Nadal shows doping at the top of tennis

Dope Hardstrong wrote:

You only asked for one. Might as well go with the most glaring.

To me Nadal seems like the least likely to need doping to do what he does.

I might add that my view is that Nadal absolutely needs doping to do what he does. There are many who agree. I say that from the perspective that tennis is the sport I know most about, having had decades of experience in the sport and contacts at a professional level.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Dope Hardstrong wrote:

You only asked for one. Might as well go with the most glaring.

To me Nadal seems like the least likely to need doping to do what he does.

I might add that my view is that Nadal absolutely needs doping to do what he does. There are many who agree. I say that from the perspective that tennis is the sport I know most about, having had decades of experience in the sport and contacts at a professional level.

Yeah, you've been pretty clear about that.

When JK competed relative to athletes today matters little. The age of her record makes them still very aware of her.

The fact that modern doping hasn't taken down her record doesn't say much for your theory of all kinds of athletes scientifically doping without being caught.

Armstronglivs wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

Jarmila Kratochvílova

Your failure is now complete.

That took some squeezing out of you - since you didn't offer it when first asked. Evidence?

No squeezing at all -- from my immediate response, you could produce a dozen names.

I thought I went far above and beyond the call, but you thought it fell short.

So now you have precisely what you asked for -- one name.

By your own rules -- you cannot prove I am a doping denier because I supplied one name.

You have failed again.

Now what new game do you want to play? You want to lure me down your rabbit hole?

Now you want evidence? -- you asked for someone I "consider" doped and didn't get caught.

OK. One piece of evidence that helps form my "consideration" are photographs with strong male characteristics. Evidence that she didn't get caught is that her times still stand, and she never served a ban or had to give back money or medals.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Dope Hardstrong wrote:

Because she didn't break 53 until she was 27. Then she magically transformed into a sub 48 runner and set the longest standing current record that nobody has sniffed since. Not even a woman with testicles.

That's way more evidence than a prodigy getting a bit better and then lasting for a long time by getting better at some things while degrading in other areas.

So one doper in 40 years. That is despite the growth in the use of increasingly sophisticated ped's in the succeeding decades and the thousands of athletes who have doped since then and still do today. What it means is that some of you literally can't see what is right in front of you.

I gave you way more than one, and you re-emphasized that you only wanted one, and would settle for nothing more and nothing less.

But to be accurate, you didn't ask me for the name of "one doper". You asked me for the name of "one athlete" which I considered doped and didn't get caught -- my consideration alone doesn't mean she is a doper.

We have seen recent doping prevalence estimates indicate many more dopers -- but we don't know all of their names.

It's an interesting thought and challenge though for those who say "likely more than 44%" or "about half" -- should we conclude that they don't count until you can name them all?

It's telling who I leave out? What does that tell you? It tells me you only asked for one -- that necessarily leaves everyone else out. My first response would have included Marita Koch, and many other Eastern women, and many Chinese women of the '90s. The only thing that is telling is that you told me to name just one.

If you want to know what I think about EPO, I wrote a whole performance thread that took a closer look at EPO-era performances -- I refer you to that thread for my detailed thoughts. I followed that thread up with a second deeper look at performance dating back to the '60s with more thoughts.

You speak of parade of Kenyan busts, but I remind you that very few are from EPO, or ABP. Most by far are for steroids, and recently a few are for whereabouts failures, which may or may not involve banned substances or methods. In fact real EPO doping prevalence estimates from biological population results are quite small, like 1 in 7. For Kenyans, that number is even less, only 1 in 9. For Ethiopians even less, 1 in 12.

I just acknowledged Eastern women and Chinese women, who I "considered" doped and were not caught. So it appears you are wrong again -- I do acknowledge athletes I consider were dopers who were not caught.

But even getting caught is not sufficient, as those athletes who have been caught may be innocent victims of false positives.

But you always circle back to "existence of doping" or "existence of EPO" -- something I don't doubt and don't find interesting to state or to prove. I refer you to official sources, such as WADA ADRV reports, or other similar studies, based on biological measurements, or based on survey techniques. I don't find "existence" of doping, or "acknowledging dopers" a very important or interesting topic.

But after all that, still not able to name a single athlete since EPO became the drug of choice for so many - 35 years ago till the present - and especially distance runners.

I'm sure if you were sent back to the Prohibition era all you could see is honest businessmen.

Brahim Boulami!

Armstronglivs wrote:

But after all that, still not able to name a single athlete since EPO became the drug of choice for so many - 35 years ago till the present - and especially distance runners.

I'm sure if you were sent back to the Prohibition era all you could see is honest businessmen.

Is your memory so short term that you forgot the question you asked me, and your stated purpose?

You did not give me any time constraints, drug constraints, sport constraints, nor limit it to distance running.

Your stated goal was to prove I was a doping denier, because I would be unable or unwilling to produce one name, apparently because for you doping only exists by virtue of accusing the athlete by name.

When your quirky little game failed by your own quirky rules and quirky logic, you want to avoid acknowledging that you failed spectacularly, and now you want to start a new game.

Why don't you stop digging new rabbit holes and start owning your failures?

You will understand if I am less than convinced by your choosing a muscle-bound woman from the E Bloc 35 years ago. Doping remains a significant issue today, with an estimated 1 in 3 (or more) championship athletes.

Remind me, when have you ever identified a distance runner in the last 30 or so years that you consider to have been a doper who was never officially confirmed to be a doper? Of course, if you were able to do that it would mean you accept evidence that suggests doping other than a drug ban. So far you have yet to show that. If you can't, then conversely it means you are unable to perceive a doper amongst any of the vast majority who dope with impunity.

Dope Hardstrong wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

I might add that my view is that Nadal absolutely needs doping to do what he does. There are many who agree. I say that from the perspective that tennis is the sport I know most about, having had decades of experience in the sport and contacts at a professional level.

Yeah, you've been pretty clear about that.

When JK competed relative to athletes today matters little. The age of her record makes them still very aware of her.

The fact that modern doping hasn't taken down her record doesn't say much for your theory of all kinds of athletes scientifically doping without being caught.

Over 30% of athletes participating in 2011 World Championships in Athletics admitted having used banned substances during their careers. According to a study commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), actually 44% of them had used them. Nevertheless, only 0.5% of those tested were caught.[10][11]

It is very easy to acknowledge doping as an abstraction, as you do, but quite another to form a view about a particular athlete or sportsman who hasn't failed a doping test (as most don't). Again, remind me of when you have ever reached a conclusion about any individual that they have doped without having incurred a doping violation - because that is the overwhelming majority of dopers. If you haven't, then you have nothing to offer that isn't dependent on knowledge that an athlete has incurred a violation. Clean until proven guilty exonerates most dopers from suspicion. Your preferred position.

Armstronglivs wrote:

It is very easy to acknowledge doping as an abstraction, as you do, but quite another to form a view about a particular athlete or sportsman who hasn't failed a doping test (as most don't). Again, remind me of when you have ever reached a conclusion about any individual that they have doped without having incurred a doping violation - because that is the overwhelming majority of dopers. If you haven't, then you have nothing to offer that isn't dependent on knowledge that an athlete has incurred a violation. Clean until proven guilty exonerates most dopers from suspicion. Your preferred position.

You are asking me when have I drawn specific conclusions without specific data?

Hopefully never, because that is a defective process for arriving at conclusions.

What I offer is the reality that you are arriving at faith based conclusions (i.e. Nadal shows doping) using an intellectually defective process without any real data.

Armstronglivs wrote:

You will understand if I am less than convinced by your choosing a muscle-bound woman from the E Bloc 35 years ago. Doping remains a significant issue today, with an estimated 1 in 3 (or more) championship athletes.

Remind me, when have you ever identified a distance runner in the last 30 or so years that you consider to have been a doper who was never officially confirmed to be a doper? Of course, if you were able to do that it would mean you accept evidence that suggests doping other than a drug ban. So far you have yet to show that. If you can't, then conversely it means you are unable to perceive a doper amongst any of the vast majority who dope with impunity.

Whether you are convinced is not relevant.

You asked for one name, predicted I wouldn't or couldn't supply one, and I did.

These were your rules, and I complied 100%.

You have failed to prove what you set out to prove.

You keep failing.

I have accepted biological estimates that significant doping exists among those tested by the IAAF in the years between 2000-2012, and in the World Championships of 2011 and 2013.

I can't name individual athletes because the results over a population are aggregated.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Doping remains a significant issue today, with an estimated 1 in 3 (or more) championship athletes.

Furthermore, you keep falling back to an argument about the existence of doping at the championship level. This is not my debate. My debate is the missing cause and effect link between doping and the best performances.

Assuming 1 in 3 have doped, that means 2 in 3 have not doped. Using your logic of population averages, El G is twice as likely clean than doped. If you find that logic defective, then you are halfway there to seeing your problem of drawing specific conclusions from general data.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Over 30% of athletes participating in 2011 World Championships in Athletics admitted having used banned substances during their careers. According to a study commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), actually 44% of them had used them. Nevertheless, only 0.5% of those tested were caught.

These general statistics are also misleading.

The main issue with the survey method is that there is no way to measure of the responses were honest. This was a primary concern of the paper, modelling all the ways the responses could be dishonest, dependent on an unknown variable they did not or could not measure. One of the authors has published another study suggesting 30% is still too high because there are still rule compliance uncertainties with the survey method used.

There are psychological reasons why athletes, even clean ones, would not comply with the clear survey instructions, even when anonymity is guaranteed, following a pattern like:

Yes, doping again? OK, whatever, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, ... Can I go now? I have a World Championship event I need to get ready for.

The 0.5% catch rate is also misleading:

- that is an annual catch rate; if you think of an athlete over the length of a career, an athlete will more likely than 0.5% be caught; prevalence estimates over a population will not change with each year, but catch rates are (approximately) additive each year, with 10 years catching ~5%.

- not all athletes are tested; only the winners and some randomly selected athletes are tested; many dopers will never be tested because they are not performing or not randomly selected, and not in OOC test pools.

I'm here for the repeated pummeling of Armstronglivs by rekrunner

the whipping is that of early Mike Tyson

btw; was Iron Mike Tyson clean?

heads of clay wrote:

Nadal is known as the King of Clay.

If near peak form, no one is beating Nadal on clay.

Soderling beat him in 2009 in the French Open

Yes, but Armstrong is white and right!

All of which means you have never drawn a conclusion of doping without the "data" of a confirmed doping violation. Since that position is immovable for you there is no argument that depends on other factors which will convince you that Nadal, for example, is a doper - or indeed any top athlete in the last 30 years. (Kratochvilova nearly 40 years ago - what a hard call!) You have nothing to offer any discussion on whether any athlete may be doping absent a violation because a confirmed violation is the only "data" you accept. Nice. That leaves out 98% of dopers. It isn't the thinking of a scientist but of a religious fanatic.