Should Pacers be Allowed to Dope?

I guess by allowing the pacer to dope then you're barring them from ever being able to compete themselves, so would the $$$ be enough for an athlete to give-up their chance of ever legally winning a race?

Tbh I suspect there are enough East Africans living in relative poverty, that dope-pacing would provide a whole career to them and they wouldn't be fazed about racing themselves.

Why are you so obsessed with doping?

I am actually Shelby Houlihan

The way you phrased your thread title, it made it sound as if you were asking, "Is it ok for a known doper to set a pace for a race for money." As far as I'm concerned, that's fine. As long as said pace setter isn't allowed to run for place and prize money until they can pass drug tests.

As far as your analogy with El G. If 1st place is DQ'd and 2nd place also broke the record then 2nd place is now 1st and whatever their time was is now official.

Let them ride a bike

I’m very curious what our insightful member with the handle “2 THE GILLS!!!” has to say on the topic.

I say we draw inspiration from our venerable reaction time DQ rules, so anyone finishing within 100ms of a winner found to have doped is automatically DQ’d because it’s physiologically impossible to be that quick.

I know we were really bad last year, but I don't think we should be the only team in the league taking steroids. At least include the Magic, Pistons and Thunder.

I'm going to bounce off of the super-interesting idea that your thread title seems to bring up (but then you switch gears in the actual post). My first reaction was to say "I don't actually have a problem with letting dopers be pacers, because then people like Bekele or Kipchoge could possibly have a pacer last longer with them".

My second reaction was "pacers get paid, and cheaters should not get paid, ever."

I'm sticking with my second reaction: f*** dopers. I don't want them in the sport in any capacity.

Anyways, I highlighted the relevant part of my response to your post itself.

Can’t say I agree. As long as it’s address that the pacers are doping and cannot compete for a championship than i don’t think that it’s a problem. Granted I don’t know if pacers need to get faster as of right now anyway.

Post of the week.

You are missing something important here: for WR purposed pacers must be valid entries in the race. And banned dopers can't enter races -- there are contamination rules for any runners racing them, not to mention the national association sanctioning the race.

In short, any athlete being paced by a known doper (or even in the event) would be subject to sanctions.

I get your point and I understand where you're coming from.

But to the OP's point, if it was a one time occurrence and the pacemaker stepped off at 1200m, shouldn't the 1st finisher in whatever distance get credit for HIS/HER time run?

Pace setters get hired by the venue, not the athletes running the race. How the hell, for example does someone actually know that their pace setter is doped to the gills?

And what are you suppose to do if you know the pacesetter is doped to the gills? Finish 3rd or 4th so no one accuses you of some monkey business?

To the OP. This is a really good conundrum you posted. Yes, if a banned runner cannot race for place and prize, then said runner should not be a pacer.

However, if a pacer who has never failed a drug test and is at the end of his/her career decides to race as a pace setter and is ineligible for whatever reason want's to pace a race for $$$, should be able to do so, with the caveat the the rest of the field knows that the pace setter is ineligible for placing and prize money.

Doping is doping and know one likes it. However doping pace setters should be a different conservation entirely.

El G was not the pacesetter because he went the whole way. If you can find a pacesetter who can go the whole way and break the WR just so you can break the WR too, pay them well.

There are probably a lot of real pacesetters who did dope their way to that level. They have no hope of reaching the top and should work on finding a job they're good at that pays better.

Your post is spot on. El G won his race. The record is his. However if the pace setter was busted for doping, and I don't even know if this is a thing, that pace setter should not find his way into the top placings if he/she was banned from international competition.

Maybe to simplify this debate, which I think is kind of important. Should banned cheaters be allowed to set pace while serving their ban.

Example, you've got a 1500m guy/gal serving a 2 year ban. Should that person be banned from setting pace as long as they step off the track 3/4 through the race?

Everyone makes mistakes. We're all human. But does that mean that the Sinner can't still try making a meaningful wage for his family in the meantime? Or should the daughter and sons starve for the sin of their father?

This is kind of a moot point, isn't it? If a pacer entered in a race is banned, the organizer is violating the rules. Have you ever heard of this happening? If it ever happened, yes, the athletes knowingly racing a banned athlete are subject to sanctions under contamination rules. (And that includes being paced by them.)

Of course you can race people you think are doped to the gills. This probably happens in literally every DL meet. But if they are actually banned, don't do it! (Ahem BTC.)

This is already a settled matter: banned cheaters are not allowed to set pace while serving their ban. They are banned not just from finishing races, but from entering them.

The whole argument about feeding families etc is illogical as long as we ban dopers. The same "sin of the father" argument could be made to let Ben Johnson run through the 90s or Shelby Houlihan compete today -- I'm sure their families wouldn't mind the money.

I don't have a problem letting pacers dope so long as it is officially documented.

But to be clear wavelight pacing solves all of this. There is no grey market for doping pacers, no additional bureaucracy (testing or lists) and the psychology of chasing a light rather than a doped pacer is likely different too.

But to entertain the topic my framework for doped pacers would be something like this:

Pacers who choose to dope are immediately dropped from the WADA testing pool and would immediately placed on a permanent doper list. Anyone on the permanent doper list is forever ineligible to complete a race they are pacing, receive prize money beyond pacing bonuses, or re-enter the pool of clean athletes. If you are in the clean pool and get popped, you can't automatically switch to the doper list to avoid punishment.

The only problem I see is with the psychology of the clean athletes, they might back off the pacers thinking that these paces cannot be run clean.

That would allow all pacesetters to dope with impunity.

Then one will get cancer from gw50 and sue WA into bankruptcy for negligently encouraging them to do it