This is how deep is doping in Kenya

I didn't say anything about support. I said he wasn't a top runner.Interesting your point that he took EPO and ran 1 minute slower.

newname wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

Eddie Hellebuyk is a top runner for you? A 2:12:47 places him around the top 7400th of all time.

Everyone stop feeding this idiot. A 42 yr old man runs 2:12 when his all-time best is 2:11:50 and wins the marathon and says the EPO is responsible and that it made him feel like "superman" and that is not even considered support by this imbecile.

The normal ones among us realize that drugs work and they improve performance a huge amount, stop arguing with the Flat Earth Society. It doesn't matter how many people come forward about their use or how many people test positive ... this guy is still going to tell you "the Earth is FLAT!!!"

Jon Orange wrote:

Why do people use alchohol and cocaine to 'have a good time'?

These athletes are young and foolish. They don't know anything about physiology. They are surrounded by blood suckers exploiting them.

Drug psychology. Come on, use your intelligence.

I would rebut with, "Come on, use YOUR intelligence." Based on the readily available evidence and 100 years of doping culture and doping experiments, and the terrible toll doping has taken on so many hundreds of thousands, it is obvious it works.

Jon Orange wrote:

You know that I know my physiology

Now what makes you make THAT crazy statement?

Insecurity. Fear. Faith. Hope. Trust.

newname wrote:

Jon,

Can you tell us why drugs are used in distance running, XC skiing, swimming, and cycling then? There can be no debate that athletes use, have used and will continue to use them in all those sports. What physiological reason are they using them for?

-newname

rekrunner wrote:

I didn't say anything about support. I said he wasn't a top runner.

Interesting your point that he took EPO and ran 1 minute slower.

I was saying that you won't believe that even an example as clear as this would be considered "support" for the idea that drugs work.

Again, you are a complete idiot, keep waving your arms and jumping up and down and screaming to the other troglodytic morons, "believe me, listen to me, the Earth REALLY, REALLY IS FLAT!!!"

At least you are complete and top-notch at something.

rekrunner wrote:

I didn't say anything about support. I said he wasn't a top runner.

Interesting your point that he took EPO and ran 1 minute slower.

Keeping in mind the gap in years/age between those two times.

It would be like Geb dropping a 2:05.

But why are you saying that to me? I think drugs can work. I'm not JR, or Jon O. I only talk about making a case for the effect of EPO for *top* distance runners. I don't ask anyone to believe me - there's already too much belief. I would ask you to examine why you believe yourself.

newname wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

I didn't say anything about support. I said he wasn't a top runner.

Interesting your point that he took EPO and ran 1 minute slower.

I was saying that you won't believe that even an example as clear as this would be considered "support" for the idea that drugs work.

Again, you are a complete idiot, keep waving your arms and jumping up and down and screaming to the other troglodytic morons, "believe me, listen to me, the Earth REALLY, REALLY IS FLAT!!!"

At least you are complete and top-notch at something.

"Top" distance athletes are just the current fastest people. There is no set line where you can say dope stops working.

Would dope have helped Jim Peters? Of course it would have.

rekrunner wrote:

But why are you saying that to me? I think drugs can work. I'm not JR, or Jon O. I only talk about making a case for the effect of EPO for *top* distance runners. I don't ask anyone to believe me - there's already too much belief. I would ask you to examine why you believe yourself.

I don't think you are likely ever to be convinced. I believe the only thing that would meet your high burden of proof would be the sort of double-blind study I referred to earlier, which is very very unlikely ever to happen, due to ethical and financial reasons both.

Honestly the kind of longitudinal studies on highly specific populations you talk about are very very rare, not just in athletics but in related fields such as rehabilitation and medications. And those are fields in which there is serious financial incentive to find cheaper, more effective options and validate them through studies.

That line is very arbitrary because blood doping was being used in distance running for several decades before EPO, starting most likely in the late 60s. The 2 practices are very broadly trying to achieve the same thing, phyisiologically.

You don't know much about Lombard; he made his national team for the world cross champs in 1999 so he was likely in better shape than his 30:30 pb but he did nevertheless make big improvements beyond this shape after changing his training/starting EPO.

This does not refute the fact that he made a huge improvement over just 18 months moving up to Olympic level and he was still taking huge chunks off his 10k time - he had just lopped off 1/2 minute shortly before he was busted.

Your "preEPO" notion is a not really correct - see above re blood doping in distance running in the 60s, 70s, and 80s .

He had still progressed to the elite level and I just expanded on this example as you do not consider him as elite. If he is not "fast" enough for you, I could use Mohmmed Mourhit who destroyed everyone in World Cross on multiple occasions, ran sub 27 for 10k, sub 12:50 5k and almost beat El Guerrouj in 2001 world indoor 3k. I suppose for you EPO was not really a factor in his rise to the top ...

Just do the best you can with basis and logic. But when there is room for doubt, uncertainty, or ambiguity, you are right, I will not be completely convinced one way or another.The rarity of controlled studies doesn't mean that non-blinded anecdotes or propagated mythology transforms into solid proof.

Now Jonny, you know that you haven't posted one single piece of neuroscience.

newname wrote:

Can you tell us why drugs are used in distance running, XC skiing, swimming, and cycling then? There can be no debate that athletes use, have used and will continue to use them in all those sports. What physiological reason are they using them for?

They use them because unthinking people, websites, journalists, trolls, buy into the big pharma advertisements that drugs do something magical and impossible that they don't. There is no physiological reason, but usually either a lack of true knowledge, or in many cases a mental deficiency.

rekrunner wrote:

Just do the best you can with basis and logic. But when there is room for doubt, uncertainty, or ambiguity, you are right, I will not be completely convinced one way or another.

The rarity of controlled studies doesn't mean that non-blinded anecdotes or propagated mythology transforms into solid proof.

Honestly I don't have any particular interest in convincing anybody that drugs work or don't. In some ways I find your adherence to "innocent until proven guilty" admirable.

I guess I just draw a different line on proof and probabilities and the burdens required.

We know that EPO works on some runners (albeit it not elite Kenyans, per se) in double blind studies. We know (as close as we can without controlled studies) that it works in other endurance sports. We know that people in running have used it an exhibited quite good gains (eddy, Cathal, deeja, etc). In extrapolating from that, it seems very reasonable for me to believe that it works on elite runners. I think that really puts the burden of proof on those who believe that it does not work on elite runners (plus whatever qualifications some want to put on that--born at altitude, training at altitude, etc). I understand the basis that Renato argues that it does not work. I find it an interesting hypothesis but I don't find the evidence that he marshals for that argument compelling.

A further factor is something I referred to earlier in the thread--just because it may not work does not mean that athletes won't use it. Vijay Singh used Deer Antler Spray. Paavo Nurmi took Rejuven, which I'm not convinced worked. Elite athletes search for an edge.

J.R. wrote:

or in many cases a mental deficiency.

newname wrote:

I would rebut with, "Come on, use YOUR intelligence." Based on the readily available evidence and 100 years of doping culture and doping experiments, and the terrible toll doping has taken on so many hundreds of thousands, it is obvious it works.

Case in point.

Heh, you rightfully say drugs have taken a terrible toll (though the toll is in the upper millions), then jump to the opposite conclusion that they work.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

We know that EPO works on some runners (albeit it not elite Kenyans, per se) in double blind studies.

All that you know is that big pharma wants you to "think" the drugs work.

Performance enhancing drugs are not big pharma. Why do you keep saying that?

The toll the guy above was stating is on the life of an athlete after they are busted not any deleterious effects.

I have no idea how many are using, what percentage, etc. Just that some are and that some of those that have been caught were at the top of the sport (yet this is disputed, too). Science is data and correlations and conclusions. But the scientific studies say it works, and these studies were NOT done by makers of EPO to boost sales (please prove me wrong about who performed these studies). People busted at the top (WMM winners, OG & WC medalists) give more credence to the efficacy. Some have even stated it made them better.

After all that, the answer is "It is purely psychological". It is stunning.

What do people think the yearly sales of EPO to athletes amounts to?