Amerikano wrote:
Chet Manly - can you explain why Abebe Bikila won the Olympic Marathon barefoot in a WR? Or how Kip Keino won the 1968 Gold Medal, beating Jim Ryun in his prime? Or what about Henry Rono breaking like 4 WRs in 81 days as a college athlete? And all of this was before the sport became organized with good training programs, tons of athletes training at high levels etc..
That's the rest of the iceberg. A relative few athletes improved the records by staggering amounts between 1939 and the end of the 1960's. Even today, 3:33 and 3:51 raises questions. Why do people suppose that a much smaller pool of runners was doing the same on pure talent and inferior training back then?
Doping did not start with the advent of doping control, doping control started because of doping. There is no question which came first, and there's no question what the dope was - the drugs that were first tested for, narcotics and amphetamines. Ironically, these are the drugs most successfully banned because they only work in competition and are nearly impossible to mask.
It's true the altitude-born Africans may have an advantage, and that may explain why Keino was the only major 60's miler to remain competitive into the 70's. But it's also true that they were nowhere near dominant until the late 1980's when out of competition testing began. When EPO hit in the early 90's, world records that had stagnated for years dropped dramatically (5000 nearly 20 seconds, and 10000 by nearly 45 seconds) by the end of the decade, almost exclusively to Kenyans and Ethiopians.
Where were the east Africans of that caliber before the 90's? It's not like they weren't trying, but good as they were, next to the 90's guys they were nothing. Rono was only 17 seconds better over 10,000 than Ron Clarke 13 years earlier, and 10 seconds better over 5000. That's only about half the improvement Geb, Tergat and Komen achieved in less time. Ngugi won 5000 gold but never broke 13:10. Ondieki was good in the 80's but never broke through until his 93 10,000 WR, and even that was only 15 seconds better than Mamede 9 years earlier.
Maybe EPO doesn't work on east Africans. But if not, then it doesn't work on anybody. Why would the people it did work on start falling behind as soon as it was around?