Let's go for over a thousand posts on this thread!
Where are we now?
Paula still has OFF scores which go from 82 to 114.87, almost a 33 point change in 2 days from prerace to postrace in 2003 after the halfmarathon WC race, and from 92 to 109.87, an almost 18 point change in 1 day from prerace to postrace in 2005 after the 10K WC race. While a high OFF score of 114 or 109 in isolation by themselves, such as her isolated 109.35 OFF score in 2012, could possibly explained by altitude, these rapid and large magnitude changes in one or two days are most plausibly explained by blood transfusion. It would not matter if the OFF scores were 66 to 99 in 2003 or 81 to 99 in 2005, all of these would be normal OFF scores in isolation by themselves, but the 33 point change in 2 days or 18 points in 1 day is what is abnormal and suspicious. These rapid and large magnitude changes have not been plausibly explained by Paula, or the IAAF, or rekrunner.
Meanwhile, Paula has been appointed vice-chairwoman of the athletes commission at the IAAF, where she will be with her pal Seb Coe.... GO PAULA!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Paula could release blood test results around her 2:15 and 2:17 marathons to be really transparent, as normal looking blood results from before and after those races would really help her case and remove a lot of doubts...but she has chosen not to...so those doubts will remain for many people....too bad....
This story has gone away for Paula, as other newer scandals take over people's attention, such as problems with drug testing in Kenya (Their anti-doping agency is still not funded!), Russian doping coverups and corruption, and IAAF corruption,bribery,extortion, money laundering, etc., etc., etc...........
We are still waiting for information on what the identities are of the over 200 bags of blood in Dr. Fuentes freezer. We are now into March, 2016 while the decision was supposed to be announced in January, and the case of Operation Puerto goes back 10 years!.........
And now the Ethiopian Aregawi, supposedly given 3 days warning!!! before her OOC test in Ethiopia, and she tests positive for Meldonium (mildronate), a 25 year old drug from Latvia, supposedly brought to Ethiopia by Russian or Ukranian doctors, unapproved in the US, with minimal scientific information about it at all, including about zero evidence that it improves endurance performance in human athletes (who are not rats or cardiac patients). I had never heard of it till now..........and by the way.... Isn't Aregawi's manager Jos Hermens?.... Isn't he the manager of the great Geb and Bekele as well?
If someone is taking something I have never heard of, like Meldonium, I wonder what else they might be taking that I have heard of, in addition to Meldonium! I doubt that was all she was taking.............
It looks like some endurance athletes will do almost anything to enhance performance including: anabolic steroids, HGH and its peptide mimetics, insulin, stimulants, EPO and its variations, blood transfusions, and now more recently..... xenon and argon gas, meldonium, cobalt, Hypoxia Inducible Factor (HIF) stabilizers (which act like EPO in an oral pill form, no more injections...how convenient!), AMP-activated kinase(AMPK) activators such as AICAR and Peroxisome Proliferator Activated Receptor(PPAR) activators such as GW1516....
Those are most of the categories I know about... that people are using...
And then there are the categories and substances that all of us and the testers still know absolutely nothing about........that people are using.......
It is a very sad state of affairs in this sport..........