Are drugs behind the amazing drop in marathon times?

The lesson from cycling is that blood manipulation is impossible to detect without continuous monitoring. There is no continuous monitoring scheme in running. Therefore it is possible to cheat with impunity.

There is a financial motive for doing so.

Italian doctors were at the centre of the doping in cycling and also acclaimed as revolutionary coaches before being exposed as corrupt.

On the other hand, there has not been any athletes speaking out (which there were in cycling before it became a big scandal) and there have never been any finds of blood banks etc (although I assume the Kenyan police are less interested in looking than the Italian French and Spanish police were).

If the marathon majors wanted a cleaner sport they could require elite entrants to their races to have submitted to longitudinal monitoring of their blood values for X months before their races. Either they are confident there is no cheating or they don't care. They have no financial incentive to care at the moment.

The main limiting factor for running a fast marathon for white runners is that in our Countries there are a lot of idiots speaking about doping for something COMPLETELY DEPENDING ON TALENT AND METHODOLOGY.

May be Americans and European don't have the same talent of Africans, but of sure it's not difficult for a lot of white runners to go under 2:08 IF THEY UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY HAVE TO DO IN TRAINING BELIEVING THEY CAN RUN FAST, instead continue to speak about the "drug" of other runners, creating a mental limit for themselves.

One thing is clear : I work from many years with some of the best distance runners of the World, AND NEVER ONE OF THEM ASKED ME ANYTHING ABOUT SOME SUPPORT FOR THEIR TRAINING (also legal). Instead, when I'm approached by some athlete from Europe, or North Africa, or America, THEIR FIRST REQUEST IS WHAT THEY HAVE TO TAKE FOR SUPPORTING THEIR TRAINING.

And for this big mistake, the responsible are the idiots seeing drugs everywhere.

Its simpler than that.

Iaaf refuses to implement any form of hematocrit limit like in cycling. Likely they are afraid of lacking interest if times are getting weaker.

Even there are many rumors about race organizers accepting no test guarrantee for the biggest stars at major marathons.

Why not use race day 50% hematocrit limit like in cycling.

It is still possible to cheat, but it makes it very much harder and more sophisticated. Top marathoners doesnt have a Lance Armstrong support team.

Renato, for sure you must agree about using such a limit?

The problem with imposing a hct limit is that when people get 'caught' with a hematocrit of over 50% they get a 2 week 'ban'.

Although the official reason for the ban is for health reasons and for the athlete to get themselves down to 'safe' levels, it essentially is a way of saying 'you're cheating and we know it, but we can't prove it, but you're not competing this time'.

If they start implementing this system, it's going to start affecting athletes from nations where the IAAF has worked incredibly hard to make sure appear clean.

Just sayin dude wrote:

vo2 max2 wrote:

I'll accept that the typical East African physique confers a real advantage to marathon racing (not so much for sports like football or basketball, however), but again, it's just the explosion of times that are jaw-dropping, and the numbers of guys who are running them.

a Kenyan:

http://thenewage.co.za/cms/gall_content/2011/12/2011_12

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Diet and lifestyle man, diet and lifestyle

This and the fact that more of them are set for life financially from a couple fast marathons.

That is the main limiting factor? mental blocks lead the entire country to be 5 minutes behind the kenyans? You admitted in another post that many kenyans are naturally very talented for the marathon. even with optimal training, mindset, etc, the average american would be at a disadvantage. That is another limiting factor, of course, probably the main one. Given the level of competition in kenya, I think that likely does give them some additional motivation. I'd also have to think that someone in the ranks has to be taking drugs as well, because of the level of competition and because it is present in the sport.

Canova's right. 40 years ago guys like Clayton, Hill, Thompson were running 2:08-2:09 by just doing 150-200 miles a week of fast aerobic running. It's just like the fundamental phase of Canova's program. This training works and these guys knew it. Sure, they overdid it; it was new at that time. But now hundreds of guys are doing basically the same thing with a little fine tuning at the end (as an aside, I imagine that big guys like Clayton would've run even faster than 2:08 if they wore today's shoes and turned down the heat just a little). Westerners have basically dropped this 1960s approach for the mixed training of Shorter/Clohessy, which will get a relatively high proportion of runners to sub 5 min/mile, but won't get the most out of the most gifted in the marathon. I don't know whether today's athletes are on drugs. However, if you take hundreds of guys with physiques like the East Africans, train them the same way Clayton/Hill/Thompson did, sharpen using modern approaches then let them race each other for the pleasure of becoming the EA equivalent of multimillionaires, I'd be very surprised if someone didn't run 2:03.

Sr. Canova, Are you saying that every North American/European runner who has approached you about training, has asked you about supplementing their running with drugs???? Or just some of them? What percentage?

QFE. I agree with this.

What is really idiotic is continuing to insist drugs don't make a difference. They clearly do and there are many, many new drugs out there currently being used on a regular basis by even amateur bodybuilders. Not just the usual 'roids, and epo. Certain Nootropics have profound endurance effects.

Google Repoxygen.

Nearly ANY chemical is available via the internet from Chinese labs as "research chemicals."

Point being if the Africans who are winning now ARE clean, then sooner or later they'll have be take drugs to compete with each other.

So, if they are really clean we should all look forward to a sub-2:00 marathon sooner than later.

Okay where is the gene doping? Or the evidence that any of these work?

Junk Master wrote:

Lol. Fragment 176-191. IGF-1 des 1,3. Ostarine.

And about repoxygen there have never been any trials showing that these viral delivery methods will work in humans. It is easy to design gene therapy, it is the delivery that is difficult. People have been working on viral vectors forever with little or no success. Evidence suggests that it will fail in humans. You don't know science and are easily fooled- please go back to your bodybuilding forums and leave science to those that are intelligent..

Junk Master wrote:

What is really idiotic is continuing to insist drugs don't make a difference. They clearly do and there are many, many new drugs out there currently being used on a regular basis by even amateur bodybuilders. Not just the usual 'roids, and epo. Certain Nootropics have profound endurance effects.

Google Repoxygen.

Nearly ANY chemical is available via the internet from Chinese labs as "research chemicals."

Point being if the Africans who are winning now ARE clean, then sooner or later they'll have be take drugs to compete with each other.

So, if they are really clean we should all look forward to a sub-2:00 marathon sooner than later.

Deception, have you ever actually used P.E.DS? Because I'm sensing lack of personal experience that had scientists claiming plain old anabolic steroids didn't work according to their studies for a good 20 YEARS after every high school football player knew they did.

Guess what, there are literally hundreds of legal, easily obtainable, research chemicals that work amazingly well for endurance athletes that can be at your door in two days or less.

Most of them are no tested for, and or clear your system in less than 24 hours.

Why wouldn't anyone who is serious about training and has the funds/knowledge experiment?

Kind of like saying you won't use a whey protein/simple carb recovery drink, or creatine.

Will they turn you into an East African Marathon champ? No way.

But will they help the marathon champ? Hell yes. Absolutely.

Why wouldn't any professional athlete do things like thyroid replacement?

All the Americans are.

Junk Master wrote:

What is really idiotic is continuing to insist drugs don't make a difference. Blah Blah more nonsense.

So you're a drug believer huh, you believe in the drugs.

Exactly how have the drugs helped you to run any faster, and how often do you take them etc.

To me, you're simply a drug believer who's deluding himself.

Junk Master wrote:

Deception, have you ever actually used P.E.DS? Because I'm sensing lack of personal experience that had scientists claiming plain old anabolic steroids didn't work according to their studies for a good 20 YEARS after every high school football player knew they did.

Gosh if the African's only used the same drugs and ate the same fatty crappy diet as brain dead American football players they might be running... 15 hour marathons!

Thanks for sharing your expertise.

Junk Master wrote:

Lol. Fragment 176-191. IGF-1 des 1,3. Ostarine.

frag is for weight loss only, igf is good for recovery and probably being used. However it will stimulate more muscle growth than hgh would, so hgh would likely be the substance of choice for recovery. ostarine wouldnt be used in distance runners, but it is likely the cause for the super sprint times we saw in beijing era

Freelove wrote:

If guys are doping, their hematocrits aren't going too high, because nobody's dying in their sleep. So testing hematocrit doesn't seem like it would catch many people.

they dope to a high level of hematocrit and thus many more rbcs. Then the blood has plasma expanders added so that the risk of a high crit is diminished but they still have the enhanced oxygen carrying capacity.

How about this ... "just imagine if they doped!!!" they would be running the same times because ... uhh they're doped!!! Renato will fill your silly little heads with BS and say that they don't have to dope ... blah, blah, blah.

Maybe Renato could suggest that IAAF, WADA, USADA are free to test his athletes hematocrit levels just like the do in cycling?

or a good ol' bio passport?