"It's been posted about a few times before, but supposedly doses as low as 6.25 - 12.5mcg are minimally suppressive. According to some people the thyroid isn't shutdown until doses of 25mcg+ are used.
The behind people running these lower doses is because it puts their t3 levels in the high-normal region. The benefits of this would be increase protein synthesis and more efficient use of food."
T3 Attack wrote:
What is T3 used for?
Fat-loss: The main use for T3.
Increase Nutrient Uptake: Not very well known, but this is a great use for T3. Doses between 6.25-12.5mcg do not shutdown endogenous thyroid output. T3 at this dose can be used to add LBM and help in keeping the fat off. When doses are kept at 6.25-12.5mcg, muscles are full and rock hard, and energy is through the roof. At these light doses, it's common for people to go to the bathroom 5-6 times a day because there bodies are making more efficient use of the food they eat.
[quote]IBuySteriods wrote:
The recommended dose of T4 is 300 mcg/day and these doses can be taken in divided doses and with or without meals. effective-for-hypothyroidism-and-metabolism.html
2 issues here:
1) I take around 6.25mcgs T3 per day with my T4. The reason for taking this was that there is evidence that it can help with raynauds - an autoimmune disorder. I can assure you that i don't go to the bathroom 5-6 times per day and my muscles are not rock hard.
2) 300 mcg T4 is a really high dose. There is no recommended dose. There is no way these guys are taking this much to improve performance. They would be hyperthyroid on this much unless it was clinically indicated.
[quote]oh brother wrote:
Whoops...embarrassing :( Hope it doesn't render the rest of the post useless.
Anyways, we'd all be better off if "A Duck" was mute. We're all stupider for having subjected ourselves to reading his posts in this thread...
[quote]
I not so sure that A Duck is the ogre we make him out to be. The key is to get past spit and listen to what he is trying to say/do.
Same thing works the other way. The message of those who disagree with him so often gets lost in the name-calling.
How many times has he encouraged people to actually do something about their "drug cheat" concerns rather than just play the "hide behind the wall and throw out accusations" game? Don't have to agree with him, but it sounds like he is for cleaning up the game.
Plus, I think is damn funny how many forum posters' goats he has collected.
When you reject that elites have higher thyroid problems for legit reasons I think our are missing another scenario and that is... given the same thyroid levels an elite may see performance worsen where a non elite, more sedentary person would never have noticed the issue and therefore not been diagnosed. This would explain why is appears that a higher percentage of elites have thyroid level issues than the general population.
oh brother wrote:
Wow, most of you guys are dumb. PLEASE read this whole post – it took me a while to write. I’m convinced I’ve arrived at the right answer.
We know three things for certain:
1) You don’t want to have hyper- or hypothyroidism, as both negatively affect running performance
2) To balance your thyroid hormones, you can take drugs
3) Many elite distance runners take these drugs (a percentage that far exceeds that of the general population)
Forget everything else (e.g. who the prescribing doctor is). These three things are the only things that matter.
OK. Based on the three facts above, there are ONLY 5 scenarios for why an abnormally high number of elite distance runners take these drugs:
1) Thyroid medication is a performance enhancing drug
2) The occurrence of thyroid imbalances is more frequent in elite distance runners for legitimate reasons (e.g. training intensity, genetics). These drugs are used as directed to treat the condition they are prescribed for
3) There is a performance benefit from taking these drugs that outweighs the negative effects of throwing off thyroid levels (e.g. weight-loss)
4) The drug masks the presence of banned substances
5) MOST LIKELY: The drugs are needed to rebalance hormone levels that have been thrown off because of non-natural reasons
There are no other scenarios other than these five. No athlete is choosing to manipulate his or her hormones for a reason other than these, because any other scenario would be odds with the three facts stated at the beginning of this post (i.e. no one would mess with their thyroid “just of the hell of it”)
What would you have to believe in order to accept each of the four scenarios above:
1) Thyroid medication is a performance enhancing drug
REJECT: Multiple posters have used this drug and testified that it does not improve performance beyond returning levels to normal. Swinging too far in either direction does not aid performance
2) Elite distance runners have higher thyroid levels for legitimate reasons.
REJECT: While thyroid problems are significantly more frequent with elite athletes than with average joes, AN OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of elite athletes do not have this problem. One can’t defend the causality of genetics or training because MOST athletes are fine without it. I’ve never heard someone say, “I’ve got to hang up my spikes…this hard training is messing with my thyroid levels too much”. (Note: this is the second most likely scenario – but a very distant second)
3) There is a performance benefit from taking these drugs that outweighs the negative effects of throwing off thyroid levels
REJECT: As many previous posters have testified, having thyroid levels that are out of whack is severely detrimental to performance. People have also testified from using the drug that the only benefit came from returning levels to normal. In other words, there are no other benefits. If athletes are only using it intermittently to lose weight, well…then that’s not how the drug was prescribed so they’re cheating anyway
4) Drug masks the presence of other drugs
REJECT: This is something that the IAAF and WADA can test for. If they really have been looking at it for seven years, and it really was a masking agent, these bodies would at least require a TUE. Since they do not, one can reasonably assume that the drug is not a masking agent (I’m speaking in terms of traditional masking agent…not regulating bio passport, which it would in fact help with)
5) The drugs are needed to rebalance hormone levels that have been thrown off because of non-natural reasons.
ACCEPT: This is by FAR the best conclusion. Athletes must be taking the drugs for some reason. We know they’re not manipulating their levels for the hell of it, and since we’ve rejected the first four scenarios, this MUST be the reason.
Supporting evidence:
WADA and the IAAF haven’t banned the drug. This means they believe that alone it’s not a PED or a masking agent. In this post, I’ve rejected the potential belief that the elite distance runner population isn’t uniquely exposed to this condition naturally (evidenced by most elite runners being fine). But why do people still take it!? It must be because other drugs unnaturally throw off thyroid levels, and this drug is needed to rebalance that level (the poster “I read something” was describing this). Under this scenario it is true that elite distance runner population has a higher instance of thyroid imbalance – but the reason is not a natural cause.
The reason WADA and the IAAF haven’t banned the drug is because it doesn’t do anything that helps. Of course, when they do their tests, they are testing to see how the drug IN ISOLATION affects performance. Apparently, it is actually detrimental (as many have attested). So, obviously, there are no grounds for banning it, as it only helps in conjunction with other, already banned substances.
So, why are athletes taking the drug that is proven to have no performance benefits? It is because they need to take this legal drug to counteract the negative.
A Duck never offers cogent, well-reasoned or well articulated opinions. Am I correct in assuming that he majored in a low level subject at a low level college? What a complete waste of time and money.
Wejo makes some valid points but the use of the Jos Hermans quotes to support the case against Rupp and Farah is a bit weak considering his past involvement with coaches and doctors involved in doping (even if he was cleared), some of the athletes he has been an agent for in the past and allegations which have been made against him when he was an athlete.
I guess Wejo included Hermans quotes so it let him put Mo Farah's name alongside Rupp on the home page as Farah's name is not mentioned in the Wall Street Journal Article and there is no evidence that he takes thyroid medication (although it would not surprise me if he does). I notice that Wejo did not include Bob Kennedy's name in the title on the home page even though he is named in the WSJ article.
In terms of the Thyroid medication, the people taking it now can't be banned, or have retrospective action taken against them in the future, as it is not a banned substance. Even if the medication does get banned presumably those already taking it will be allowed to continue taking it and be able to compete as, from what I understand, once you start taking it you can't stop, as it can endanger your health so they would get a TUE. By the time it gets banned, if it ever does, Rupp and those others taking it now will probably have finished their careers anyway.
An interesting point is how much athletes are talked into taking medication like this by others. When Rupp started taking this in 2006 he was 20. If I were 20 and struggling with fatigue and told by Salazar to go see a specialist who then told me to take the medication I probably would. I doubt Rupp knew at that stage how many other endurance athletes were taking it, or if it had any performance improving aspects other than making him feel normal again. Even if he did have an attack of guilt about it later it would be too late to stop taking it.
I don't accept the argument in the WSJ article that taking this stuff is different and worse than taking asthma medication. Asthma might not be caused by exercise but many athletes don't realize they have a problem with it until they start running and don't need medication until they exercise. Who is to say that this is not the case with this as well?
Rojo's defense of Paula Ratcliffe compared to Rupp on the basis of junior performance does not stand up. Rupp has an outstanding record as a junior. Ratcliffe did take Asthma medication as well in the past so that might be one point behind another posters criticism of her.
Trying to get an advantage like this without actually breaking the rules is not new of course. Before EPO many athletes were blood doping by doing blood transfusions and this practice was not banned until the early 80’s (and of course is not possible to detect even now if athletes use their own blood). Seb Coe and Lassie Viren amongst others has been accused of this in the past.
Taking Thyroid meds is of course morally questionable and appears dangerous, if you don't really need it, but as it is not on the banned list and there is no evidence it improves performance I can't see a Lance like scandal coming from this even if it is banned in the future. There are people taking proven performance enhancers and getting away with it and more focus should be given to catching them rather than starting a campaign against athletes like Rupp who have openly admitted that they take this stuff.
Anyone who has followed bodybuilding is aware that competitors with normal thyroid function commonly take T3 to reduce body weight while maintaining muscle simply because the additional thyroid hormone increases their resting metabolic rate.
When combined with things hgh and a fast acting water based testosterone one can get stronger, recover faster and improve body composition concurrently.
In the wonderful world of drug using bodybuilders this is common knowledge. It won't take more than a few minutes of googling to come up with a good cycle based on sex/body weight/and frequency of testing to have a very basic and effective set of PEDS that will provide an athlete with a performance advantage and little chance of a failed test.
This can be as subtle as ensuring peak levels post competition or as extreme as hiding an athlete for 6-10 weak and giving them a solid competitive advantage. Cheating isn't terribly hard.
What is so cutting edge about this doctor? It seems all he did is run the same battery of blood tests as the athletes' previous doctors and just interpreted the results differently. For Salazar this makes him the "best sports endocrinologist in the world" (whatever that means)??? To Begley "he's the most thorough endocrinologist I've ever seen." How many has she seen, and based on what?
Whatever...
Sprintgeezer wrote:
eurodonkey--
I was thinking not about prolonged training and recovery, but rather about competitions where pain could cause a lack of confidence or distraction.
Good point. I remember travelling to Rome to watch the WC in 1987. Peter Elliott was in a terrible state, having cortisone shots after every round, but got through to get the silver medal. Not exactly painkillers, but he was in a LOT of pain. On the other hand, with 'normal function' maybe he would have got past Konchellah. And there's nothing controversial about helping an injured athlete try to get through the rounds.
But uninjured people swallowing ibuprofen in case their road race might hurt later that day - that's scary, wrong, and I would be utterly amazed if there was evidence that it worked.
Sprintgeezer wrote:
Are there any surgeries that are performed simply to enable athletic performance, in excess of that required for daily function?
There is a great book called "Any Given Monday" by a top surgeon, Dr. James Andrews, who has treated many baseball and football players. He is absolutely adamant that there is no surgery on the planet which can make anything better than it was before the injury.
He spends a lot of time explaining to pushy parents that something called a 'Tommy John' surgery will NOT make their kids throw further. He reckons that the few cases where pros threw further afterwards were because they had a year of carefully supervised rehab and training instead of their usual all-year-round competitive insanity.
211 Crew wrote:
A Duck never offers cogent, well-reasoned or well articulated opinions. Am I correct in assuming that he majored in a low level subject at a low level college? What a complete waste of time and money.
Yes.
eurodonkey wrote:
Good point. I remember travelling to Rome to watch the WC in 1987. Peter Elliott was in a terrible state, having cortisone shots after every round, but got through to get the silver medal. Not exactly painkillers, but he was in a LOT of pain. On the other hand, with 'normal function' maybe he would have got past Konchellah. And there's nothing controversial about helping an injured athlete try to get through the rounds.
But uninjured people swallowing ibuprofen in case their road race might hurt later that day - that's scary, wrong, and I would be utterly amazed if there was evidence that it worked.
Nope. As far as I'm aware, there's no evidence that taking painkillers before a race improves performance. What's worse is that all these people are risking serious complications from their thoughtless use of NSAIDs. A friend of mine passed out mid-run and had to be hospitalized after he developed bleeding ulcers; it turned out he'd been taking ibuprofen all day for months.
Steve Bence, er, A Duck needs to get back to work and stay off of the message boards.
A Duck wrote:
bla bla bla.
Totally f*xking baking sht up.
Time for Beddy Byes wrote:
Settle down Steve, time for nite nites I think.
Phil Knight wrote:
Steve Bence, er, A Duck needs to get back to work and stay off of the message boards.
He only posts late at night and early morning, like 1am/2am.
I think we need a Congressional investigation to get to the bottom of the Hyper Thyroidism PED Dodge technique to expose the perps and cheats.
In case anyone still cares. . . I finally found the literature review that Brown is probably basing his treatments on. The review is published by the National Academy of Clinical Biochemistry, which sets the standards for clinical laboratory analyses.
The information pertinent to this debate is that they found that many people with occult thyroid dysfunction (they are unaware that they have subclinical hypothyroidism), were included in past efforts to establish ranges for the normal healthy population. This skews the data right, and results in an exaggerated healthy range. They expect a future TSH range of 0.4 to 2.5 mIU/L to be the standard for healthy individuals.
They say it best:
"Over the last two decades, the upper reference limit for TSH has steadily declined from ~10 to approximately ~4.0-4.5 mIU/L. This decrease reflects a number of factors including the improved sensitivity and specificity of current monoclonal antibody based immunometric assays, the recognition that normal TSH values are log-distributed and importantly, improvements in the sensitivity and specificity of the thyroid antibody tests that are used to pre-screen subjects. . . In the future, it is likely that the upper limit of the serum TSH euthyroid reference range will be reduced to 2.5 mIU/L because >95% of rigorously screened normal euthyroid volunteers have serum TSH values between 0.4 and 2.5 mIU/L."
This is found on page 35 of the document, which is an interesting read if this subject is important to you.
"Laboratory Support for the Diagnosis and Monitoring of Thyroid Disease" (NACB):
Gotta hand it to Salazar. How long ago was it that he was saying you couldn't be top 5 in any distance event without EPO or HGH? But now, suddenly, he has arguably the top 2 track distance runners in the world. EPO use and HGH use haven't been eradicated, although admittedly they have perhaps been limited somewhat by testing advances. And anyway, his 2 main guys are performing on a comparable level to the guys Salazar was talking about during the "EPO Era." So what gives?
It looks to me like he Salazar has done an end-around. Rather than using EPO/HGH for his athletes, he found other avenues to achieve the same effects. The great thing for him is, even as this comes into the open, he doesn't look all that bad to many. Everything that has been revealed so far, and much of what has been speculated, is legal at least in a technical sense. As another poster mentioned, his athletes will never retroactively lose their medals for thyroid hormones, even if the drugs are regulated more strictly in the future.
It might be that his only regret is that in the ongoing battle to gain an edge on the competition, the little thyroid game is becoming less of a secret. Soon everybody will be taking thyroid meds, and the playing field will be even in that area.
Personally, I find the whole thing depressing. It brings home the inevitability of cheating, or in this case, pushing the gray areas. It would be nice if sportsmanship ruled, and some ambitious runner could go get a cabin in the woods, train their butt off, and mould themself into a champion, but I have to accept that those days are gone (if indeed they ever truly existed).
I haven't read any of this read yet, but controversies like this thyroid thing and guys looking for any advantage to get ahead make me more disillusioned about the professional level of the sport everyday. I might only pay attention to high school and college from now on.
These young guys don't realize that the real finish line is the grave, and over training plus hormone therapy is going going to get them there faster. Fit guys who don't take any medicines will run their victory laps when they are 90.
The athletes realize that for the most part the scare tactics and hype are obscenely overblown. Aspirin is far more dangerous than hgh or any of the testosterone derivatives AND the paydays attached to gold medals are more than they will ever make working in a bank or selling insurance.
Athletes having been using PEDS for almost 70 years and the ones who reach world class have the labs and the doctors to support them.
PEDS allow the hardest, smartest training athletes to win instead of simply staging a beauty pageant for the winners of the genetic lottery.
Release the hounds!