This is how deep is doping in Kenya

And I don't disagree with any of that. Just that extrapolation has a risk and can bring uncertainty. We also know there are many differences. Cycling is not running. With East Africans, there is also an altitude factor which cannot be ignored, especially when discussing an oxygen related drug. They are a different population than European descended sea level dwellers.

New rbcs work better than old stale blood. That's why EPO is better than blood doping.

Africans are aided by their coping with parasites that destroy rbcs Their body is always striving to maintain adequate levels.

Treat the parasites AND hit them with EPO and look out.

Please don't respond to J.R.

I am all for honest debate but he does not deserve people's time.

FlawedThinking wrote:

the scientific studies say it works, and these studies were NOT done by makers of EPO to boost sales

How dumb can you get.

Good grief... wrote:

FlawedThinking wrote:

the scientific studies say it works, and these studies were NOT done by makers of EPO to boost sales

How dumb can you get.

Toss up between JR and JO.

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.

Why I believe myself:

- Thousands of top cyclists have been caught for it. Some of them have admitted how they were on it for years and then detailed how they beat the tests (Landis, Hincapie, Hamilton, Barry, Leipheimer, Armstrong, and the rest of the 12 from the Reasoned Decision testimony).

- Every TdF winner from 1996 to 2007 has been caught for drugs, and most of the top-10 every year for 20 years going back to before they tested for EPO, but just made the 50% HCT limit. Riis (admitted) 1996, Ulrich (caught and admitted) 1997, Pantani (caught) 1998, Armstrong (admitted) 1999-2005, Landis (caught and admitted) 2006, Contador (caught for clen') 2007.

- If every multi-millionaire WINNER gets caught (even with all their resources) of EVERY TdF winner for 12 years, this leads me to believe that nearly everyone at the ProTour level is using.

This leads me to believe that it is in heavy use in other sports where testing is not as effective. The hundreds of positive tests in XC skiing, and other endurance sports support this. Before you tell me testing in track is just as effective, establish your credentials as a cycling expert. Track is a sport where, when someone sets an AR in the Steeple, they "forget" to take the obligatory drug test and the organizers don't force them. They subsequently do not ratify the AR.

- Hundreds of top runners have been caught for it. By "top runner" I mean someone who could meet the "A" standard. I can't provide a list of them, but if you were actually as committed as you act like, you would see them when I do. I read them in Track and Field News each month, in Athletics Weekly, on the internet and other publications. Just because you may not be aware that hundreds have been caught does not mean they weren't. Hundreds of other lesser lights and National Class athletes have been caught too.

This leads me to believe that its use is nearly 100% among the top class.

- Last, the distance WRs had plateaued by the end of the '80s despite (or perhaps BECAUSE OF) drugs being used heavily for 30 years in distance running, when lo and behold (after EPO became available) in the early '90s they started dropping from 1500-10k.

When Ondeiki ran 26:58 and became the first man to break 27, it was hailed as The Greatest Distance Race of All Time. Do you know why you never hear about that anymore? Because EPO suddenly made that record look weak ... and every other one from 1500-10k right with it.

NoNames were suddenly running faster than every WR holder and Olympic Champion before 1990. I remember in 2000 when Felix Limo came out of NOWHERE (he had never run under 28:00 - he had run 28:23 a yr earlier) to run SECOND at Brussels to Paul Tergat (at 27:03) and run 27:04. He only ran under 28:30 twice more (27:26 and 27:57).

So the records dropped 3.5 secs for 1500m, 7 secs for 2000m, 9 secs for 3000m, 20 secs for 5000m, and 46 secs for 10k all in 6 years. Then they sat there for 17 years.

WRs set in the '90s (most of it over 8 yrs):

1500m - 3 (dropped 3.46 secs)

Mile - 2 (dropped 3.2 secs)

2000m - 3 (dropped 6.6 secs)

3000m - 3 (dropped 8.7 secs)

Steeple - 4 (dropped 10 secs)

5000m - 6 (dropped 19 secs)

10000m - 8 (dropped 45 secs)

Total - 96 secs

29 WRs set in the 90s (by 15 different people).

WRs set since Yr 2000 (over 16 yrs):

1500m - ZERO

Mile - ZERO

2000m - ZERO

3000m - ZERO

Steeple - 2 (dropped 2.1 secs)

5000m - 1 (dropped 2 secs)

10000m - 2 (dropped 5.2 secs)

Total - 9.3 secs

5 WRs set in 16 yrs (by 3 people).

It is so patently obvious that the development of EPO is what brought this on.

1500m WR went this year.

J.R. wrote:

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.

I said "terrible toll doping has taken", as in PEDs. And they do work, those are not mutually exclusive.

"or in many cases a mental deficiency"

You are on the right track here though.

If you were keeping up at all you would see that I was only listing MEN's WRs.

newname wrote:

If every multi-millionaire WINNER gets caught (even with all their resources) of EVERY TdF winner for 12 years, this leads me to believe that nearly everyone at the ProTour level is using.

Many people believe in Santa Claus and The Tooth Fairy too.

Heck, many people go to church every week to worship a deity, born in Israel, who created the universe.

G-Spotter wrote:

A detection window of over a year? Any documentation of this? That seems to make it almost useless. OTOH Nandro was a more common bust in Western countries 10-15 years ago. Can anyone confirm or deny?

From the abstract: "The pharmacokinetics of nandrolone in serum and urine were investigated in healthy young men after a single im injection of 50 mg (n = 20), 100 mg (n = 17), or 150 mg (n = 17) nandrolone decanoate. Blood samples were collected before treatment and for up to 32 d after dosing. In addition, in the 50- and 150-mg groups, 24-h urine samples were collected before treatment and on d 1, 7, and 33 after treatment; in the 150-mg group, additional samples were collected after 3 and 6 months. [...]

In the 150-mg group, who were presumed to have not previously used nandrolone, nandrolone metabolites could be detected for up to 6 months in eight of 12 subjects (67%) for 19-NE and in 10 of 12 subjects (83%) for 19-NA."

Note that the study only ran for six months, and most subjects still tested positive after that. This is why Nandrolone is no longer used by anyone who has a chance of being tested at least once in any given year, i.e. any elite athlete in a country with a reasonably working anti-doping system.

Also note that the study is from 2005. If any athletes took Nandrolone in the 2010s, you can be pretty sure that they assumed that there was probably no drugs testing whatsoever.

@Renato: if you think that EPO does not help top Kenyan's, do you also believe that steroids do not help them either?

I already had the opportunity to answer several times to this question.

About steroids, the fact to be born, living and training in altitude is not relevant, so the effects of taking nandrolone or similar is the same of any other athlete in the World.

But my reading of the problem in Kenya is different from yours.

They didn't assume Nandrolone because there are not OOC tests (that is not true, since there are not BLOOD TESTS, but a lot of tests with urine : the fact is that the most part of these athletes are not among the best in Kenya, so they are in a situation similar athletes in any Country when they are not of National interest), but because their pharmacists, and the local doctors cheating them, don't know anything about the study on nandrolone, and how much time it needs for disappearing from the body. So, this is not something because they suppose to be "save" because there is not control, but is something provoked by total ignorance, not only on the side of the athletes, but above all on the side of doctors and pharmacists.

Some of your arguments can have a base, but your examples when you go to athletics are not really correct.

The improvement of a record during different periods depends on several factors, and doping can have a little role only in all the situation.

How do you consider, for example, the great jump of the WR of 10000m from 28'15" to 27'39" (36" !) made with Ron Clarke in one competition only, and himself was the holder of the previous record ?

Or the jump, in one competition, of the WR of 1500m, from 3'35"6 of Elliot to 3'33"1 of Jim Ryun (2"5 !) ?

During the '90 years, athletics had a big improvement of popularity in all the World. Great meetings started to be better organized, with much more money, the Golden League was created, and the possibility to beat WR was something giving big image to every meeting. With more image, the meetings of GL increased the budget every year, and all the events of middle and long distances were considered at the top of the interest, with investment of a lot of money.

I remember, in Zurich, Eliud Bargnetuny receiveing 12,000 USD for pacing Wilson Boit Kipketer, when he beated the WR. In every meeting pacers were organized for running fast, since the current WR were largely beatable.

At the same time, there was a generation of top Champions, arguably stronger than the athletes of today. Daniel Komen, Haile Gebrselassie and, later, Bekele and Shaheen, are not athletes who born every day, and currently we can say that only Asbel Kiprop can have the same talent.

It's a fact that today, if we could have the best Haile or Kenenisa or Shaheen (who, don't forget, had to quit activity when only 24, for a stupid injury in the left knee, hit against the corner of the door of his car) the results of middle distances events could be still the same of the past, because organizers could have again interest to pay strong pacers, using money where there is the possibility of some new WR.

About Felix Limo, your example is not correct. You speak about an athlete running from nowhere 27'04", explaining he never ran again near this time

(27'26" his second best performance), but you forget he went imeediately to Marathon after bettering the WR of 15 km on road, and for two years was the number one in Marathon, winning Rotterdam, London, Berlin and Chicago.

Renato, thanks. You are clearly right here. The conspiracy theorists are not. They are not the majority of fans.

Maybe you don't care about the 2:00:00 marathon so much, but I would love to see one of your athletes do it. That transcendental talent must be somewhere.

If the clean talent is out there to break 2 then that means 2:04 no longer represents the top athletes. Will EPO then work for those guys?

No.

yyy wrote:

No.

Why not? People are saying it helps those that aren't naturally the best.

renato logic wrote:

yyy wrote:

No.

Why not? People are saying it helps those that aren't naturally the best.

EPO works for middle distance ,ladies marathon and race walking

It has no effect on top Kenyan marathoners and may in fact slow them down

sorry, I was being sarcastic.

Of course it works.