Round II: New German ARD TV doping report coming out tomorrow - Kenya/Russia

Don't forget David Kimani, six-time NCAA champ at U Alabama, who "in apparent perfect health" dropped dead in 2003. Back then there was no EPO test in the NCAA (not sure they really get blood-tested even now). No one was suspicious of this incredible anomaly, since "Kenyans don't dope" was the paradigm back then.http://articles.latimes.com/20...ssings19.1«12345»

spongerobert wrote:

The details surrounding the death of Geoffrey Tarno made me think of the case of Kenenisa Bekele's fiancee, Alem Techale, who died suddenly in 2005 - even though she was a world-class athlete - and whose medical details were subsequently covered with a cloak of secrecy.

As many people have speculated, it seems highly likely that her death was caused by EPO. (And I wonder how Jos Hermens can sleep at night.)

Apparently there have been other sudden athlete deaths in Kenya - marathoner Barnabas Kipkoech, for example. If the athletes were administering the EPO themselves without any medical guidance (as seems to be the case with Tarno), I'm surprised it isn't even more common.

B-Sample wrote:

Don't forget David Kimani, six-time NCAA champ at U Alabama, who "in apparent perfect health" dropped dead in 2003. Back then there was no EPO test in the NCAA (not sure they really get blood-tested even now). No one was suspicious of this incredible anomaly, since "Kenyans don't dope" was the paradigm back then.

http://articles.latimes.com/2003/apr/19/local/me-passings19.1

But they would have tested post-mortem. "The clinical evidence supports that in all probability David suffered a fatal cardiac arrhythmia while eating lunch. No evidence of illicit or illegal drug use was found in the comprehensive investigation."

They probably tested for cocaine, amphetamines at best. EPO test back then was new, and a county coroner is unlikely to have access to the lab and protocol for testing, and if they did why would they anyway? Kenyans were all "natural wonders" with no suspicion of such things.

Elder of Zion wrote:

B-Sample wrote:

Don't forget David Kimani, six-time NCAA champ at U Alabama, who "in apparent perfect health" dropped dead in 2003. Back then there was no EPO test in the NCAA (not sure they really get blood-tested even now). No one was suspicious of this incredible anomaly, since "Kenyans don't dope" was the paradigm back then.

http://articles.latimes.com/2003/apr/19/local/me-passings19.1

But they would have tested post-mortem. "The clinical evidence supports that in all probability David suffered a fatal cardiac arrhythmia while eating lunch. No evidence of illicit or illegal drug use was found in the comprehensive investigation."

You mustn't have been around much then. There was absolutely people suggesting doping in Kimani's death, and it was investigated and ruled out.

I suggest you think people gave Shay a free pass as well?

So, we all understand that you have better evidence than the coroner... Next

B-Sample wrote:

They probably tested for cocaine, amphetamines at best. EPO test back then was new, and a county coroner is unlikely to have access to the lab and protocol for testing, and if they did why would they anyway? Kenyans were all "natural wonders" with no suspicion of such things.

Elder of Zion wrote:

But they would have tested post-mortem. "The clinical evidence supports that in all probability David suffered a fatal cardiac arrhythmia while eating lunch. No evidence of illicit or illegal drug use was found in the comprehensive investigation."

jahangir khan wrote:

agree. This is huge.

Way bigger than the Salazar case, yet this site went nuts for that.

William Tell(ing) wrote:

Watch.

It's crazy that the NOP threads absolutely blew this board up. Can't imagine the traffic spikes. But this IRREFUTABLE and rock solid documentary seems to be barely making waves here.

What gives? We can rag on our own athletes without a shred of actual evidence-- base or condemnation on what is practically speculation given the lack of evidence. But this German bombshell drops and the board is flooding with typical bullshit threads?

You're making me wonder about the authenticity or lack of it of "all the Salazar haters" on these message boards.

The lack of "the board exploding" over this very compelling documentary, makes me wonder if all the different Salazar attackers are the same handful of 4 people, and the Brojo's trolling their own board (somewhere there's a link they put up to an interview some other site did with them where they admit to trolling their own board, and that sometimes they have come on here under troll names and just argued with each other to spike traffic on the site).

Have the "numerous" accusers and attackers of NOP been a fraud in "themselves," numbers wise, in that they could be, could have been, the same 4-6 people, and the Brojo's in disguise, over and over and over and over again.

Those that query why this ARD documentary story hasn't exploded on this site bring up a great point.

It's fishy that it took a day for LRC to get up a front page plug for the film, when the first people watching and reviewing it here were going "wow," and "the IAAF has been colluding all along."

I guess the rest of the week shall see...

I looked a little more into the Finnish skier Mantyranta that Gladwell had mentioned and found that he "was known since youth to have high hemoglobin levels of above 20 g dL (hematocrit above 60%)." (from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2696729/)That is obscene! How did he live until 76?Also, I did a quick search on his condition (primary familial and congenital polycythemia) and found that there were large groups of Russians out there in Chuvashia with "naturally" high levels of hematocrit (66.6, 76.5 in this study!!) and hemoglobin (22.6, 21.8) and RBCs (7.5, 7.3). I wouldn't be surprised if a state sponsored program recruited these types of people to do any type of endurance events to see if they make it or break it.http://www.bloodjournal.org/content/89/6/2148You've got to think that people with this "benign" condition would be overrepresented on the medal stand for endurance events.

kanny wrote:

Sigh... It's tough to be an optimistic fan. I'm still trying to get over Tyson Gay. However, this reminds me of Gladwell's article -

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/09/man-and-superman

.

"Mäntyranta carries a rare genetic mutation. His DNA has an anomaly that causes his bone marrow to overproduce red blood cells... Mäntyranta, by virtue of his unique physiology, had something like sixty-five per cent more red blood cells than the normal adult male."

Observationallist wrote:

The lack of "the board exploding" over this very compelling documentary, makes me wonder if all the different Salazar attackers are the same handful of 4 people

It's because this case hasn't attracted a bunch of Nike shills to defend the dopers.

No. That is not my claim.

I was arguing that there is reason to believe Mo is doping, and that it is not "clear that he is very unlikely to be doping." I am not adamant that he is. There is a difference.

Insulting me as a person does not make my arguments any less sound, nor does it makes yours any more so.

Again, no, it is not "clear that he is very unlikely to be doping."

You said it is clear that he is very unlikely to be doping.

In other words, your claim was not only is he almost certainly not doping, but further, we can know that this is the case.

It does not follow that he is very unlikely to be doping based on the report, nor does it follow that we can know that he is very unlikely to be doping.

Again, this is not a reason to believe he hasn't doped. The BBC reporter took EPO, put his blood through the system, and it wasn't flagged as being suspicious.

Not once again. Nothing changed. The values they reviewed in 2015 were the same values collected when the samples were taken.

By not having doped.

Whether he has doped, and whether we can know that he has doped, are two different propositions.

I don't know, nor is it my job to know.

- He has been the best distance runner in the world for the past 4 years.

- If you are beating the best dopers, you are either supremely talented, or are doping yourself.

- He made an unprecedented late career improvement after going to the NOP.

- The NOP is currently under investigation by USADA.

- Mo's coach works to get every possible advantage, supposedly including but not limited to, getting inhalers for athletes that don't need them, knowing how much testosterone cream one can rub into an athlete without triggering a positive test, coaching an athlete on how to get an IV drip, encouraging his athlete to take prescription drugs for which they don't have a prescription, sending prescription drugs through the mail, sending many of his athletes to doctor Jefferey Brown to be diagnosed with hypothyroidism, etc, etc, etc

- He routinely goes to Kenya, which we know now is a haven for easy access to drugs, as well as a place where out of competition blood tests are not taken, or rarely taken (i.e., not since 2006 with Rita Jeptoo).

- Recently trained with a drug cheat in Kenya.

- He was grilled for several hours last week in a hotel by the same lawyer who helped take down Lance Armstrong.

It doesn't follow that because never failing a test doesn't tell you if someone has cheated, that therefore, tests should be done away with altogether.

I didn't claim tests mean nothing, I claimed that they mean next to nothing insofar as they allow one to know if someone has doped.

No, it was picked up before. However, nothing was done about it.

No, it does not mean that those medals were won cleanly, it means that his values did not hit the threshold of what has been deemed abnormal.

You characterize people on this forum who express a view you do not share as living in their mother's basement in an attempt to dismiss what they've said without actually having to address it, or in an attempt to discredit it before you do, similarly to the way you described me as not being a sensible person.

Such characterizations do not further your argument.

The bar for libel in the UK is lower than it is in the US, so it isn't surprising that no one spoke on the record against Mo. There have however been many people who have come forward since that documentary aired.

Kara left the NOP in 2011 which is the same year that Mo joined.

See above.

He has a house in Portland and his family lives there. He is around Salazar plenty enough to get the good stuff.

Correct.

I never claimed it was a conspiracy. I merely pointed out the reason as to why he doesn't have faster 5k & 10k PRs, which you cited as a reason as to why one should believe he is clean.

He has the word record for 2 miles indoors.

Not surprising considering, again, that he doesn't time trial 5ks.

Your claim, not mine.

I never claimed that if he runs fast, then he must be on drugs.

With people who rationally and dispassionately assess the facts as they are?

No, it does not follow that because his championships wins have come in races slower than the Olympic or world championship records, that therefore, his wins are probably clean.

Further, Mo broke the world record of a person who holds those Olympic and world championship records.

The irony.

If you want an example of something taken out of context, refer to your sentence that preceded the one I was replying to:

That is giving something zero context. Stating a fact such as his 1500 in 2013 put him at #6 all time, is not taking something out of context.

Nick is not a 10k runner.

I'd expect 800m specialists to run a fast 800m.

Mo is not a 1500m specialist.

Running really fast multiple times doesn't many one less suspicious.

I do.

No one has run sub 3:29 without pacemakers.

iphone69 wrote:

Sounds like a witch hunt to me. Next thing the Germans will be doing is saying the NOP abuses the TUE process and Salazar gives Galen T cream...

LOL - No kidding!

AndroGalen wrote:

Observationallist wrote:

The lack of "the board exploding" over this very compelling documentary, makes me wonder if all the different Salazar attackers are the same handful of 4 people

It's because this case hasn't attracted a bunch of Nike shills to defend the dopers.

Ding! Ding! Ding!

B-Sample wrote:

Don't forget David Kimani, six-time NCAA champ at U Alabama, who "in apparent perfect health" dropped dead in 2003. Back then there was no EPO test in the NCAA (not sure they really get blood-tested even now). No one was suspicious of this incredible anomaly, since "Kenyans don't dope" was the paradigm back then.

http://articles.latimes.com/2003/apr/19/local/me-passings19.1

Hey, a-hole! My brother, "in apparent perfect health", dropped dead in school aged 17. He didn't smoke, did no drugs, was training to become a fireman...

Why don't you get some info on "sudden death" before spouting tat garbage?

If I was a David Kimani family member I wouldn't forget you.

Alem Techale's death was also the end of Bekele's absolute dominance, I believe. An article from back then questioning whether this had to do with drugs, possibly administered by Wolhfahrt, the famous doctor of lots of top athletes. She had won world junior or youth 1500m and was thought to be one of Ethiopia's next stars. She was listed as 18.

http://www.scotsman.com/sport/more-sport/athletics/mystery-of-marathon-proportions-over-ethiopian-runner-s-death-1-1401552

Smile, I have no time to respond to all that. It's very clear you think he's doping. I don't. Fine, stick to to that narrative. As things stand, my side of the argument is backed up with evidence. Yours is based on suggestions and insinuations.

"HE'S IS CHEATING! I JUST DON'T KNOW HOW! DESPITE HAVING NORMAL BLOOD LEVELS AND HIS URINE SAMPLES BEING CLEAN, AND HIS PERSONAL PB IN THE 5K/10K BEING BELOW PAR, HE IS CHEATING! SOMEHOW!"

That in itself is the essence of the accusers on this forum.

In the past 7 days. An independent UKA body conducted a 6 week long investigation and found that Farah did nothing wrong. A Sunday Times investigation revealed that the blood levels of Farah from 2011 and 2012 were clean. Remember, the Sunday Times has already stated one top British athlete had abnormal blood levels and 7 others were suspicious. They have no interest in protecting Farah. If they could nail him, they would, along with the Daily Mail. The BBC and ProPublica conducted a two year investigation and could not find anything to accuse Farah of. In fact, the BBC have been stated this line for weeks in their articles:

The simple question you have to ask yourself is this, has Farah ever been accused of doping by a journalist or an athlete or a coach? Hint: the answer isn't yes. You can insinuate what you like, but that's just the fact.

This is exactly what happens. I'm curious to see the values creating so many suspicions.

If some scientist has suspicions about doping, looking at the values of many top athletes of endurance, he needs to have some longitudinal data about these athletes, since looking some single data it's not possible to have any idea.

The values of the athletes of endurance are very different one from another, and never it's possible to compare the values of different athletes among them.

For example, Gelindo Bordin won OG 1988 having 12.8 of Hb and 39.7 of Hct in the last blood test he did in Italy, after his best "super test", about two weeks before his victory. These data are obviously far from the average of the best Marathon runners, and nobody thinks possible to win Olympics with similar levels.

On the other side, during a congress I had in Quito (Ecuador) in 1998 about the effects of High Altitude Training, we received the info that the AVERAGE of normal people living on the Ande between 3000 and 4000m regarding Hb and Hct is 19-20, and 58-62 (and nobody of them is a very strong runner of endurance).

With all the Chinese Team, last year I had a long period in altitude (2400m) in Duoba before Asian Games, and, because there is a lab in the Provincial Training Center, I had blood tests every week, since I wanted to see not only the values before and after altitude (like I could do several times in the past, when I was in Sestriere or St. Moritz), but the weekly development of the adaptation in those conditions.

The final resul was very surprising : the athletes improving more consistantly (Ding Changqin, 15'55" before altitude, in Asian Games 2nd in 10000 with 31'53" fruit of 16'20" + 15'33", and 3 days later 3rd in 5000m with 15'12" ; Zhao Jing, 2'02" PB the previous year, 2'07" before training in altitude, then able running 1'59"48 ; Li Zhenzhu, two years without competitions of steeple, 9'53" in 2013 and 9'35" (silver medal) in the race)

had values LOWER than the values they had before going altitude, with no improvement in the number of RBC, and the same MCV (globular volume), while the athletes with increased values were not able to improve their seasonal bests.

In the past, I tested several Kenyan athletes, finding big differences in their values. The only common behavior was that, everytime their shape became better (because they were able running faster), all thei values decreased.

For example, Christopher Kosgei, the only golf medal for Kenya in WCh 1999, was another example of athletes with very low Hb (about 12) and Hct under 40, while his Brother Stephen Cherono (alias Shaheen), current WR holder, had at the beginning of every season, after some period of resting, values about 17 and 47, going at the time of his WR to levels of 15.5 and 43.

The big differences are in the affinity between Hb and O2. Everybody continues to speak about the "increased ability to transport Oxygen" taking EPO, but nobody speaks about "how much Oxygen there is at your disposal for being transported". With a bigger lorry we don't have any advantage, if the items that have to be transported are not so numerous to fill the lorry itself, because, also with a smaller lorry, we have enough possibility to transport the same amount of material.

And also, there are too many variables to consider for having right suspicions.

For example, an athlete can have 50 of Hct with 6 millions RBC and 83.3 MCV, or with 5 millions RBC and 100 MCV : this seems the same Hct, but the behavior of these two different situation is the same, looking at the ability to "catch" O2 from the air and to transport to the cells, or is different ?

The reality is that, till now, there is not ONE SINGLE RESEARCH on the top kenyan and ethiopian living and training in altitude.

When Shaheen bettered the WR, some physiologist asked me to test him, and I refused. Why ? Because the only test they do is Always the same, using the same protocol in order to compare the data, and all these data are completely useless, since they can only look at a STATIC PICTURE of the athlete when is in top shape. I asked, instead, to follow all the period of training, for explaining and understanding the modifications we produce with proper training in the body, from point A (for example, 3 months before the WR) till point B (the moment of WR). Training is a DYNAMIC PROCESS, and normally scientists don't know what happens during this process.

I strongly doubt the two Australian scientists have data about the best kenyan and ethiopian athletes, tested with continuity, during their normal period of training.

Last thing : I'm, of course, sorry for the Death of Geoffrey Kipketer Tarno. But he was an athlete who practically didn't exist : never running 10 km under 30' or a Marathon under 2 hr 25' ; in other words, an athlete NOT IN TOP 1000 KENYAN RUNNERS.

We never denied the fact there is doping in Kenya : in 2011, myself informed AK of this problem, with many weak athletes cheated by local doctors and pharmacists, without any control.

But I strongly deny that the top runners are involved. They are not so stupid, and not so desperated, to use something that well know doesn't have any effect, compared with their full training.

So, to compare the doping in Russia (used by the most part of the best athletes) with the doping in Kenya (used by poor desperated, with very little talent compared with the talent of the top runners) is something completely wrong. And, if somebody wants now to speak about Rita Jeptoo and Mathew Kisorio (the only two "bigs" positive), i have to use one word only : they were two idiots.

As of this minute (5:09 Central), this story is the lead on the Reuters website. Here's an excerpt from it. It is rather amazing stuff.The Sunday Times and ARD said they were given access to the results of over 12,000 tests of more than 5,000 athletes taken between 2001 and 2012.Parisotto and another scientist, Michael Ashendon, concluded that more than 800 athletes had recorded one or more "abnormal" results, defined as a result that had less than one chance in 100 of being natural.Such athletes accounted for 146 medals at top events, including 55 golds, the Sunday Times said. Russia accounted for by far the most, with 415 abnormal tests, followed distantly by Ukraine, Morocco, Spain, Kenya, Turkey and others."A remarkable 80 percent of Russia's medal winners had recorded suspicious scores at some point in their careers," the Sunday Times said.Russia's sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, said the scandal had "nothing to do with Russia", but reflected a "battle for power" ahead of an upcoming election to lead the IAAF: "Russian athletes are being checked for doping the same way as athletes from other countries are."The reports also drew attention to Kenya, a power in distance running. The Sunday Times said Kenyans accounted for 18 of the medals won by athletes with suspicious results.Athletics Kenya called ARD's documentary "an attempt to smear our runners with unwarranted suspicion as they prepare to undertake their duty for their country" at the world championships.

Renato, you know the blood values of a number of the top Kenyans, for some over a significant period, and you know their training, but you don't know whether they took drugs to put them at those values. The video indicates that drug use is very prevalent. Why would the better athletes not have more incentive, more contact with European coaches/agents, and more means to dope? Why would the clean ones beat the doped ones?

Some signs you might be acting irrationally:

1) You become angry when discussing an issue

When someone is defending a position about some issue and that causes you to become angry, that is a sign you have biases preventing you from thinking rationally about the issue.

Yet to be determined

2) You have a strong opinion about something before considering all of the facts

When you have an opinion about some issue, and that opinion doesn't change as more evidence is presented to you that conflicts with your opinion, it is a sign of irrationality.

Check

3) You call people who disagree with you names

When discussing some issue, if you tend to call people who do not hold your view names, it is a sign that you're acting irrationally.

Check

I never claimed that I think he is doping, nor is that what my posts have been about.

I don't have a narrative.

That is not the case and I pointed out why.

Instead of making vague generalized statements about why I'm wrong, please list what you disagree with and why.

That was not my claim.

So again, instead of making vague generalized statements about why I'm wrong, please list what you disagree with and why.

No, they wrote that they didn't find that he did dope, not that he didn't dope.

I know, you've already stated this.

And again, this is not a reason to believe he hasn't doped. The BBC reporter took EPO, put his blood through the system, and it wasn't flagged as being suspicious.

Again, the fact that his values did not meet the threshold of suspicious is not a reason to believe he hasn't doped. The BBC reporter took EPO, put his blood through the system, and it wasn't flagged as being suspicious.

I dealt with this in my previous post.

See above.

No, that's not what you have to ask yourself. Being accused of doping isn't a necessary condition for having doped.

See above.

See above

What you say is not exact. About my top athletes, I use blood tests with continuity, and never they had fluctuations in their parameters, only lowering the values during the season.

So, I perfectly know that it's possible to run steeple in 7'53" (and I was not satisfied for this result, because Shaheen could run, in 2006, very much faster...), 30 km on track in 1:26'47" and Marathon in 2:03'06" for men, 26'30" in 10000m (Nicholas Kemboi) with only 2 months of proper training, and, if woman, 1 hr 05' in HM, using only ugali, milk, vegetables and chicken.

All these athletes NEVER asked, and never took, a legal supplement.

Knowing this fact and having their data, for which reason must I have suspicions on the most part of top runners ?

The video doesn't indicates that drug is very prevalent, but that there is somebody using drugs. Do you know how many runners there are in Kenya ?

I think that 4,000 is an approximation by defect. I think there are more than 100 athletes in top 20 in the World (so in regime of whereabouts), about other 300-400 athletes who can run at not high international level, and 3,500 that "hope" to have one opportunity in the future. These athletes competes in small local races, sometimes one of them becomes better and can go to run a competition abroad : this is the real field where there is doping.

I saw the documentary of Seppelt, but I didn't see any connection (not the places, not the buildings, not the roads) with the places of training of the top athletes.

The best athletes, with the best coaches and agents, know there is no advantage to use EPO, when they are in full hard training.

And, about your last question, the answer is : "because they have more talent, have better training, more motivation and better support (economic and medical, in case of injuries). And for these reasons they have the best coaches and the best managers : because have more talent, more motivation and more professionalism".