'We Can Now Estimate the Effect of Blood Doping'

rekrunner wrote:

[quote]Armstronglivs wrote:

I also don't agree with your claim that "Africans don't possess the physiology of other human beings".

.

Are you sure he meant that they way you quote it?

You missed the intended irony. It fits with your view that unlike most other human beings they don't gain from doping.

That is not my view.

Again, I don't that Africans are different than non-Africans with respect to gains from doping.

rekrunner is a liar wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

My ideas and observations about doping helping is a function of talent and instant fitness and instant weakness, and not necessarily restricted to just Africans or non-Africans. In fact, on the contrary, I think one of my stronger historical observations, assuming doping is both widespread and highly effective, that doping seems largely inneffective for non-Africans in distance events, apart from steroids for women..

So, now your argument, based on your evidence seems to be that doping is particularly effective in Africans compared to non-Africans. I mean it does seem to be a pretty inevitable conclusion on the basis of your "data"

Interesting turn of events.

With the Africans, something was particularly effective, but I did not conclude that it was doping.

Recall we lack the necessary doping data to show a strong correlation.

I have also accepted the assumption of others, that Africans have the same physiology, with respect to doping response, as non-Africans, concluding we must also consider other non-doping hypotheses to help explain the 2-3% performance difference that developed in the '90s (for the men) and has lasted ever since.

physics defiant wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

I also don't agree with your claim that "Africans don't possess the physiology of other human beings".

Are you sure he meant that they way you quote it?

I'm not sure what he meant -- it's his strawman.

WADA doesn't use performance as an indicator for sanctioning dopers - how could it? there would be no consistent standards that could apply amongst athletes - rather, it is concerned to sanction them for the drugs they take, drugs that are believed to be performance enhancing. I know you will come back with your usual facile observation that WADA only requires that the drugs have the "potential" to be performance enhancing, but that enables it to circumvent the possible defence that the drugs didn't have that effect. Doping thus remains a strict liability offence; you have the drugs in your system, you incur a penalty - no argument. The principle for sanctioning is that drugs enhance performance . That is the raison d'etre for WADA.

rekrunner wrote:

That is not my view.

Again, I don't that Africans are different than non-Africans with respect to gains from doping.

You contradict yourself. You argue that Africans mostly don't benefit from drugs, while others - like sprinters, women athletes and Russian race walkers do.

rekrunner wrote:

rekrunner is a liar wrote:

So, now your argument, based on your evidence seems to be that doping is particularly effective in Africans compared to non-Africans. I mean it does seem to be a pretty inevitable conclusion on the basis of your "data"

Interesting turn of events.

With the Africans, something was particularly effective, but I did not conclude that it was doping.

Recall we lack the necessary doping data to show a strong correlation.

I have also accepted the assumption of others, that Africans have the same physiology, with respect to doping response, as non-Africans, concluding we must also consider other non-doping hypotheses to help explain the 2-3% performance difference that developed in the '90s (for the men) and has lasted ever since.

It is the necessary conclusion from your data. I know you don't want to say so explicitly, but you developed the data yourself...if it is particularly ineffective for non-africans that it must be ___________ _______________ for Africans.

Re-reading what you said above I realise you said doping appears to be ineffective for non-Africans in distance events - I missed that and read it as your usual claim that it doesn't work for Africans. But now I see you're essentially saying it doesn't work for anybody - in distance events. Well, that certainly brings your doping apologism clearly to the fore. You base that astonishing claim on little more than your subjective evaluation of performances over time - subjective because you have no data that establishes what is a yardstick for a clean (or a doped) performance, which must necessarily vary amongst athletes. Your views are little more than guesswork, seen through a lens that chooses to discount the effects of doping.

Armstronglivs wrote:

You argue that Africans mostly don't benefit from drugs,

That is not my argument. I don't make a distinction of doping benefit between Africans and non-Africans.

The only African distinction I make is that of observed historical performance.

rekrunner is a liar wrote:

It is the necessary conclusion from your data. I know you don't want to say so explicitly, but you developed the data yourself...if it is particularly ineffective for non-africans that it must be ___________ _______________ for Africans.

It is more speculation on your part than necessary conclusion.

"my data" does not include individual doping data, so I would not dare to suggest cause and effect when I am missing one set of key data.

The prevalence data I do have, which is admittedly very limited, is summarized by country, and does not seem to correlate very highly with the performance data, motivating me to look for non-doping explanations.

rekrunner wrote:

rekrunner is a liar wrote:

It is the necessary conclusion from your data. I know you don't want to say so explicitly, but you developed the data yourself...if it is particularly ineffective for non-africans that it must be ___________ _______________ for Africans.

It is more speculation on your part than necessary conclusion.

"my data" does not include individual doping data, so I would not dare to suggest cause and effect when I am missing one set of key data.

The prevalence data I do have, which is admittedly very limited, is summarized by country, and does not seem to correlate very highly with the performance data, motivating me to look for non-doping explanations.

Yet you conclude that doping is ineffective for non Africans, which is definitely cause and effect, based on the very same data and the same absences of data.

So either you are being disingenuous or you need to rethink the whole thing.

They make those gains more frequently though and even their most talented love the boost.

All on an individual scale of course. As a study of one.

x 1000

According to the WADA. Which we must trust.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Re-reading what you said above I realise you said doping appears to be ineffective for non-Africans in distance events - I missed that and read it as your usual claim that it doesn't work for Africans. But now I see you're essentially saying it doesn't work for anybody - in distance events. Well, that certainly brings your doping apologism clearly to the fore. You base that astonishing claim on little more than your subjective evaluation of performances over time - subjective because you have no data that establishes what is a yardstick for a clean (or a doped) performance, which must necessarily vary amongst athletes. Your views are little more than guesswork, seen through a lens that chooses to discount the effects of doping.

That explains your odder than usual posts.

rekrunner wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

You argue that Africans mostly don't benefit from drugs,

That is not my argument. I don't make a distinction of doping benefit between Africans and non-Africans.

The only African distinction I make is that of observed historical performance.

But you do between Russian women and Male Racewalkers and everyone else.

rekrunner is a liar wrote:

Yet you conclude that doping is ineffective for non Africans, which is definitely cause and effect, based on the very same data and the same absences of data.

So either you are being disingenuous or you need to rethink the whole thing.

I've rethought and arrived at the same conclusions.

What I observed for non-Africans was comparatively ineffective performances on a global scale over the course of the last three decades. While I lack individual doping data, I do have some general prevalence data available by country to show that non-African doping prevalence was not zero.

rekrunner wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

Re-reading what you said above I realise you said doping appears to be ineffective for non-Africans in distance events - I missed that and read it as your usual claim that it doesn't work for Africans. But now I see you're essentially saying it doesn't work for anybody - in distance events. Well, that certainly brings your doping apologism clearly to the fore. You base that astonishing claim on little more than your subjective evaluation of performances over time - subjective because you have no data that establishes what is a yardstick for a clean (or a doped) performance, which must necessarily vary amongst athletes. Your views are little more than guesswork, seen through a lens that chooses to discount the effects of doping.

That explains your odder than usual posts.

But not as odd as your being "motivated to look for non-doping" explanations for performance in a sport known to be rife with dopers. I'm sure you would expect to discover virginity in a bordello. Your "data" would confirm it - but I'd never suggest that you would depend on experience.

Africans definitely discovered secret training techniques in the 90s but unfortunately they forgot to write then down and they are lost.

Westerners were never able to figure them out so their times have only dropped by about 5 seconds over 5k in the last 38 years. In the same time East Africans dropped about 25 seconds. With the loss of knowledge they are back to being about 10 seconds faster.

physics defiant wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

That is not my argument. I don't make a distinction of doping benefit between Africans and non-Africans.

The only African distinction I make is that of observed historical performance.

But you do between Russian women and Male Racewalkers and everyone else.

I don't understand your posts. They always seem to be non-sequiturs.

With respect to doping response, I do not distinguish Russian women from other women.

With respect to doping response, I do not distinguish male racewalkers from ? other male racewalkers?

As you can see in my posts above, my ideas of where doping helps are a function of dope, event, gender, talent, fitness, and weakness.

In previous discussions, when my comments and observations were limited to male distance runners, I often had to remind others that such conclusions did not apply to Russian women or male race-walkers, and sometimes male cyclists, because they are not male distance runners.