Ali Saidi Sief, Algerian (anti) hero, who crossed the line with Nandrolone at W.C. Edmonton, 2001. 2nd in 5000 behind (clean) Richard Limo. That was a super fast race with Limo in 13:00, Sief 13:02, and even Spanish warrior, Alberto Garcia 13:06.
The tragedy of all this and many other cases is that these athletes who broke the rules were still talented and could have reached super high levels without doing these things but impatience and greed pushed them to cross the line.
Turkish Kenyan distance runner busted for EPO is painfully predictable. My guess and hope is that either we see a couple more POS's go the same way as this one in getting busted and/or that those Kenyans remaining as Turks go clean and slow down accordingly. Kazakhstan also importing Kenyans and , maybe stereotyping lazily on my part, I think their national sporting ethics will be very much at the Russian/Turkish end of the spectrum.
Makhloufi still posts on Insta, and looks like he is involved in children's charity which appears Nobel.
Did you know that Muslims are expected to give 10% of their income to charity and poor people? In fact one player for Morocco apparently gives all his income to charity -Al Hamdullilah!
Let us all embrace each other whether Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Mormon, Zion, etc ..there is room for everyone and we can all learn from each other. Thank you.
Oops, I forgot Agnostics and Atheists...good luck to them also. The main thing is to try to be a good person in life with good actions - not just words. Words are easy, but what counts are good actions and deeds
Ghost, I usually like your posts but you are wayyyy off base here. Just because someone feels compelled to do good deeds in the name of their religion (especially to curry favor for the afterlife!) does not make them a good, or trustworthy, person.
Makhloufi still posts on Insta, and looks like he is involved in children's charity which appears Nobel.
Did you know that Muslims are expected to give 10% of their income to charity and poor people? In fact one player for Morocco apparently gives all his income to charity -Al Hamdullilah!
Let us all embrace each other whether Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Mormon, Zion, etc ..there is room for everyone and we can all learn from each other. Thank you.
Oops, I forgot Agnostics and Atheists...good luck to them also. The main thing is to try to be a good person in life with good actions - not just words. Words are easy, but what counts are good actions and deeds
Ghost, I usually like your posts but you are wayyyy off base here. Just because someone feels compelled to do good deeds in the name of their religion (especially to curry favor for the afterlife!) does not make them a good, or trustworthy, person.
You speak the truth.
The other day 2 Christians accosted me and warned me to "accept God into life " and if I didn't do this I would "go to hell and burn for eternity." Very strange mindset, some of these diehards.
Coevett your passion for the sport and your heroes is admirable, but the stereotyping and simplistic demonization is not. Everyone rightfully suspects Makhloufi at a very high level. Jama Aden was an elite cheater, Makhloufis career trajectory is bizarre, there’s the Gressier incident and more. Now a 2-year ban for whereabouts is an unprofessional/suspicious look for any athlete. Nobody will dispute that. But look at associations, progression, testing history and competition history to form a complete picture. Don’t let bias overwhelm your analysis as it do often does
Yes by all accounts if you read the book by the Russian who went undercover to bust the doping ring, Maria Savinova was a great friend and person but a willing doper as well. Humans are complex.
No, the tragedy is that they cheated clean hard working athletes out of medals and prize money.
This is true but it goes far beyond this too.
So much of making it in this sport - especially on the track comes down to opportunity. There are stacks of really good and talented men and women that are buried on the permit meet circuit and would give an arm and a leg (figuratively speaking of course) to have just one or two chances to run at Zurich or Monaco etc - the races where they can lower PRs and take that step up in credibility etc that catapults their careers and they are just stonewalled for these opportunities by cheats.
So the biggest tragedy isn't the cost of medals or money - it's opportunity. Better races - maybe the difference between being eliminated in a heat vs making a semi-final at a Worlds or Olympics. The trickle down effect is astronomical so f--k these guys and good on Gressier.
By the way, in May 2022 I was unfortunately stopped by two policemen in Nairobi, Kenya, and had to empty the contents of my wallet ostensibly because I was walking around without my passport. It was a stark reminder that Kenyan policemen are very underpaid which leads to this type of incident. If I had not complied I would have been in the custody of Nairobi police, in an overcrowded Nairobi police cell with all sorts of people, probably not very good company. I’m not dissing Kenya by the way, but just pointing out that in some countries policemen are so grossly underpaid that they have to resort to this type of thing to make a living wage. It was a scary incident.
First time in Kenya?
Hint: those weren't real cops (though you were right to be scared).
This raises my second question, why is everyone so keen to accuse people of being racist on a daily basis on these boards?
East Africa has had an abnormally high level of doping positives over the past six years. This is objective data, not racism. For the love of God, the fact that East Africa is outpacing the rest of the world in their volume of positive doping tests is just a sheer fact, that is not an opinion.
So this board operates in a manner where people feel better about themselves by shouting racist if they don't like the data that someone else is associating with an athlete?
Ghost, I usually like your posts but you are wayyyy off base here. Just because someone feels compelled to do good deeds in the name of their religion (especially to curry favor for the afterlife!) does not make them a good, or trustworthy, person.
You speak the truth.
The other day 2 Christians accosted me and warned me to "accept God into life " and if I didn't do this I would "go to hell and burn for eternity." Very strange mindset, some of these diehards.
I agree. It’s as silly as claiming some God chose your people as ‘special’. So much garbage in the world.
Just in response to the page 1 speculation about Crippa:
there is a category of runner that rises dramatically and dominantly on the periphery of the sport's competitions and then struggles mightily to demonstrate that same performance once they are in the spotlight (read: testing pool).
Crippa unfortunately falls not only into that category, but into the also notorious category of 2020-2021 performers that fell off.
Hope for the best, prepare for the worst with what comes of some careers in the end
Just in response to the page 1 speculation about Crippa:
there is a category of runner that rises dramatically and dominantly on the periphery of the sport's competitions and then struggles mightily to demonstrate that same performance once they are in the spotlight (read: testing pool).
Crippa unfortunately falls not only into that category, but into the also notorious category of 2020-2021 performers that fell off.
Hope for the best, prepare for the worst with what comes of some careers in the end
Crippa who’s 2/2 in setting national records in 2024? What are you talking about?
