Already I explained this several times. Now I repeat again.
First point : NO ONE of my athletes took any support (also legal) during their training. This is a fact that I know very well, other people can have some doubt, not me.
Second point : between my athletes completely clean (I speak about Kenyans and, for example, Imane Merga), there were results of top level : World Record in steeple, athletes in 10000m running 26'30" / 26'38" / 26'49" / 26'52" / 26'52", World Champions in HM (Paul Kosgei, Florence Kiplagat, Wilson Kiprop), winners of major marathons, 800m runners (already old) in 1'43"03 (Kenneth Kimwetich), athletes already "done" that went to win World Championships (Christopher Koskei), winners of World Junior Champs (Robert Kipchumba, Remmy Limo and others), and so and so.
Third point : some pseudo-scientific article speaks about an advantage of 40" / 1'10" in 10000m, and of 8" in steeple.
Fourth point : Since I know that my athletes were clean, somebody can think I believe that, giving them EPO, I could have 5 athletes between 25'30" and 25'50" in 10000m, or Shaheen could run 7'45" ?
Fifth point : as many evidences are a proof, I started to believe that EPO, for top athletes having some particular quality, doesn't work.
After this, I tried to understand WHY with some athletes blood test doesn't work.
I DON'T SAY NOBODY IS ON DRUG. I know very well there are athletes using blood doping, having some advantage (in any case, not so big as many people think). BUT IS A FACT THAT IN SOME CASE DOESN'T WORK, and I wanted to understand WHY.
So, I spoke with some scientists, that informed me about a long investigation with Danish rowers, staying in altitude for long time, that at the end had an increase in their total volume of blood, and it was possible investigate these particulars using MRI.
In connection with the University of Torino, I started to investigate using MRI the situation of some of these best athletes, when they were in little training, and when they were able to be in top shape.
What I discovered, is that the best Kenyans can increase till 25% their total volume of blood.
So, because haematocrit is a number (the product of the globular volume per the number of erythrocytes), we can have a high haematocrit because we have a lot of red cells, or because we have a very high globular volume.
In the case of African living in altitude, the effect of altitude is to have a big globular volume, not a big number of erythrocytes. On the contrary, when an athlete living at sea level goes to altitude for a long period, the first stimulus depending on the hypoxia is to produce more red cells, that maintain the same globular volume (for giving numbers, for caucasic people the volume is about 85/90, for athletes living in the Highlands is about 105/110).
What does this mean ? When the volume is bigger, the liquid part is more important, and there is less viscosity.
For example, if we have an athlete living at sea level, having a heart range between 40 (while resting) and 200 (for example, after a sprint uphill at max speed long 300/400m), when he goes at 2000m he loses about 5% of this range, reduced to 45 (resting) and 190.
But, we have a Kenyan of top level, he maintain the same range in altitude like at sea level, BECAUSE HIS BLOOD IS VERY FLUID and the periferal resistance against the circulation is very little.
The second point is that haematocrit is a RELATIVE parameter, not an ABSOLUTE parameter.
I try to explain. If the hypothesis is that the quantity of blood is always the same, of course, enhancing the haematocrit we have advantage in transporting oxygen, consequentely in the final performance.
But, if the athlete can have 1 liter of blood more in his body, he can have more hemoglobin, and at the same time a LOWER HAEMATOCRIT.
Practical example. You have a bottle of 1 liter. You put 500 gr of sugar inside, and fill the bottle with approximately half liter of water. After, you go to shake the bottle, mixing everything, and you use 10 centiliters for the analysis. You find 50% of sugar, and 50% of water.
Now, you have a bottle of 1.2 liters. You put 550 gr. of sugar, and fill the bottle with 650 cl of water. You again go to shake everything, and in the analysis you find...
45% of sugar and 55% of water.
Supposing that sugar is like hemaglobin (able to transport oxygen), WHEN YOU CAN TRANSPORT MORE OXYGEN ? When you have 50% of sugar with 500 gr, of when you have 45% of sugar with 550 gr. ?
So, why not with all the athletes we have the same situation ? Because the problem is the ELASTICITY OF THE CARDIOVASCULAR APPARATUS. If the apparatus is elastic enough, there is the possibility to produce and to host 1 liter of blood more. If the apparatus is not elastic enough, the only way is to use EPO.
Because the morphology of the tissues is similar, we can see that athletes with high elasticity in their muscles NORMALLY HAVE AN ELASTIC CARDIO VASCULAR SYSTEM, while athletes with big mass don't have the same elasticity.
When you want to compare Maroccans and Kenyans or Ethiopians, you can see that the normal morphology is deeply different. Under this point of view, El Guerrouj had a "Kenyan" morphology, while Ramzi, Boulami, Lahlafim Skah and many other had a different morphology.
Coming back to the situation, everybody knows that the first effect of EPO is to raise the blood viscosity. But the big difference between top Kenyans and Ethiopians, and the European, is exactly regarding the viscosity, that in the blood of white people (or people in South America, for example, that live at 3000 / 4000m but have very high haematocrit depending on a lot of erythrocytes with small volume) is very high.
That's the reason because I'm sure that, with the best athletes (that are phenomen of physiology), if we give EPO, we have WORSE performances. Som, for me, NOT ONLY WITH THESE ATHLETES EPO DOESN-T WORK, BUT CAN BE DAMAGEOUS FOR THE PERFORMANCE.
For knowing exactly, in scientific way, is a substance can work or not, and which percentage of improvement can give, WE NEED TO HAVE A RESEARCH USING THE BLIND DOUBLE.
Never there was any research like this, because of course nobody tried to see what a cyclist can do WITH EPO, and what can do WITHOUT EPO (the same person).
Of course, it is possible to say that the cyclists were able to improve. Why ? Because they train with more volume and more intensity AFTER taking EPO, but NEVER TRIED THE SAME TYPE OF TRAINING WITHOUT DRUG BECAUSE MENTALLY SURE THEY COULD NOT RECOVER.
This is my precise idea, and I work with this type of athletes. People speaking about theory, never had anything to do with this type of athletes.
I finish with an example. Physiologists are like good mechanics, able to arrange and to understand every type of car normally producted by the Factories. But these mechanics cannot work with a Formula One, because, also if the principles are the same, the material and the sophistication of the machine are very different.
If you think that the article speaking about the advantages in transporting oxygen had like target TO EXPLAIN THE EFFECTS OF EPO FOR PEOPLE UNDERGOING DIALYSIS, you understand how unfair it is. Or does somebody suppose that the WR holders need dialysis ?