not saying I think he's clean or drugged, just that you can't hold him to a different standard just because you've never heard of him. If he was a 13:15-13:20 US runner you would have been seeing his results for the last 5 years and maybe thinking that he's due to drop a big one. Maybe he was injured all the time... had a bad setback.. wrong coach.. wrong training.. you just can't know.

Sorry but I call bs. He's been running ever since 2001 and he got 83rd place in WJXC. Despite his "legit" progressions for whatever reason they may be, he would have shown at least some promise at an early age. The thing I don't understand is that if this guy was a Moroccan instead of a Spaniard than there would be no question he was a cheat. And a lot of guys are probably refusing to look at his progressions. I mean some of you make it sound like he was sick and injured for NINE years and suddenly BOOM. The answer, he trains like the east Africans. If that was the case we'll be seeing a lot more guys running WL's times with the EA's instead of just him. The whole "my diet, changing coaches, setback, etc are typical excuses for druggies. Call me an ass but I refuse to be gullible like everyone here on this site.

Of course I intentionally skewed data to prove a point. I meant that, unfortunately, nowadays I wouldn't be surprised if ANYONE is caught cheating. But there are many examples of athletes that made a big improvement in the middle of their careers, and that doesn't prove anything.

And about nationality, I don't think Balco was a Spanish firm, nor Marion Jones, Tim Montgomery, Kelli White, Regina Jacobs, Melissa Myerscough, Jerome Young, Justin Gatlin, Antonio Pettigrew (I can go on and on) were spanish athletes.

nepoks wrote:

Dude, watch the race, he cross the line and was immediately recovered, like he had just jogged across the line, not closed in a 2:25 kilo. Amazing.

But he was gritting his teeth and pushing hard from 1k out and clearly hurting from the effort. I don't know if he is clean but he has earned my respect until I hear otherwise.

Lagat did show signs of brillance and he always placed high against any competitors regardless if he was running for time or not. He didn't break 13:00 for 5000m because he seldomly ran them and until this year his focus hasn't been on time; however, he showed that he was capable of much faster and didn't drop huge chucks of his pbs like Sergio.

YOU SAY THERE ARE MANY others who done the same as Sergio, please just list THREE that dropped over 11 seconds off their 3000m times in ONE year and moved high upon World All-Time list (and wasn't later caught using any performance enchancing agents)? Could he be cleaned of course but to me and many others its suspect.

Sergio had to be training decently to run 7:59 two years ago and 7:43 last year so its not like he was sandbagging and decide to train seriously. My point is that nowhere in his career from a teenager til 2009 did he show any signs that he was capable of running 4:52 (2000m) and 7:32.41 (3000m) and to do it in his first 2 races a year later is unreal. Also the indoor season just started so he very likely will run faster and have even bigger improvement compared to his pb last year. So if he goes from 13:20 outdoors and lower his pbs to 12:49-12:52 (which I expect him to achieve) would that be believable or suspect?

Could Sergio Sanchez be clean..yes it possibly; however, I wouldn't be shocked even the slightest to learn otherwise.

"He was gritting his teeth and pushing hard from 1km", you said. Yes but he as also running sub 30 seconds laps from 3000m and ending with a last lap of 27's for 1000m after running 2000m in 5:06 which probably was a personal best for 2010. After he crossed the finish you honestly could not tell if the guy had just finished an incredible fast race or was getting ready to go to the starting line.

I dare you to find one video of Hicham El Guerrouj, Haile Gebrselliase, or Kenenisa Bekele where the first time they dropped their personal bests that much in a middle distance race they didn't show alittle sign of fatigue after crossing the finish line? Unlike Sergio Sanchez.

I think the real issue with Sanchez is that he is encroaching on America's white boy dominance of distance and he wears those cheesy glasses when he races.

But seriously, anytime some guy in his late 20s drops those kinds of times from his previous PRs, you have to be suspicious.

VIPAM wrote:

YOU SAY THERE ARE MANY others who done the same as Sergio, please just list THREE that dropped over 11 seconds off their 3000m times in ONE year and moved high upon World All-Time list (and wasn't later caught using any performance enchancing agents)?

Although there are not so many of nothing in every top list (just the top listed) let's take a look:

Daniel Komen

1996 7:20.67 Rieti 01/09/1996

1995 7:38.09 Monaco 09/09/1995

Saïdi-Sief Ali

2000 7:25.02 Monaco 18/08/2000

1999 7:36.97 Rieti 05/09/1999

(indoor)

2000 7:36.25 Stuttgart 06/02/2000

1999 7:51.56 Erfurt 03/02/1999

Kenenisa Bekele

2001 7:30.67 Bruxelles 24/08/2001

2000 7:46.95 Cottbus 23/08/2000

Moses Kiptanui

1998 7:30.82 Oslo 09/07/1998

1997 7:45.55 Gateshead 07/09/1997

Sorry, forgot you said THREE...

quenton cassidy dropped 8 seconds off his mile time.... nobody accused him.

tromala wrote:

Of course I intentionally skewed data to prove a point. I meant that, unfortunately, nowadays I wouldn't be surprised if ANYONE is caught cheating. But there are many examples of athletes that made a big improvement in the middle of their careers, and that doesn't prove anything.

And about nationality, I don't think Balco was a Spanish firm, nor Marion Jones, Tim Montgomery, Kelli White, Regina Jacobs, Melissa Myerscough, Jerome Young, Justin Gatlin, Antonio Pettigrew (I can go on and on) were spanish athletes.

Again, apples and oranges. I do not dispute that American sprinters have a long and shameful history of performance enhancing drug use, but what does that have to do with a Spanish middle distance runner's purported doping? The last Spaniard who showed this sort of improvement (Garcia) was using EPO. It stands to reason that an athlete showing even greater improvement in a shorter period of time is also likely doping.

You say there are numerous examples of clean athletes making Sanchez-esque improvements out of nowhere in the middle of their careers, but I can't think of any. Sanchez's improvement seems to me a lot like Ramzi's, and we know how that ended. Any athlete regardless of nationality showing this kind of improvement would (and should, for that matter) come under scrutiny.

tromala wrote:

VIPAM wrote:

YOU SAY THERE ARE MANY others who done the same as Sergio, please just list THREE that dropped over 11 seconds off their 3000m times in ONE year and moved high upon World All-Time list (and wasn't later caught using any performance enchancing agents)?

Although there are not so many of nothing in every top list (just the top listed) let's take a look:

...

Sorry, you can take Saïdi-Sief out of the list. But we can take two in it instead:

Kipchoge Eliud

2003 7:30.91 Bruxelles 05/09/2003

2002 7:46.34 Cagliari 10/09/2002

Benjamin Limo

1999 7:28.67 Monaco 04/08/1999

1998 7:41.95 Caorle 13/06/1998

But I agree with you on that, as you can see in the quote you selected: "I wouldn't be surprised if ANYONE is caught cheating". That, of course, includes Sánchez, whose improvement is so remarkable that he was defending himself before nobody acused him.

I just didn't understand why American runners are "where they have to be", and the rest non-African runners are just cheaters. American distance runners are improving by running a lot more miles than they used to do; exactly what Sánchez said he has been doing. Just my opinion.

You are not taking into consideration the age of the runner or their number of years of experience prior to the breakthrough.

Please, Saidi-Sief is a KNOWN doper, and many (including myself) believe that Komen was doping. Kipchoge was 18 when he ran 7:46 and 19 when he ran 7:30. While this is an abnormal improvement, the teenage years are when the most improvement can be expected.

Here is part of the IAAF profile on Limo, "He began running seriously at the end of 1997. He ran his first 5000m in 1998." One would expect large improvements in the first couple years of competing seriously. And to use Bekele as an example is just asinine. He is probably the most talented distance runner ever to live, and his improvement curve (at a young age, no less) can't be used as evidence to grant Sanchez clemency.

slavoj zizek wrote:

many (including myself) believe that Komen was doping.

Sánchez doesn't need clemency (yet), but if you are deciding who is a cheater and who is not, regarless any objective data, maybe many (including myself) can conclude that there's no point in arguing about it.