'Doping in Kenya is completely out of control'

I didn't say I believe everything Armstrong has said. I said I'm inclined to believe what he's said about the effectiveness of EPO because he used it. I also acknowledged that it is possible that he is lying about that. Later in the post I said that we're all really guessing.

I'm pretty ready to be done with this topic at lesat on this thread. I doubt I follow the doping business nearly as closely as you do so my memories of things aren't as clear of what I've seen. I have read studies claiming tremendous effectiveness for EPO and I've seen one or two that say it does little if anything to improve endurance performances. I think it was in my first post here that I said some people respond to drugs more than others.

I am definitely not going back and rereading this thread. What I'll say is that I agree with the OP's initial post, that doping is out of control in Kenya and say again that I'm basing that on the recent number of busts and from discussions I've had with a friend who trains in Iten with many of the top people. From that it's hard for me to believe doping there is in control, (and what would that look like anyway?) But the discussion has drifted from the business of whether or not Kenyans are taking illegal stuff to whether or not what their taking is effective and really I think there ARE insufficent data to answer that question.

Sorry, another thing I cannot help. I appreciate the civility and the acknowledgement of uncertainty. I don't doubt what your friend might say about athletes doping in Iten.

The two meta-studies I referred to are most critical of the entire body of studies looking at EPO and performance. The first one looks at the quality of research conducted, finding very few studies applying quality standards like double-blinding and controlling for other variables and including control groups. The second one assesses the quantitative gains of the highest quality studies, concluding that in a scientific setting, the effect has been over-estimated, and in a real world setting, other factors, like drafting and race strategy, will play a larger role.

It serves no one to conduct an EPO performance study but failing to observe widely accepted quality standards.

In my opinion, anyone finding a large improvement from EPO in distance running (elite and amateur) is not because the resulting time is unnaturally fast, but because their choice of the initial time is a poor one and is too slow.

And once again, I think the Athletics Illustrated article linked in the OP is too pessimistic about the current status, and is the wrong way to think about the increase in busts. His suggested "solutions" are extreme and draconian and unrealistic: suspend AK; lifetime bans; criminalizing doping; not inviting Kenyans. His "in fairness" observations are in need of an update -- e.g. the ABP was rolled out in 2009, and aggressive whereabouts enforcement started in 2019 -- and fails to acknowledge the progress made to date by all parties.

The AIU's Brett Clothier seems to be much more frank and open and optimistic about the current situation. There is now a WADA Lab in Nairobi. The Kenyan government has committed to investing heavily in anti-doping. ADAK is in place and testing and catching national class (and less) athletes, while the AIU is aggressively testing and catching international class athletes. The increase in busts is a direct reflection of increased testing, both in number of athletes and number of tests per athlete, and shows that the anti-doping testing systems are working.

The one point I am in wholehearted agreement with the OP article is increasing investigative efforts to go after the supply chain (as well as increasing education of athletes, doctors, pharmacists to avoid negligent doping for standard care). Unfortunately increasing testing of the athletes tackles the symptoms and not the root cause.

One mistake I think is making the Kenyan government pay the whole cost. The beneficiaries are the rest of the world. The progress to date so far has been slow in coming because Kenya is a relatively poor nation with a huge pyramid of talented athletes. Seems like a different financial structure, where some modest amount of worldwide money goes into a pool, and gets redirected with intelligence where it will be most effective, would have addressed this problem much more quickly.

That study has several flaws:

bicycling.com

​That EPO Study You’re Reading About May Not Tell The Full Story

​Sports scientists push back against the idea that EPO has no effect on performance

Open link

I guess I'm not done yet. Should the Kenyan government and or AK bear the cost of testing alone? Sure. It's Kenyan athletes winning money when they race so I think Kenyans should be responsible for trying to keep them legal. And if what my friend in Iten is correct officials in those places are making a nice second income by protecting runners who are using stuff.

This discussion has gotten away from doping in Kenya to discussing how effective or ineffective doping, especially with EPO is. You've mentioned studies questioning how effective EPO is. My first response is "So what?" Maybe it's not nearly as effective as a lot of us believe. Maybe other drugs aren't either. Maybe, as I am inclined to believe, they're very effective for some people and not at all effective for others. Maybe the drugs do squat biochemically but give some people a really good placebo effect. Whatever is going on, it's illegal to use them so I'd have no problem with taking draconian measures against a country that seems unable or unwilling to do a reasonable job of keeping its athletes from using them.

What do you mean, "this discussion has gotten away ..."? The very first sentence of this discussion in the very first post is about "EPO does not work": "One international coach, Renato Canova, ... declared that EPO does not work on them."

The beneficiaires of effective Kenyan anti-doping are arguably the whole sport, and all of the competing countries. Asking Kenya to foot the whole bill hurts Kenya two ways: the country is relatively poor, and (according to the AIU), Kenya's unique problem is the sheer abundance and depth of their top-class talent. The GDP of Kenya is 2,099 USD per capita, compared to the world at 12,646 USD per capita, versus UK at 46,125 USD per capita, versus USA at 76,330 USD per capita.

To the extent that lack of OOC testing is the problem, and increased testing is a partial solution, If more effective testing with a local WADA-accredited lab had been put in place two decades ago, funded in part by a supplemental global tax committed to efficiently and intelligently cleaning up the whole sport where it is most needed, then Kenyan athletes, and its corrupt officials, would be making less "illegal" money.

Another topic is whether countries (i.e. Kenyan officials) should be policing themselves in the first place, but that is not my battle.

Similarly, other posters are telling me that the money for doping Kenyan athletes is not coming from the poor athletes, but in part from their rich foreign agents, who are also taking a part of the race winnings out of Kenya.

One answer to "So what?" is, if certain drugs are ineffective for elite performances, then clean athletes are not harmed. This should help temper and gauge public outrage. It should also inform targeted efficient anti-doping testing.

The Kenyan government seems more than willing and able to do a "reasonable job" of implementing anti-doping. The government has pledged funding, and ADAK is starting to catch more athletes. When did "reasonable" include "keeping its athletes from using them", beyond education and awareness programs and WADA-compliant testing? Which country is doing a reasonable job at that? Or alternatively, which countries are not? Looking at annual WADA reports, Kenya is not even in the top-10. When and where are the precedents for such draconian measures for any country in any sport, e.g. for these top-10 countries: Russia, Italy, Brazil, India, Iran, France, United States, Kazakhstan, Poland, and Ukraine? Russia was banned, not because of excessive doping busts, but because their government, their federation, and their WADA-approved lab in Moscow were proactively in on the both the doping and the cover-up.

Can you be more specific? Are you able to say which of the flaws you found most relevant to this discussion? It looks like the critics are mostly criticizing the shocking headlines, rather than the study design, or any study findings.

The critics say that the EPO group actually improved in several metrics in the lab. This is not a flaw in the study, because the study reported these improvements. These criticisms echo one half of the study findings: although these indirect measures improved in the lab, i.e. increased hemoglobin, increased VO2max, increased power, it did not translate to a faster time trial on the road.

Do the critics say that the EPO group actually climbed, or should have climbed, the Mont Ventoux faster than the control group? They actually say they expect it wouldn't. Surprisingly, one of the criticisms is that, of course, EPO doesn't work for sub-maximal efforts, like racing up the Mont Ventoux on a bicycle. The critics of the study that found EPO doesn't work on the road actually agree that EPO shouldn't even be expected to work! I'll keep that in mind in the next thread that talks about Lombard's 3-minute gains in the sub-maximal 10000m from EPO, or the next top research scientist who predicts up to 3% or 1-minute benefit for the 10000m, or the next thread about Kenyan sub-maximal half-marathons and marathons. According to this study and its critics alike, no one expects EPO to work for these sub-maximal efforts.

Another criticism is that amateur athletes are not elite athletes. While that is true, remarkably they suggest that EPO might not work for amateurs, while it still might work for elites. That is a real head-scratcher given all the research on amateurs compared to next to no research on elite athletes. It also contradicts studies finding that VO2max is less important at predicting elite cycling performance than sub-maximal parameters like LT, or LTP, or OBLA, or VT1, or VT2, or RCP, etc., not to mention the role of economy/efficiency, and that it is these sub-maximal parameters which separate elite cyclists from the rest.

I think they should have given the EPO group other PEDs (e.g. anabolic steroids, testosterone, GH, etc) to make it more realistic of what the elites are really taking.

I think that's where we've been losing sight is the synergistic effects of these multiple PEDs being used --- the "cocktails" so popular with endurance athletes.

Since the Tour de France is a very hot topic right now with the shocking, Earth-shattering performance of Tadej Pogocar winning an HC mountain top stage & shattering the record held by Marco Pantini by 3 minutes! 😲 (see the multiple threads on this site alone).

This led me to do some research on Pantani (considered the GOAT of climbers) & his well-publicized doping history. He not only used EPO but a multiple of other compounds such as anabolic steroids, testosterone, GH, IGF-1 & corticosteroids. He was involved in Operation Puerto --- the doping ring that was administering these doping products to both professional cyclists & distance runners by the infamous Dr Fuentes.

So, at least the minimum for endurance athletes, seems to be EPO/blood transfusions + an anabolic steroid or testosterone. When you look at multiple doping raids over the past (Operation's Puero, Galgo, Chamberi, Jama Aden raid, etc) multiple compounds were always found in addition to EPO.

Matt Mosman's excellent video focuses on combination of EPO + anabolic steroids/testosterone for endurance athletes:

We know, for example, the Moroccan doping program was using additional compounds in conjunction with EPO. And I don't need to remind of their shocking PED-Powered performances with the likes of Ramzi, Boulami & El G (and yes...El G).

We know in the pharmacology world the synergistic effects of multiple drugs administered to patients with varying diseases have a clinical benefit than just one pharmaceutical used alone.

Even LA who touts EPO as his "ten-percenter" was also using testosterone, GH & corticosteroids --- all administered to him by his doping coach Ferrari. Lol. Perhaps the combination of these compounds is his real "ten-percenter."

Multiple PEDs with good responders = PED-Powered performances.

Of course. Plus, all these studies use only a random amount of EPO over a few weeks, rarely months. Thus the effects from optimizing the doping, including using the right amounts at the right point in training, and from long-term usage are by default not included.

Look, even the 2:20 3rd rate male marathoners who participate in nameless marathons in Asia and South America are caught for doping, so what do you think sir?

Exactly my sentiment and expertise as well sir!!!

Is rekrunner (in the past) really trying to suggest that if I can't describe to the exact nano-second space and time interval the electromagnetics of harm of telecommunications radio waves on the human biology then it isn't happening????

I feel you sir I can sympathize and empathize.

You are saying that there is precisely no need to nail down the exact physical mechanism of cause in order to make an unequivocal judgement and conclusion about the effects (whether positive or negative) of that cause or physical mechanism of cause.

You are saying that there is precisely no need to obsess over the cause of death if it can already be reasonably adjudicated in space and time that it was the COVID vaccine and/or anthropogenic RFs that did it.

This is what I have been espousing and advocating all along. I have always been advocating not for 100% objectivity but for JUST ENOUGH objectivity in space and time subject to the relevant circumstances of those space and time. Difference circumstances and scenarios of space and time would obviously demand different levels of objectivity in space and time as well. There is no need for a blanket 100% all-the-time objective burden of proof because like seriously humans only operate at far less than 10% of its brain power but demand 100% all-time-time objective burden of proof????? Absurd right????

Rekrunner are you reading this, I'm here to outduel your objective-only philosophy once for all and silence your ignorance totally!!!!

No not true dear rekrunner, I still remember you btw for imputing indelibly in my soul your pro-doping tendencies!!!!!!!!!

Are you sure athletes born at altitude have higher blood counts??? Higher by how much btw???? And are you sure your implication is correct that a higher blood count works better or relatively better for high performance and non high performance athletes? If it's not higher by all that much relative to the definitely VERY HIGH OR HIGHER altitude of 2000-3000m, then for me I will just classify it as the same number of cell counts as sea level athletes. The diameter and shape of the cell is more significant than its number count!!!

I still remember your tendency to imagine your own subjective surrealities.

Are you just now responding to something I wrote two weeks ago?

I didn't say "higher" or "athletes born at atlitude", so you ask me the wrong questions.

As far as what works better, I said "It remains to be seen". In other words, I am not so sure.

Is rekrunner (in the past) really trying to suggest that if I can't describe to the exact nano-second space and time interval the electromagnetics of harm of telecommunications radio waves on the human biology then it isn't happening????

Why can't you just answer a simple question Rekrunner?