Abraham Kiptum WORLD RECORD 58:18 Half Marathon

Says the white guy pretending to be Kenyan.

El Keniano wrote:

Truly mentally disturbed individuals, this pair.

This is a question for me which is wrongly based on an assumption that such a red flag determination can be made on time alone. Since I have not accepted that EPO can lead to superhuman performances, for distance running events, a 58' time could be doped, or clean, depending on other factors rather than time. If someone now runs 57' or 56', my answer will not change based on time alone. The fastest time I found annulled due to doping is Abraham Kiprotich's 61:02, a performance which is ranked 1393rd of all time.

Armstronglivs wrote:

I would be curious to know what you considered a likely doped performance, since no feat by any Kenyan seems to raise any red flags for you. Take Kiptum's run. If 58' doesn't do it for you, what time - by him - (or anyone?) - would? Sub 58? 57? If not 58', why not?

rekrunner wrote:

This is a question for me which is wrongly based on an assumption that such a red flag determination can be made on time alone.

Since I have not accepted that EPO can lead to superhuman performances, for distance running events, a 58' time could be doped, or clean, depending on other factors rather than time. If someone now runs 57' or 56', my answer will not change based on time alone.

The fastest time I found annulled due to doping is Abraham Kiprotich's 61:02, a performance which is ranked 1393rd of all time.

Aren't you contradicting yourself when you say you have "not accepted accepted that EPO can lead to superhuman performances," but yet a very fast 58 could be doped?

Also, if you do not base suspicion on time alone, does the athlete's country make any difference? For example, an athlete setting a WR from Morroco or Russia, two countries with extensive and profound doping histories, would that enhance your suspicion at all?

I didn't understand El Keniano making a circular argument that assumed and concluded that Kenyans are elite because they dope. You make a long argument that concludes we cannot trust elite performances because of the question mark of uncontrolled doping. This seems to forget the history of the 1990s, where EPO doping was uncontrolled worldwide as no EPO test existed until 2000. In the 2000s, there was no OOC blood testing worldwide, until the ABP introduction in 2009. There was, however, OOC urine testing since 2002 worldwide, with more relaxed logistical requirements of getting acceptable samples to the lab. So for much of this 30-year history in question, the testing environment was fairly level world-wide, for two decades, until 2009, when OOC blood testing became relevant. I've long argued that it is not credible that such a powerful endurance doping solution exists, and yet only small regions in Africa would be able to leverage and harness the full power, even during a decade when EPO doping was completely undetectable, and another decade where testing was easily beatable. I've never seen such regional limitations on doping in any other discipline. Another part of history is that there are many East Africans subject to American, Japanese, European standards of testing which out perform their host nation, e.g. Chelimo, Bor, Meb, Abdi, Lagat, Farah, Kipketer, Wanjiru, etc. Often (but not always) these East African imports are not the best East Africans, but the second best that could not make their Kenyan or Ethiopian team, and they still outperform the whole history of their host nations, while subject to OOC testing. This leads me to think that you stress too much the significance of doping, and testing, when evaluating the better performances of the East Africans. Not sure what role athlete confidence in WADA plays -- WADA is in charge of making standards and approving labs that meet standards, and declaring organizations WADA code-compliant. Lately they've expanded their role to conduct detailed investigations. It is up to other national, regional. and international organizations, to enforce anti-doping. WADA is not involved in these athlete anti-doping decisions, except in rare cases where they exercise their right of appeal, and submit a case to the CAS. It looks like their recent decision to re-instate RUSADA was unpopular, and might unfairly benefit Russia -- but, we are in a thread talking about Kenyan performance. When it comes to doping, we can talk a lot about Russia, but when it comes to recent world level performances, Russia is not often part of that conversation, with the exception of about a dozen Russian women, mainly in the shorter distance events.

No. Any elite performance, fast or slow, can be a doped performance, based on that athlete's decision to dope or not, and we cannot guess that based on time. Your hypothetical of Russia setting world records is an important illustration -- Russia is by far the world leader in doping, but by far not the world leader in performance. In endurance running events, they are really not better than Americans or Europeans or Canadians, except for about a dozen women on steroids, and some men (not in running) in race walks. Since I don't expect a big benefit, I don't really concern myself much with who is suspicious and who is not. To the extent that I've considered it, I considered Russian, Chinese, and East German women who performed at world levels because of doping. Instead, I'm concerned with performance, and I don't see doping playing a significant role in the question of performance in distance running events, outside of women on steroids.

You asked me for a time boundary. I find Kiptum's time credible, given his background and rate of improvement. Others look to doping to explain what they cannot believe is natural. I don't find doping a credible explanation for producing times you consider unnatural. Your whole premise is that natural times have one limit, and that unnatural times have a significantly different limit. This is a premise, to a large extent, I haven't accepted for the distance events for the men, and it is a premise I partially accept for shorter distance events for the women on steroids and other male hormones. If some synergistic combination of whatever drugs you want to concoct exists, and this is the main factor for nearly three decades of "unnatural" performances, this should have been easy to replicate outside of Africa, in the 1990s and 2000s. As far as Victor Conte goes, my comments do not extend to the men's sprinting events, but I do think Bolt was clean.

It was Renato Canova on motobike motivated Kiptum along the course? Does he coach Kiptum?

Well, again I'd say that most posters here are quite aware of that. But understandably there is a lot of PR to cover this up.

For example, you have seen the list of doped 100 m runners. Another example on the other side is about the marathon; this here is from rjm (and no, not women on roids):

+1

See here how the dopers reduced their cheating globally, as testing improved:

In parallel, see here how the dopers changed their cheating strategy in 2002 from EPO (too high ret-%) to blood transfusions (too low ret-%):

Second and third tier athletes benefit more, because their weaknesses are larger, and there is more room for improvement against a physical limit. Your idea of different natural and doping limits producing observably different times is still an assumption, one that I don't share. Generally you will find me completely unswayed by examples that neglect to consider confounding factors. Regarding Rashid Ramzi, I'm willing to listen, but you need many words than two, about other factors than CERA or high blood values. To convince me, you need to follow the same strategy that anti-doping uses, enumerate ALL the significant performance factors that changed for Ramzi, and one by one, rule out, or account for, all factors except for doping. This will help convince me that Ramzi's natural limit is not 3:29. Kiprop is an interesting example, as, after running 3:26.69 in2015, he got 3 seconds slower in 2016, and 4 seconds slower again in 2017 -- two years we have seen evidence that he was doping. If you were trying to show that doping makes athletes slower, Kiprop would be a great example. Besides Kiprop, we have 14 athletes faster than Ramzi not yet implicated in any doping (except in one case, Lagat, which was cleared due to observations of enzymatic activity corrupting test results). If you want to talk further about "natural limits" you need to include these athletes in the discussion, and bring more than baseless assumptions that assume the conclusion and conclude the assumption. Some people get tired of me keeping bringing this up, but I guess you are unaware I have already looked at ALL the best times for the past 28 years in a dedicated thread where I wondered why non-Africans, from America, Europe, Asia, Oceania, were generally unable to replicate some of these "unnatural performances" for two decades when testing was either non-existent, or easily beat. You speak of a high doping prevalence, which means that many non-Africans are doping too, yet still not realizing performances significantly better than what was achieved in the mid-1980s. Perhaps you can give me your idea of what are the natural limits for non-Africans versus the the natural limits for Africans.

And maybe you're underestimating it based on your research? And how is the press "largely overestimating" the effects of EPO? Generally they just report a doping positive or ABP sanction, what the athlete tested positive for and any notable accomplishments in their resume (e.g., Olympic/WC medalist, marathon title(s), etc.).

Getting back to the estimation of improvement with rEPO & elites, let's take a look at another expert opinion. Dr. Yorck Olaf Schumacher, who was on the expert anti-doping panel hearing the evidence on the Svetlana Karamasheva's ABP CAS hearing in 2017.

Paragraph 77:

(77). "Moreover, EPO is typically taken as a course of many weeks, not as a single injection. Professer Schumacher explained that it can increase oxygen supply by 6% and take as much as one minute off the time taken to run 10,000 metres, and proportionately more over lesser distances."

So, there you are rekrunner. An opinion from an anti-doping expert with unassailable credentials who sits on expert panels reviewing evidence presented in ABP CAS hearings.

Maybe, but unlikely. It doesn't take me long to find quotes like "Kenyan runners improved their 3000-meter times by an average of 5% after taking EPO, which is the same improvement seen in Scottish runners", in the press. Which elite runners does Professor Schumacher coach, or has studied? Did Professor Schumacher say for whom? I could believe finding 3% for well trained amateurs in a study, but for 27 minute elite runners, does Professor Schumacher still expect a 1 minute, or 3.7%, benefit? Get back to me with a quote on that. Surely you've heard all this before, but ... Let's think this through a little bit. In the 5 years between 1984 and 1989, 4 non-African runners ran between 27:08.23 and 27:17.48. Given that doping prevalence was high, worldwide, and no EPO testing until 2000, world-wide, and easy to beat testing up until 2009, world-wide, and East Africans started improving on the track in 1991, relegating non-Africans to also-rans, and a professional opinion of an expectation of up to 1 minute benefit from EPO from expert Prof. Schumacher, shouldn't we see both African and non-African times around 26:08 to 26:18? Maybe 26:48? Maybe 27:08? What did we really see in the 20 years before the ABP, when EPO became easier to detect, and the East Africans gained a OOC testing advantage? The best non-Africans (Americans, Europeans, Japanese, Australians, Russians) for the next 20 years were Antonio Pinto (27:12.47) and Fabian Roncero (27:14.44), not 1 minute faster, not even faster at all, but slower than Arturo Barrios. So while everyone here is content to ask me why I doubt a 1 minute benefit for the 27:00 runner, the more important question is why the highly prevelant doping non-Africans world-wide could not run faster than Arturo Barrios, over the course of 20 years, while 44 East Africans and 3 North Africans could as early as 1993, starting just 4 years later? Why did they fall up to 1 minute behind, when EPO could have caused the very best to run up to 1 minute faster?

The lack of basis is this idea that Kenyan athletes, like Kiptum running 58:19, have crossed a natural ceiling, and that some doping combination exists for the very best elite endurance athletes producing a significantly higher unnatural ceiling. While I'm talking about endurance events, the kind Kenyans excel at, you keep coming back with examples of sprinters. My comments do not extend to sprinters, and drugs designed to increase strength and power. Some of this seems to be based on another idea that things haven't really changed much in the last 50 years, so therefore it can only be modern doping. East Africans do have a different physiology, in at least two respects: 1) they typically weigh 20-40 pounds less than their non-African competitors -- something important for endurance events, with respect to energy costs, and heat dissipation, and 2) lifelong and multi-generational adaptations growing up at altitude. While we talk a lot in these threads about EPO and altitude and oxygen, I think an overlooked factor is the light weight of the East Africans, while being at full strength. You might be interested in reading "The Sports Gene" to see how athletes have specialized in the last few decades across all sports, compared to 50 years ago, and also more info on some specific altitude modifications only possible at altitude, like developing larger lungs while at altitude during formative growth years. I note here that both Cram and Coe ran 3:29.67 and 2:29.77 (as well as South African American Sydney Maree). If you buy "a couple of seconds since then" we are talking about 3:27.7 ballpark -- which (all statistics as of Jan. 15 2018) only 5 athletes have beaten. Only 20 athletes have run between 3:27.7 and and 3:29.7. Armchair experts here give an automatic 2 second bonus for performances at Monaco, crediting the renovated track surface in 2010, which reduces that list even further to just El G, Lagat, and Morceli. Regarding a general slowdown in the last few years, 7 out of the fastest 11 athletes in the 1500m have come after London 2012.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Rekrunner, you are being a little unkind when you suggest that I am arguing from "baseless assumptions". I don't have the kind of data or detail that perhaps you and some others have recourse to but my arguments don't begin and end with hot air.

...

All these scientists who study the effects of doping never had any clue about talent and training of top athletes.

I have to repeat again : I had world record holders (Shaheen in steeple till today, Mosop in 25000 and 30000m, Florence Kiplagat on the road in HM and some shorter distance) and they achieved these results totally clean. I had athletes such as Nicholas Kemboi, who ran 26'30" after 2 months of training in St. Moritz staying in my same apartment, so I well know he was clean, eating only ugali and vegetables and chicken, and drinking only milk.

And in the last year I had athletes moving in less than 8 months from 3'37" in 1500m to 58'42" in HM, from their first competition ever in 14'25" on 5th of May till the ability to run 30 km at the same pace, from 8'30" in steeple and 29'25" in 10000m in altitude to 59'06" in HM (twice) defeating the new WR holder in Copenhagen.

And in 2017 I had a European athlete (Sondre Moen) running marathon in 2h05'48".

I well know they achieved these results WITHOUT the aid of any substance, legal or illegal.

And I know they did this only because their talent and their training.

So, while people speaking about minutes of improvement because of doping make only speculations, I have FACT showing that athletes can be at the top WITHOUT any aid, and this automatically means that blood doping can't have big effect.

Maybe who believes in doping doesn't believe the above athletes were clean, but I KNOW : mine is not a supposition, is a FACT.

So, for me all the researches of scientists not knowing the training of top athletes have some validity for the subjects investigated only, and it's not possible to transfer the results to other athletes.

Can EPO or blood manipulation increase the ability to transport Oxygen ? YES.

Can the rate of improvement be the same for everybody, not depending on halth, talent and training ? NO.

There are studies showing EPO can increase the transportation of Oxygen of 30% for people having kidneys' problems and needing dialysis. There are studies showing the increase can be 10% in case of helath but not trained people. There is somebody speaking about 4% in case of professional athletes, not at the top. This means that, when there is more talent and more training, the effect decreases, and in my experience at the absolute top the effect is around zero, and in marathon maybe a damage.

I don't care the results of every experiment with average people, with not complete protocols, and without precise infos about training before, during and after the administration.

I know where it's possible to arrive in clean way, because I believe in training.

Could the athletes achieving top results in clean way improve their PB taking EPO ? I don't have an answer to that question : my feeling is NO, because otherwise the WR could go very much under the current limits.

And don't forget that, when we speak about some doped, nobody knows exactly WHEN and WHY he/she started to dope.

What I can say, after speaking with some doped kenyan (man or woman), is that they started to look at doping only when were no more able to achieve the same previous results, or after some injury for cutting the period of recovery. This means that their best PB were clean, and doping didn't help them to reach their best.

Have these athletes to be banned, also if their doping didn't really help them ? Yes, because sport has an ethic, and everytime somebody wants to take advantage from something illegal, MUST be punished.

But don't ask "if doesn't work, why do so many athletes use EPO", because I can ask you "if it works, why the main number of top athletes don't use and achieve clean results in clean way", and this looking not only at my personal experience, but also at the quantity of athletes in top 100 all time who were caught positive, and at their position.

If in top 100 all time in 100m, 48 athletes had something to do with doping (and sprinters are the athletes with more money and more medical assistance), and in top 100 marathon runners only one (Wilson Erupe) was positive, and ran his PB AFTER his ban (and after having a lot of OOC tests, a must for every doped athlete who wants to go back in competition), is it not possible that the explanation, instead to look at some cosmic conspirancy, is very simple : THEY ARE NOT CAUGHT BECAUSE ARE CLEAN ?

And, please, don't speak about Conte, he NEVER had anything to do with endurance events, and doesn't know anything about the effects of training for long distances, and effects of doping for those events.

I'm sure that the athletes improving their PB after taking EPO do this BECAUSE THE IMPROVEMENT OF THEIR TRAINING, not for direct effect of EPO. In this case, EPO is the reason because they finally try ro train with higher volume and higher intensity, because, BEFORE taking EPO, they believed NOT POSSIBLE to have the same regimen without any external support.

I liked, if possible, to have this kind of experiment : two groups of athletes of similar value (also not too strong), using the same type of training. One group taking EPO, the other taking placebo, of course without knowing (double blind).

They have to use the same type of training, and their training, in the period of about 4 months, has to become more qualified, of course under a top level coach. At the end of the period, we can see the improvement of the PB of everybody.

I bet that the improvement of the two groups is the same, not depending on the fact they took EPO or not, if their training was the same.

I'm personally ready to do this type of research, if finally IAAF wants to discover the effects of training (and of EPO WHEN there is the same level of training), using money not for stupid researches that don't have any mean, but for really checking the effects of the most overrated kind of doping in the current period.

Yeah, screw science. A shady Italian coach is much more trustworthy. Just ask him.

Totally Clean wrote:

Yeah, screw science. A shady Italian coach is much more trustworthy. Just ask him.

And who are you? Right. A nobody trolling on an online forum.

Ciao!

What about doping in the off season prior to in-season stint in St Moritz?