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

Wrong.

"hundreths" - from the guy who makes jokes about non-native speakers doing some mistakes.

I'm just going by WADA's stats. Doping prevalence is very much a "percentage game", by definition. It is unremarkable and predictable that a sport that tests the most samples will find the most positives. If anti-doping reduced their testing by a factor of 10, would you then argue that it is one of the cleanest sports?

1. Prove the converse, since that is your claim.

2. The fastest times in the 1500/mile achieved in the '90s are still faster than the best today. In that era there was no reliable test for EPO and athletes competed without the benefit of superspikes.

3. Following his doping conviction - when we might assume he was not on drugs - Kiprop never got near 3:26.69 again, which he recorded before he was caught.

4. Drugs are banned, because they can offer "unfair advantage". Shoes aren't banned. If all drugs did was risk an athlete's health they would never be used. There would be nothing to gain.

Hundredths. Just for you. You've got nothing more significant.

These are all empty rationalizations, which at best support a preliminary suspicion and hypothesis and baseless speculation.

1) I made no such claim. I can provide data for shoes, but have nothing to compare it with.

2) That is not a proof that any of these athletes took EPO, let alone how much performance EPO enabled.

3) Kiprop was getting old. He would have been what, 32 years old, when his ban ended?

4) Drugs are banned for 2 out of 3 reasons, one of which is "potential to enhance performance". WADA doesn't state which reasons were met, and banning a drug doesn't require proving any of the reasons.

None of this is a proof that EPO enables more performance than shoes. To answer how much EPO helps requires data, not long-winded circular rationalizations.

You should tell WADA they've been wasting their time all these years trying to stop athletes using EPO and other drugs they believe are peds.

You still don't say why legions of athletes (with the help of their coaches, trainers, physios and doctors) supposedly risk their health and their careers for no discernible gains.

EPO can be harmful to the health of athletes, so I don't see it as a waste of time to protect athletes from harm.

I have repeatedly said why a few athletes take the risk -- belief. They have a lack of belief in themselves and their training, and they succumb to the belief in the alleged benefits of doping. Some athletes are forced to dope.

"I have repeatedly said why a few athletes take the risk -- belief. They have a lack of belief in themselves and their training, and they succumb to the belief in the alleged benefits of doping."

Firstly, it isn't a "few" athletes who dope, it is many. It is in all sports around the globe and is a billion dollar black market. It is rife in t and f.

How do you draw the conclusion that those who dope (like Marion Jones did, Ramzi, Kiprop, Jeptoo, Chepnegetich, Katir and countless others, so many Kenyans and of course Lance Armstrong) did so because they "lacked belief" in themselves? How about they simply wanted to do whatever they could to succeed? That's more to do with ambition than self doubt.

They also didn't "succumb to belief in the alleged benefits of doping". They did what they knew other athletes were doing that gave them an edge. As a former doper, Jose Canseco, once said, "an average athlete who dopes becomes a good athlete, an good athlete becomes outstanding and an outstanding athlete becomes invincible". There isn't much that is "alleged" about that. If doping didn't enable performance gains it would have long ago disappeared or been rendered no more relevant than chewing gum.

He did not have to convince me. Most dope accusers on this site are old trump endorsing cronies who refuse to believe in other people making accomplishments. It´s funny and sad at the same time

I only said that a few succumbed to belief. But if you insist it is many who succumbed to belief, I will not dispute you.

Sometimes it is not the athlete themselves, but their coach, or pharmacist, or husband, or someone else who believes in drugs more than the athlete.

I must admit though when you then argue that these athletes don't even believe in the alleged benefits of drugs, and they still take the risk, I am not totally persuaded.

What is Canseco's 5K time? or Marathon time? Thanks.

It is absurd - and false - for you to claim that you know why athletes succumb to doping. You don't know any. Dopers don't speak publicly about why they do it. Canseco was an exception in speaking publicly. He knew what it was like to dope - unlike you - because he doped and he knew numerous other dopers in his sport. He claimed 85% of pro baseball players were doping.

Dopers don't take drugs based on "belief"; they do so on experience. They use them. Unlike you. If they gained nothing they wouldn't take drugs and the practice would have long ago died out. They also take the professional advice of coaches, trainers, physios and doctors, just as they will with any other part of their careers.

You don't know that athletes take drugs directed like sheep by others in their lives. Is that what they also do with their training, nutrition and equipment? Do they suddenly become mindless dupes only when it comes to drugs?

Of course Canseco didn't dope to run marathons. But marathon runners dope to run marathons.

You spout neverending mindless rubbish simply to maintain a delusional set of beliefs about a world-wide practice.

If you already knew it was so absurd all along for me to claim to know why, how absurd must it be for you to ask me to say why?: "You still don't say why legions of athletes (with the help of their coaches, trainers, physios and doctors) supposedly risk their health and their careers for no discernible gains."

I'm curious what kind of response were you expecting? How can I say why, if I cannot know why, nor even claim to know why? Wouldn't the logical reason in your mind be that I don't say it because I don't know? Why would you even ask then? It seems the only right answer is for me to tell you what deep down you must have already known, that you are being absurd.

How absurd is it to appeal to Canseco about distance running? Maybe 85% of baseball players are doping, and maybe drugs work in baseball. I don't know. You don't know.

It is equally absurd for you to claim that you know "they do so on experience", and even doubly so after you argue "Dopers don't speak publicly about why they do it."

The dripping irony is that your post debunks itself. You don't have any doping experience. You don't know dopers. And you spout neverending mindless rubbish simply to maintain a delusional set of beliefs about a world-wide practice.

But all of this is a diversion, as you have yet to prove that EPO enables more performance than shoes.

"I have repeatedly said why a few athletes take the risk -- belief. They have a lack of belief in themselves and their training, and they succumb to the belief in the alleged benefits of doping."

Name an athlete who said they doped because they lacked belief in themselves and their training.

Recall you wanted me to say why, despite the absurdity of the question, and now you forever keep erecting new goalposts.

Dopers tend to lie about it, including to themselves. Gullible people fall for it. I don't really listen to the athletes themselves, and they usually don't talk anyway.

Rather than keeping erecting new goal posts, recall what was originally requested of you: "Please prove that EPO enables more performance enhancement than the shoes."

I haven't erected another goal post. You set it. You claimed that athletes dope because they lack belief in themselves and their training. This, despite that you have never met anyone who admitted doping. Your evasion to my question to name an athlete who has admitted to that lack of self belief as the reason why they doped shows you just made it up. Like you do.

The goalpost was: "Please prove that EPO enables more performance enhancement than the shoes." Your evasion to that question shows you just made it up. Like you do.

That's your evasion. Unless you are now trying to say you didn't make the false claim that you did - which would be a lie - you are trying to avoid facing the fact you have produced NOTHING to support your claim that athletes dope because they lack self-belief.

What you can't deal with is being called out on yet another obvious falsehood about doping.

On the point of EPO being more performance enhancing than the shoes, the shoes aren't banned. There is no way WA could justify allowing a new technology that results in greater performance gains than the most potent of peds. But it also shows you know nothing about how these drugs work and why so many athletes use them. You also lied when you said I evaded the question: I didn't. I referred to the example of a convicted drug cheat who ran 3:26.69 in the old shoes. It wasn't shoes that got him that close to El G's record. If it was only training he wouldn't have needed to dope.

In one of your never-ending series of erected goalposts, you wrongly accused me of not ever saying "why" -- something you later argued was a question that could only lead to absurd answers, but you asked anyway. After I corrected your wrong conclusion, you completely abandoned your wrong accusation, to erect a new goalpost. This sequence happens every time you find yourself unable to support your strongly held beliefs.

Your misguided notions of what WA would or wouldn't ban is not a measure, let alone proof, of performance benefits, either for shoes, or for drugs.

The question isn't how these drugs work, but how much. When we answer that, we can compare that to how much the shoes work. Only then can we say one is more than the other.

Your example of Kiprop is also not a proof. "Proof by example" is one of the most simple-minded logical fallacies there is. In any case, nothing proves the 3:26.69 performance was doped. I agree though he didn't need to dope (assuming for argument that he doped). No athlete needs to dope.