I've never seen him admit to the use of WADA banned substances and have even seen some flat denials.
During the end of his running career, he was open about his low T and did not want to compete while taking TRT, even if it were legal through a TUE. I also remember that he defended his thyroid medication once after it was getting some chatter for alleged cheating. His stance was that thyroid meds are not cheating. I think his silence now is a bit telling, but perhaps he does not feel compelled to share what he is or is not taking since he is no longer competing. I can understand that.
I agree with posters who say that if Ryan Hall is taking something now, it's nowhere near as bad as those who are still competing in races and/or peddling products. Still not a good look though, in my opinion.
To Sage's point, to me what is FAR worse than these influencers who are using are those age group runners who are doping with impunity. Some of them are beyond obvious and they are never subject to testing because they avoid track races and age group testing in and out of competition at major road races is borderline non-existent.
I don’t care if someone isn’t an “elite athlete” and instead they are just an “influencer” in the running/endurance athlete social media space. If they are abusing PEDS (performance enhancing drugs) that are against the rules then they are flat out cheating and essentially selling a lie. And I simply will never respect that. Work hard, (but don’t cheat) and play by the rules like all the rest of us! #cleansport
Who do you think he's referring to?
No. Who do YOU think he’s referring to. He wasn’t referring to anyone in particular and your title is a lie. It’s just a post. We know people dope at every level and he’s giving his stance not pointing fingers.
Rules from the big marathons the influencers make their bucks off of:
So, since all these races are either sanctioned by USATF or in the case of Berlin adopted USATF regulations for all American nationals or in the case of London or Tokoyo have explicit anti-drug policies that say exclusion from the event is the result of a positive drug test for any athlete, the drug testing rules actually *do* apply to the influencers (and everyone else for that matter). As a matter of course, those rules sadly aren't enforced because USATF has limited resources and cares more about elite athletes who might make the Olympic team doping.
The definition of what is a pro runner is much different these days. Alexi Pappas is likely making more off her Instagram following and influencer status than she ever did as a professional runner. Why people have followings is partly about ability and partly about charisma. But if you're charisma is based off of being an average couch potato who went from couch to 2:40 marathon in less than a year, the same principles of what makes doping bad in the pro ranks apply to the influencer ranks.
Finally, I know LRC loves to hate on Seth James DeMoor. I find him annoying sometimes too. One thing that I think is for certain: that guy is clean. His decline in times is normal for somebody in their late 30s.
So if influencers are already subject to testing, what does Sage want again? To call doping influencers cheaters and liars? Who doesn't think that already? What is the point of calling out nobody? Is he just flag waving for his own image?
So like should YouTube start drug testing? Instagram shows up at the door 6 am looking for a urine sample?
They aren't making money off of the platforms themselves, they are making money off of gaining a big following with big race videos then leveraging that following into shoe reviews or training diary content. Look at what happens to channels when the protagonist is injured. (Their views crash). So doping to have a good result, and a better video, or to be able to do unrealistic training despite age is the same sort of cheating everyone gets worked up about when elite athletes do it. In some ways, because the influencers probably make more than the average pro runner, it matters more. Don't believe me that influencers make more than the average pro runner? Look at the number of average pro runners trying to be influencers!
Is Sage an average pro runner trying to become an influencer?
This is all a red herring. Why are we now 6 pages deep arguing the value of testing 2:30-3:30 marathon influencers on the legitimacy of their fitness when we have women knocking on sub 2:10 and proven systematic and state sponsored doping at the professional level?
If you're dumb enough to believe that Bare is clean and that his products are how he 100% got there, spend your money, I couldn't care less.
My beef (pun intended) is that Sage is just taking pot shots and influencers to stay even remotely relevant. He can't keep up, neither on the roads nor the content game and is lashing out as a result. Sad.
Cool. So what governing body do they fall under? Like is WADA or USADA going to waste time to test 2:30 marathoners because they make a living selling a fantasy? Do their sponsors really care if they are “cheating” to maintain a body image?
All Marathon Majors are run under the World Athletics banner and their local national organizing committee (in the US that's USATF). Most major US Marathons are USATF sanctioned. And even the not quite majors (CIM and Grandma's) are USATF events (the Pacific and Minnesota USATF marathon championship respectively). Therefore any athlete is subject to testing, especially any USATF member.
This is all a red herring. Why are we now 6 pages deep arguing the value of testing 2:30-3:30 marathon influencers on the legitimacy of their fitness when we have women knocking on sub 2:10 and proven systematic and state sponsored doping at the professional level?
If you're dumb enough to believe that Bare is clean and that his products are how he 100% got there, spend your money, I couldn't care less.
My beef (pun intended) is that Sage is just taking pot shots and influencers to stay even remotely relevant. He can't keep up, neither on the roads nor the content game and is lashing out as a result. Sad.
To his credit, Sage does not seem to think SJD is doping since Sage believes SJD should be able to run faster.
They aren't making money off of the platforms themselves, they are making money off of gaining a big following with big race videos then leveraging that following into shoe reviews or training diary content. Look at what happens to channels when the protagonist is injured. (Their views crash). So doping to have a good result, and a better video, or to be able to do unrealistic training despite age is the same sort of cheating everyone gets worked up about when elite athletes do it. In some ways, because the influencers probably make more than the average pro runner, it matters more. Don't believe me that influencers make more than the average pro runner? Look at the number of average pro runners trying to be influencers!
Is Sage an average pro runner trying to become an influencer?
IMO, he's pretty much the original at that, though he wisely diversified his business into coaching and influencing and pro running, so he's not overly dependent on one basket.
I've never seen him admit to the use of WADA banned substances and have even seen some flat denials.
During the end of his running career, he was open about his low T and did not want to compete while taking TRT, even if it were legal through a TUE. I also remember that he defended his thyroid medication once after it was getting some chatter for alleged cheating. His stance was that thyroid meds are not cheating. I think his silence now is a bit telling, but perhaps he does not feel compelled to share what he is or is not taking since he is no longer competing. I can understand that.
I've given people plenty of time to come up with a single admission by Ryan (or any other reliable evidence) that he was or has been taking exogenous testosterone, anabolic steroids, human growth hormone, or any other WADA-banned substance for increasing muscle mass, and nobody has yet done so.
Yes, it is true that Ryan appeared open about his low T levels (in fact, I recall that he gave specific concentration levels), and I don't doubt that he didn't want to compete while undergoing so-called testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) "even if it were legal through a TUE [therapeutic use exemption]." The TUE possibility is a bit of a distraction, since anyone who knows the WADA and USADA rules and their application also knows that the specific grounds for a testosterone TUE are almost impossible to meet, requiring proof of a specific etiology of male hypogonadism that isn't met by the mere existence of extremely low testosterone levels.
One thing that seems very clear is that testosterone levels can be suppressed by, among other things, very high levels of high-mileage training, and that low testosterone levels brought on by high-mileage training can be reversed by cessation of such training. In my own case, my serum (blood) testosterone levels while I was among the fastest fifty marathoners in the U.S. and training about 5,000 miles per year (along with a very stressful 52-week-per-year job outside of running) were consistently within the bottom one or two percent of all adult males, somewhere around where Ryan's were. I thought that I was stuck with abnormally low testosterone levels for life. When I was 65, however, during a period of relatively low activity, I suddenly recorded serum T levels that were well within the normal reference range for young men, and perhaps a bit higher than the average T levels for men of my own age. I was not undergoing any TRT or other anabolic or androgenic treatment or supplementation that would boost testosterone levels. I was shocked to discover that my T levels were suddenly something like two to three times my levels during my best years of athletic performance. (Unlike Ryan, I have no intention of using my increased T levels to try to massively boost muscle mass, although the increased T levels give me greater hope of slowing down and possibly reversing the loss of muscle mass and strength that almost invariably accompanies aging and senescence.)
Finally, regarding the use of a drug like levothyroxine to treat hypothyroidism, there is simply no WADA or USADA ban. I have no strong views about whether that is appropriate or not. Perhaps the biggest issue at this point is whether a physician is committing a legal or ethical breach by prescribing the drug in the absence of laboratory confirmation of a diagnosis of hypothyroidism. I am inclined to believe that a physician who provides a prescription for such a drug without concrete and legitimate medical grounds (which could include off-label grounds) should be considered for board review and disciplinary action, but that's rather outside my very limited knowledge of the processes for enforcing ethical and professional standards for physicians.
I don’t care if someone isn’t an “elite athlete” and instead they are just an “influencer” in the running/endurance athlete social media space. If they are abusing PEDS (performance enhancing drugs) that are against the rules then they are flat out cheating and essentially selling a lie. And I simply will never respect that. Work hard, (but don’t cheat) and play by the rules like all the rest of us! #cleansport
Who do you think he's referring to?
Why should we listen to someone who doesn’t use the word “space” appropriately? Social media isn’t a “space.” It’s just social media.
During the end of his running career, he was open about his low T and did not want to compete while taking TRT, even if it were legal through a TUE. I also remember that he defended his thyroid medication once after it was getting some chatter for alleged cheating. His stance was that thyroid meds are not cheating. I think his silence now is a bit telling, but perhaps he does not feel compelled to share what he is or is not taking since he is no longer competing. I can understand that.
I've given people plenty of time to come up with a single admission by Ryan (or any other reliable evidence) that he was or has been taking exogenous testosterone, anabolic steroids, human growth hormone, or any other WADA-banned substance for increasing muscle mass, and nobody has yet done so.
Yes, it is true that Ryan appeared open about his low T levels (in fact, I recall that he gave specific concentration levels), and I don't doubt that he didn't want to compete while undergoing so-called testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) "even if it were legal through a TUE [therapeutic use exemption]." The TUE possibility is a bit of a distraction, since anyone who knows the WADA and USADA rules and their application also knows that the specific grounds for a testosterone TUE are almost impossible to meet, requiring proof of a specific etiology of male hypogonadism that isn't met by the mere existence of extremely low testosterone levels.
I made a brief comment about Ryan Hall earlier, and went out to read a bunch of articles again about what he actually said about his testosterone recovery (rather than what I recalled/what my impression was). Hall is pretty consistent in his statements that his recovery from low T was NOT due to testosterone replacement therapy or any suspect supplements. Instead, it was stopping the hard endurance training, eating more, sleeping more, and taking (at most) natural supplements.
So if influencers are already subject to testing, what does Sage want again? To call doping influencers cheaters and liars? Who doesn't think that already? What is the point of calling out nobody? Is he just flag waving for his own image?
The point is that he's expressing an opinion... Just like you're doing.
What is the point of your post? To show you have the IQ of a jackalope? Or are you just waving some flag virtue signalling how you're so above it all?
Help us build the best running shoe review site for a chance to win a LetsRun t-shirt.Help us build the best running shoe review site for a chance to win one of 10 LetsRun t-shirts.