If Paula came out and admitted doping, I would be COMPLETELY shocked, and would once again, have to commit hari kari to restore honor to my family name.With Lance we had 100 warning signs from friends, colleagues, competitors, of a very powerful athlete in bed with his policing federation. We have none of this with Paula.For me, the science is just not a mere administrative hurdle for organizations to be allowed to sanction her.The altitude threshold of suspicion is around 110. Paula regularly trained at altitude, and only some of her worst scores hovered around this threshold (two below, and only one above). (The Sunday Times published no others -- so presumably they are all below 103). They only require confirmation that they look like altitude values, and that she reported it on the form. Given that the 2003 and 2005 were taken too early, after a heavy effort (Schumacher told us in a paper that we should wait two hours), this can also add up to 8-10 points to the Off-score, and must be considered and compensated (usually the points are rejected).While some insist on stressing the value of being able to call these values "suspicious", because they exceeded some initial pre-screening population threshold. This is a hollow victory, because the values would be discarded at the next step of the ABP evaluation -- expert opinion. On the contrary, for me, these values are confirmation that Paula did NOT blood dope. Blood doping looks like what the Russians did -- RBC values of 18, and off-scores of 130-150, not the altitude values of 15-16 and 110.
cleans wrote:
rekrunner wrote:Paula might be clean, guilty, or in the middle. You can debate all you want.
My contribution is that the pre-2009 data, especially the borderline altitude threshold scores we've seen, cannot be reliably used to confirm guilty suspicions. If the RBC values were 18 rather than 15, and the scores were 130-150+, rather than 110-115, then I would agree the case against her is much stronger. This is a defense for a proper interpretation of the data, rather than a defense of Paula's innocence.
I don't think too many would disagree with your statement. I have conceded that I don't know enough about the science to determine what is a 'guilty' score. I thought an off-score of 115 meant that there was a 1/1000 chance of the athlete achieving this state by natural means. Thus i had Paula down as 99.9% guilty. But I've been told that it's not that simple, as there can be extenuating circumstances. It seems to me that you think a 130-150+ off-score indicates 'guilty', and I will trust you on that.
Your argument above, though, does contain an item of interest. If an RBC score of 18 is more suspicious score that 15, and a 130-150+ off-score is more suspicious than 110-115, then it follows logically that Paula's scores are more suspicious than lower scores held by other athletes. There is either a sliding scale of suspicion or there isn't.
So, in sum, she is not guilty but her scores are suspicious.
If Paula came out, like Lance Armstrong, and admitted to blood doping, would you be shocked? I'm not sure you would. If that is a correct assumption, then I think I see now where you are coming from, viz. you are keen to underscore the forensic facts of this case/story, which do not conclusively prove that Paula is a doper. I don't think you have set out to prove that Paula is clean.