How do the benefits of technology today compare to the benefits of *alleged* steroid use from the past

Armstronglivs will post at least 30 times in this thread. That is about all I can tell you for sure.

The latter is 37% of the former. Hope that helps.

EPO is not a steroid. The best way to go is to combine EPO with steroids (and likely HGH).

As for which is better? First, today's runners are not necessarily clean, just not doped to the gills or they would get caught almost instantly. So, you are comparing doped runners with old shoes and no bicarb and old training methods with less doped runners with carbon shoes and bicarb and modern training methods.

Second, the numbers speak for themselves: on the track, the current top times are very comparable from 800 to 10,000 (800 and 1500 WR are still unbroken, 3000 once, 3000 steeple once, 5000 twice, and 10,000 once iirc). On the road, the WRs continue to fall, in part because the supershoes provide a larger benefit than the superspikes (larger stack height, 40 mm v 20 mm).

And rekrunner will match that, post more questions than all other the posters combined, and have the last word.

You should appreciate this given your posting as "facts are facts".

Most all of my questions can be boiled down to whether posts are based on facts, or rather faith and fallacy.

For example with shoes, there exists much data and many studies looking at the impact of shoes and many examples of records across the board, from high school to elites, for men and women, from all nations, providing many facts to support arguments for shoes explaining superior distance running performances since around 2017.

Not so fast. The steroid/drug accusations continue with today's runners (read that: Kenyans).

It's not the shoes - it's the drugs. And the Kenyans.

Here is a small sample, out of hundreds if not thousands, of recent studies I recently found on supershoes:

One study, "Super shoes: How super are they?", uses a mathematical model and a best fit curve to estimate the impact of new shoes. "This model shows that this new shoe technology is responsible for an additional roughly 24 additional sub-2 : 08 times per year. Estimated from this, we find a shoe-related time reduction of 1 minute and 31 seconds, or a 1.174% decrease in time."

Could it be placebo? Another study, "Are super shoes a super placebo?" looked at the question, telling a group of women the study was comparing a cheap knockoff shoe against a control supershoe, but really just painted one set black and tested everyone with the same shoes. "While no significant physiological or biomechanical differences were observed, a significant placebo effect was apparent for both perceived comfort and perceived performance based on shoe description alone."

Another study, "Recreational Runners Gain Physiological and Biomechanical Benefits From Super Shoes at Marathon Paces" concluded "There was a physiological benefit to running in the super shoes even at the slower speed. There were also spatiotemporal and global stiffness improvements indicating that recreational runners benefit from wearing super shoes."

I found an older article, "Carbon Fibre Running Trainers: Science behind the super shoes", giving an overview of the different features of the supershoe: carbon fiber plate, shape of the plate giving a "rocker effect", surrounded by thick, lightweight foam. It suggested "the performance enhancing effects of the trainers, may be more likely explained by the energy returning properties of the shoe, rather than a specific change in biomechanics." And suggesting to look at a combination of factors: "Not just the inclusion of a (carbon fiber) plate, but the shape of the plate, the weight of the shoe and the features of the midsole; the compliance, resilience and thickness."

Another study from researchers in Waikato New Zealand, "Advancements in running shoe technology and their effects on running economy and performance – a current concepts overview", wrote something similar: "The improvements in super shoes are around 4% for running economy and 2% for performance, and speculatively around 1% to 1.5% for super spikes. These enhancements are believed multifactorial in nature and difficult to parse, although involve longitudinal bending stiffness, the ‘teeter-totter effect’, the high-energy return properties of the midsole material, enhanced stack height and lightweight characteristic of shoes."

While scientists discuss the reasons for the observed improvements, there is universal agreement in the measurably improved running economy provided by the shoes, and the observed increase in the quantity of runners running faster times, ranging from high school track to the elite marathon.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.3233/JSA-240703https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/19424280.2025.2458330https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/13225/1/13225%20BISSAS%20Athanasios%20%282023%29%20Recreational%20runners%20gain%20physiological%20article.pdf

extramilehealth.com

Carbon Fibre Running Trainers: Science behind the super shoes.

Dr Chris Bramah

In October 2019, Eliud Kipchoge made history, running the first ever sub 2-hour marathon. A triumph of human performance powered by cutting edge sports science and technology. However, perhaps the most talked about aspect of...

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Another observational study "Does running speed affect the performance improvements experienced by elite distance runners wearing advanced footwear technology spikes?" looked at the top 100 runners from events from 800m to 10,000m, suggests potential for improvements from superspikes diminishes at faster speeds.

https://journals.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.00610.2024

Steroid use is far more prevalent today since US bribes WADA and AIU to ignore US drug cheaters.

Only once is necessary. No form of ongoing technology remains as it was. Doping has gone from the equivalent of biplanes to the jet engine era.

I've been trying to tell you all about the spatiotemporal effects for years!

Anywho, wreckrunner doesn't think anyone doped ever, they were all railroaded with presumtions, so this is a non-question.

EPO is a peptide, not a steroid.

I don't understand this use of "steroid" as synonymous with "PED." Not all PEDs are steroids, and most steroids are not PEDs.

The bigger issue with this question is that you cannot compare benefits of something with the benefits of something else without first quantifying the benefits of each.

We can say that for supershoes and superspikes.

Rekrunners goal is to protect the Africans by deflection and obfuscation. That’s become increasingly obvoius as of late. He has an extreme case of “muh Africans”, and he feels it helps him work on his pilpul skills. Glad to be of assistance.

???

I thought this thread is about comparing one benefits of today with benefits of the past. There is nothing specific about Africans in this exercise.

HGH, Steroids, Pain Killers are used more in 2026 by US and Europe more than years past. The US/Eur pays off the drug testers. The Kenyans, Russians dont pay them off and get busted. That's why you see so many drugged times and throws these days by US/Eur athletes. Its all DOPING manufactured. Fake performances.

My favorite posts are of the ipso facto variety with zero support. Nice work!

Im sure the drugs were different.

The internet changed the sport dramatically. You would see the Olympics every four years. usually one or two laps of a 5k. It was rare to know who you were racing. Results were not readily available. There were a few books about running. No internet to learn what others were doing and what training methods work.

Sport watches providing immediately feedback. The cars in 1980's were known to not measure miles accurately. Checking heart rate was rare.

In 1980 there was a machine that lined the cinder track similar to putting lines on a baseball field. In high school winning duel meets was cool.

Over time the sport made changes that helped athletes succeed. There are more youths running and parents that ran. Better coaching and nutrition. In the early 1980 some of the better mental training methods were not publicly available yet.

The drugs may have progressed over time.