Random 28 y/o German nearly broke 8 in the steeple today!?

I found whenever I got below 70kg at 1.86 meters, my running would suffer - either injured, or simply felt weak and ill.
A new coach, better nutrition plans, and a big change in training stimulus could all add up to a significant improvement..

Good post.

Same story. 185 cm tall and used to be overly motivated, so I tried to keep my weight as low as possible. Wrong! I achieved my best results at around 71-72 kg, not 67 kg.

He ran
3:38,12

if true, that aligns well with his 5k and 3k. The 3k steeple remains an incredible outlier

Yes, it's an exceptional run, and he and his coach said so themselves. They were hoping for 8:06. Let's make an admittedly poor comparison. Karsten Warholm's PB for the 400m flat is 44.87 and for the 400m hurdles 45.94. There are 10 hurdles. There are several athletes in the 400m hurdles who run the 400m flat at a similar pace and yet still can't break the world record over the hurdles.

The 3000m steeplechase has 28 hurdles and seven water jumps, making 35 jumps, all of which are comparatively slower than in a 400m hurdles race. I definitely think that Ruppert is one of those athletes who copes better with hurdles than others, just as Warholm is one of those athletes who masters the 10 hurdles better than others. What I'm trying to say is that there's no mathematical calculation between flat and steeplechase that applies equally to every runner. Incidentally, Ruppert's 3k time was run indoors (7:46 in Februar 2025) which is simply slower than outdoors. The 8:01 hurdles suggests about 7:38 potential for 3000 flat outside, if you give Ruppert the 23 seconds like Bakkali (7:56 and 7:33).

This needs clarification: Baumann did not claim anything about his toothpaste, but the doping control laboratory found something in his toothpaste (I don't remember exactly why they examined it). There is more to be said about it, but for me, the bottom line is this one: While we can't possibly know whether Baumann was always clean, he definitely didn't take this nandrolone knowingly.

The testing Laboratory tested food items, beverages & other products in Baumann's house, including his toothpaste.

Here is the background to this: Earlier in 1999 the Cologne Lab contacted the German Governing body, the DLV, advising that nandrolone was being found in contaminated nutritional supplements & not declared on the labels of the products. Their recommendation was any positive nandrolone test warranted a full investigation to rule out any inadvertent doping.

Fast forward 6 months later and Baumann tested positive. The DLV contacted the Cologne lab & requested assistance in the investigation. The Cologne lab removed various mainly milk based products from Baumann's home, and continued to collect urine samples form him (and his wife!) during the investigation. He and his wife both tested for nandrolone after the first batch of products were tested, which came back negative & were ruled out. The investigation then expanded their search to daily use items, such as other food stuffs, face and body creams, shower gels and toothpaste. It was then found in the toothpaste.

The urine tests from Baumann and his wife during the investigation showed they were both somehow being continuously administered nandrolone. The toothpaste was the culprit. They did follow up tests on other people that were consistent with the findings.

Note the local Prosecutor was involved, and they found an unused toothpaste in Baumann's training bag that subsequently also tested positive. The Cologne lab did further tests (hair analysis, blood sample analysis, etc.) & the DLV ended up not sanctioning him. The then IAAF challenged this and banned him. Baumann went to CAS and CAS upheld the IAAF's decision.

Werner Franke, one of the most respected antidoping experts, stated in 2006 in an interview with German magazine Der Spiegel “I’m sure it was an attack. Baumann was very committed to the fight against doping. His toothpaste tubes were contaminated, proven to be an old Stasi method"

Not really well known since the 1980s. Those reports are from 2013.

It's strategic of El-Bakkali not to run really fast times, which would involve the testers much more rigorously. To have that much left in every championship meet shows that he is just not that tired with 400 to go.

Some further background context: there continued to be an East vs West mentality in German politics, sport, organisations etc. right up until the early 00s. Don't be fooled that in 1999, when Baumann failed his test, everything was hunky dory in Deutschland.

Melanie Paschke, a Wessi, was very vocal to the press between 95 & 99 about not wanting Heike Drechsler, an Ossi, in the German 4x1 team. Similarly Sabine Braun's coach (a wessi like Braun) was also etremely vocal about Drechsler being nominated for the heptathlon in 95. On the flip side, it was revealed that there was organised doping in the FRG in the 70s-80s, and so former ossi's were very vocal about that, as they were always made out to be the bad guys.

Let me also add a remark on

sportschau.de

Names withheld: 76 unknown German dopers

@sportschau

ARD investigations reveal that Germany's doping hunters have not published the names of convicted dopers for years due to data protection risks. This has not even been noticed by many sports insiders.

Open link

: This is not about not banning dopers, it is about not publishing their names.

I think NADA (the German anti-doping agency) should at least have issued a press release on that and why they they stopped publishing the names. But that's typically German: If you mention potential legal issues to a German, he will not dare to do anything anymore (I am German myself so I feel entitled to treat that in a slighty satirical way).

7:57 today!