The actual question about EPO doping allegations

I wonder what you base your view on that many of the drugs athletes use have little or no effect?

That isn't the view of antidoping agencies. Not is it the view of those few athletes who have admitted to using drugs. There has been one such (anonymously) on this thread, who was unequivocal about the kind of gains he made.

I can understand you arguing that we can't be conclusive about the extent of the gains drugs may enable but I would think that we were way past the scepticism you appear to express about whether there will be any gains at all. WADA may cast a wide net with what it bans but it does so on expert advice about how the drugs work and why athletes use them. They would probably hit the bull's-eye for most of what they list.

With the regular stream of violations coming out of Kenya we are able to observe what they are using. I haven't seen it argued anywhere - except from a couple of doping deniers on these threads - that these drugs will not have been performance enhancing.

Doping is not an amateur pursuit today. It is increasingly conducted with sophisticated medical and pharmaceutical expertise. If we were able to put a man in the moon over half a century ago this kind of "progress" is easily within the realm of sports.

Sure -- in elementary school I had a reputation for being one of the the smartest kids in the class. I think it was largely because I possessed a genuine understanding of the concepts while the others were just parrotting what they were told from authority figures.

Little has changed.

What real-world data do you need to say that it hasn't been established? When there is no real-world data, that is about the only conclusion possible -- that no conclusion can be drawn. Why the data doesn't exist hardly matters and won't change that outcome.

My expressed doubts do not come from only one study, but a combination of all the relevant studies I could find, recognizing their limitations, combined with a fairly complete list of historical all-time top performances.

That is virtually all the relevant data I could find on the topic. If there is more, everyone is welcome to contribute any missing facts, evidence, and observations, and less supposition and baseless conclusions supported only with false arrogance and personal attacks.

Athletes use all sorts of supplements and methods that have dubious efficacy and uncertain (albeit positive if any) outcome. Banned "drugs" isn't a separate category in this regard. If it has little downside but potential to boost performance on some instances, many athletes will use it.

Some of the doping methods are more effective and reliable than others, but I wouldn't draw too much conclusions about the efficacy of any method from the prevalence of its use alone other than it is unlikely that a method with no efficacy on anyone would survive for a long time. Maybe there is scientific or good anecdotal evidence to back up the efficacy of some method or substance, but that is another matter.

If would strongly disagree on the statement that "[WADA] would probably hit the bull's-eye for most of what they list" unless it is about fair play and what substances with rare medical use should be banned because of their potential to enhance performance. There is actually next-to-no evidence about many of the drugs banned by WADA enhancing performance even if there is some mechanism is sound on many instances (ergo potential).

link.springer.com

Review of WADA Prohibited Substances: Limited Evidence for Performance-Enhancing Effects - Sports Medicine

The World Anti-Doping Agency is responsible for maintaining a Prohibited List that describes the use of substances and methods that are prohibited for athletes. The list currently contains 23 substance classes, and an importa...

Open link

The process why some methods and substances end up being banned is far from clear and likely based on extrapolation from similar compounds (novel anabolic steroids, erythropoietic stimulating agents), prevalence of use (meldonium) or convergence of scientific and anecdotal evidence. To think that WADA bans any substance because they believe that 100 % of the world's 8 billion population with all the possible training (or health) status would with 100 % certainty gain a boost in 100 % of olympic sports is just ludicrous.

Are you assuming that EPO enhances performance?

Because anyone who makes that assumption also assumes that they can exceed their natural oxygen delivery. Which also assumes that their natural limits are not actually their true physiological limits.

Some basic education is required in this debate which is sadly lacking in all of these discussions.

Articles like that are amusing. It is the same game that is played with the effects of biological sex on athletic performance. They cannot show that there is no significant correlation amidst universal experience, but they will cite the absence of double blind, placeno accounting studies to claim "lack of evidence."

You couldn't have been the smartest since you failed to understand what I said. But I'm sure you thought you were the smartest - against all the evidence. That's what you do.

Yours is indeed a very elementary mind - as you said above about your school days. When you rely on academic studies to form conclusions about the effects of doping you can form no conclusions when there are no such studies, because no doped elite athletes took part. However there are many other ways of reliably estimating the effects of doping which you make a point of not seeing, since only academic studies are able to persuade you of anything - along with your guesses about historical performances that do not distinguish between doped and clean athletes because you don't know which are which.

"To think that WADA bans any substance because they believe that 100 % of the world's 8 billion population with all the possible training (or health) status would with 100 % certainty gain a boost in 100 % of olympic sports is just ludicrous".(quote)

That is a bit of a straw man. I didn't assert that. What I would say is that the drugs banned are not merely possibly performance enhancing but would be probably be so to a high degree of likelihood. I say that because we can see a correlation between taking the drug and increases in performance - and increases that are often spectacular - in those athletes that have been caught. We don't typically see athletes being busted who have made no improvements on their performances. Then we may see them try to make a comeback clean and get nowhere near their previous level.

However it seems to me, that - details aside - you are saying it is largely speculative and unconfirmed that doping actually assists athletes. That might have been so a century ago but it simply doesn't stack up in the world-wide industry that is doping in the 21st century.

I'd go even further than calling it "amusing" and question why they didn't address blood transfusions at all which makes the EPO part of the paper look partly suspicious.

It would look stupid to admit that transfusions increased both Vo2Max and running performance in double-blind tests whereas EPO only Vo2Max but not time trial performance if the underlying mechanism is the same.

I'd say that their key claim that the evidence for performance enhancing effect of many of the substances is limited is sound despite their pretty high threshold of evidence.

Training can improve oxygen delivery. So does doping.

Yours is the basic education that is lacking - as well as your perceiving nothing of what has long been occurring in sports that has seen increased performance levels as a result of doping.

I literally laughed out loud. Are you making fun of yourself on purpose?

None of the above.

None of your statements are true.

Again, pretty much nothing you've said above is true.

Note we were talking just about raising blood values, and not just any doping.

I do not rely on studies to estimate elite performance enhancement. But I do note that studies on amateurs show similar gains from legal altitude doping and banned blood doping substances and methods. The few studies that do exist, and the experts who interpret them, give all of us a pretty good indication of an optimistic upper bound, but as I said, have to be interpreted within their express (or implicit) limitations.

What are some of these many ways to reliably estimate the performance enhancing effects of doping? Contrary to your suggestion, I think I consistently go out of my way, always asking for you to show me something so I can see it, and you have always refused. I do not limit myself, nor restrict you, to acadamic studies. I would accept any source of reliable facts, evidence, or observations, along with any limitations of such in context, that form the basis for your long held beliefs in the power of doping for elite distance running athletes.

The specific question here is not showing the elusive performance enhancement effect of blood doping, but whether it has been established that additional banned blood doping provides better results than legal altitude training alone.

"The specific question here is not showing the elusive performance enhancement effect of blood doping, but whether it has been established that additional banned blood doping provides better results than legal altitude training alone."(quite)

I have read studies that have concluded that blood doping has a more potent effect than altitude training alone. I can't quote them because unlike you I don't pin everything I read on the subject on the fridge, and in this case the point is no longer being seriously debated by experts. That blood doping has an additional effect is reinforced by the fact that altitude-training has existed since the late 60's and has not produced results equivalent to athletes who have doped in subsequent eras, in addition to the fact that altitude-trained athletes continue to dope - as we see in Kenya. They don't do so because they only "believe" it will help them but because they find it does - along with the many other doping options they have.

It's a shame your memory is so faulty. Have you properly considered any of the studies' limitations, either express or inherent? What were they?

What do the anti-doping experts say? Anti-doping experts of the sort WADA relies on to assess elite performance, like Olaf Schumacher, tell us that the expected blood doping enhancement can be up to 3%, regardless of method. Stray-Gundersen and Levine showed us comparable gains of 3% from hi-lo altitude training with just 4 weeks exposure to high altitude. If we use the same (uncontrolled) measure found in many blood doping time trial studies, e.g. like a recent one conducted by Pitsiladis on Scottish athletes and Kenyan athletes, one hi-lo altitude group of men improved by 6.5% after 4 weeks of altitude, while the Scottish and Kenyan athletes improved 5.4% and 4.7%, respectively, after 4 weeks of EPO. (Note the Kenyan athletes were not really trying, as confirmed by RPE measurements, and were merely tempo-ing the 3K time trials at marathon to half-marathon pace, running about 1 minute slower than their predicted capability, so we must take these EPO results within the context of the limitations of the process used to obtain the data. Note also that the post altitude time trials of the hi-lo and hi-hi groups were confounded by Texas summer heat, potentially making these results potentially slower.)

This recollection is not from studies pinned on my fridge, but just from my memory. It's a shame you cannot remember more about a topic that you seem to care a great deal about and claim to know so much about.

Contrary to "no longer being seriously debated by experts", there were recently two meta-studies reviewing four decades of blood doping studies, finding many lacked controls and were not blinded, and concluded the performance enhancement effect from blood doping studies (i.e. the conclusions reported by "experts" like Olaf Schumacher) was over-estimated. Could that include the studies you have read?

That blood doping effect is insignificant among elite athletes is reinforced by the imperceptibility of any additional significant effect during the EPO-era among the fastest sea-level distance running athletes, who theoretically stand to gain the most from the combined effects of blood doping at altitude. We know non-Africans are doping, and that their doping experience is based on their knowledge and experience that "it works". Russia doped more than the Kenyans are doping now, and there is another current thread about Spain's anti-doping authorities still covering up doping, and you keep insisting that doping prevelance is 1 in 2 athletes, and that experts at the AIU tell us that at least 60% of doped athletes are not Kenyan. And yet, outside of Africa, the blood doping effect that allegedly produce the significant east-African results, is the emporer's clothes among sea-level athletes.

You have failed to follow up on this important question: "What are some of these many ways to reliably estimate the performance enhancing effects of doping?" you suggested I make a point of not seeing. I am insisting on making the point now that I would like to see it -- please draw from your vast well of knowledge and show them to all of us.

Actually, Vaughters did have naturally high hematocrit , but still added epo on to that. This is why Everyone Was Doing It So It's Not Cheating doesn't work. If you start at 45 and bump it to 50, it doesn't change much. If you start at 38 and crank it to 50-- big difference, Lance.

You are SO WRONG. Actually , you're right. Because those assumptions are correct.