Is Sabastian Sawe showing that the sport is cleaner than we thought?

It is widely considered because anti-doping is more effective at catching bodybuilding dopers. It is effective because more samples are testing positive. Against a backdrop of a global average of around 1% of samples testing positive, in bodybuilding that figure was 11%, and in previous years, as much as 16%.

You have a proven track record of either misquoting sources, or misattributing sources, or both, assuming for argument that such a quote was ever made in the first place.

In addition to repeatedly asking you for the original source, I have long searched for such a WADA quote, without success. I just asked AI to help me find the WADA quote, and here is the response:

"No. There is no single official quote, press release, or document from WADA that neatly groups exactly those four sports together under a single "high-risk" verbal statement."

That was a question about standard of proof. The right answer is "none". Civil courts still require evidence.

I am on the same side as the "Chair of the WADA Prevalence Committee", who provided a range of known prevalence with an "evidence base".

It is easy to end up on the "losing side" when the rules do not require an "evidence base".

This looks more like an obvious demonstration of the latest advanced technology in supershoes.

He doesn't because he has simply speculated ,-- based on 'catching transgressors after the fact, Chepngetich et al, --that they are not 'effective' prior to participation. That may well be because they are not testing enough, not enough equipment in places where they should be etc

However, the advanced testing equipment where present, is capable of quantifying known analytes but also qualifying and identifying 'unknown' analytes. So speculation about unknown PEDs (as I said not named by anyone) is pure rubbish. It elevates these backyard chemists (Howman himself calls them kitchen chemists) above those who have spent there careers studying, researching, developing tests for and testing for these analytes and/or their fragments.

...and the other thread about post Tergat era clearly gives a plausible justification for the improvement in performances greater than one hour duration, whilst the sub one hour has been dormant. A PED argument does not support that.

{edit} ...but you won't acknowledge that nor let it go because it does not fit in with your speculations

Athletes over 25 years ago were able to dope without returning a positive test. Remember "the clean" and "the clear" - Marion Jones's favoured choice of steroids? She was able to pass drug tests while "glowing". Doping is way more sophisticated today. As Howman says, doping control is "ineffective". Sawe's team will know how he can easily beat the testers.

The ped argument is based firstly on the fact that that dopers today know how to beat tests but above all that supposedly "clean" athletes are running far faster than any doper is supposed to have run. So drugs don't aid performance. Tell that to the countless athletes who dope and the antidoping experts who are trying to stop it.

So shoes enable greater gains than drugs might do? That's attributing an awful lot to a structure that is essentially support for the foot, and contains nothing more complicated than a carbon rim containing foam. Oh - and laces. Athletes are more sceptical than you. They continue to dope unabated, even while they wear the shoes.

If there were no unknown peds there would be no rationale for retaining blood samples for 10 years, which is because tests can't identify the drugs when they are being used.

Top athletes don't rely on "backyard chemists". They have teams that include medical and pharmacological experts. That is why Howman has said doping is more sophisticated than antidoping and is always ahead. You apparently still think doping is at the level of the Wright brothers when it has become supersonic. That is why doping has become indispensable to professional sport and why it can't be eradicated.

When it comes to "proven records" yours is of obfuscation and lying. The comment attributed to WADA was in a document discussing the preponderance of doping in global championships like the Olympics. It stood out as a telling comparison of running with other sports that are notorious for their doping - which made it easy to recall. AI is definitely ahead of you but it doesn't access everything that isn't obviously categorized.

Everything that has considered "probable" - as used by experts such as Howman, when he says "plausible" - requires a factual or "evidentiary" basis. Otherwise it is merely conjecture and at best is only "possible". Howman isn't speculating; he is making a considered judgment or assessment. That requires facts.

The balance of probabilities was also the standard of proof explicitly exercised by CAS in the Houlihan case.

Based on the available data, yes.

Howman quoted someone else.

The "Chair of the WADA Prevalence Committee" gave one range of estimates supported by the "evidence base", and another estimate without any "evidence base" support. You are right to say it is merely conjecture. He did not apply or meet the standard of "balance of probability".

You've fallen for another myth.

Without that document, I cannot be sure what was said, or if it was WADA that said it.

Athletics produces a lot of doping positives because it is the sport by far with the most samples. When you rank doping positives by sport as a percentage of samples (as I did earlier), athletics drops down to #7, and is only marginally above the global average.

lol

Just proves how little you know about running biomechanics, nor physics itself

They may or may not have specific tests for unknown analytes, but believe me, I have sold, serviced, trained chemists on etc,m the high end instrumentation that is used, and seen it used in a WADA lab...,.they will detect trace levels of unknowns nonetheless, report as red flags, do more thourough testing.

You say the 'chemists' are not backyard, but Howman calls them 'kitchen chemists' and compared to the mainstream they would be worse than a backyard meth chemist

...just another note Armstrong, on posts of the stances you take, you know just enough to argue about it, and little enough to make your arguments foolish

cheers

What I do know is that whether athletes are using "kitchen chemists" or the best pharmacological experts available antidoping can't catch the dopers. Howman has long maintained the drug cheats are ahead of antidoping and he has said only this year that doping control is "ineffective" and dopers are "getting away with it". So his arguments, too, are foolish?