You have no idea, Cram was a schoolboy champion training in a depressed area of North East England. There was no 'programme' or facilities to speak of. There certainly wasn't money or knowledge of drugs. He was a major talent at just 13/14.
You have no idea, Cram was a schoolboy champion training in a depressed area of North East England. There was no 'programme' or facilities to speak of. There certainly wasn't money or knowledge of drugs. He was a major talent at just 13/14.
Viva la Cram wrote:
Agree with Cram on this one, especially in the case of David Torrence, who we now know was a doper AND a snitch!
People bringing up Farah though don't quite get it. His coach is Cuban-American Alberto Salazar, former winner of the New York marathon. Farah has practiced with runners from Aden's stable, but he belongs to the Nike Oregon Project (NOP) in Portland.
So you want to ban everyone from Aden's group with no proof of who did or did not accept 'treatment,' which is a ban of a bunch of athletes who trained with a doper, and you think that because Torrence was with them that he definitely got something illegal, but you find it inconceiveable that Farah, who trained with a bunch of doped athletes, was never offered or always refused "vitamin" injections?
I believe it is you who doesn't quite get it.
hard to ban people by association. Banning a country like Russia is different because that's the only way to punish the higher ups in the national sport federation and government who are actually responsible. It's unfortunate for the athletes but so was the systematic doping system. In the end you can justify the national ban as being in the athletes' interest, i.e. free them from a system of state mandated doping.
In the case of the Aden group, you can punish Aden and his assistants directly so it's a completely different situation. I hope law enforcement applies enough pressure to get people in the group to come forward with evidence. Maybe the IAAF could offer reduced bans for the first few to come forward.
Presumably farah will be questioned on the Aden affair and his knowledge of ped use among the group
I notice british athletics priority was merely to distance mo from scandal-typical of them.
Jarrasparra wrote:
World age best at 17 suggests he was plenty talented and Olympics at 19, not too many drugs floating around Jarrow in 1977! Just the odd glue sniffer!
So Cram doped on glue? It's all making sense now.
That's called shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.
i agree with cram.still itll be interesting to see whether or not genzebe dibaba will be at the olympics.perhaps she'll perform way below par at the ethiopian trials,not qualify,and feign an injury.
Shouldn't the drug testers be banned? They are obviously doing a shite job.
Dirtiest and most corrupt bunch of cheaters anywhere.
Coe, Cram, Radcliffe, Bannister, all of them dirty cheats.
And they try to get rid of their competition with politics.
Ban Russia?
Why not band the USA? Dirtyest nation ever.
I suspect that the group will be under scrutiny until Rio, if the entire group isn't banned before then. With this in mind, I suspect that being off of the juice for ~8 weeks will return them all to their mortal status - very good, but not great. A good analogy would be Batman, without his toys.
The Scot wrote:
Crammie just being interviewed on BBC and suggests whole Aden group should be banned by association in the same way Russia has been even if it sweeps up innocents (if there are any).
cold war politics wrote:
Ban Russia?
Why not band the USA? Dirtyest nation ever.
Because Russia wins too many medals. It makes the USA winning the medal count too hard.
The USA would cry; you cannot ban the USA, we don't state-sponsor sports. Russia, maybe, has some foolish coaches who are state sponsored, and some coaches who are not sponsored at all. Ban them ALL anyway. Guilty by their association to Russia. In the USA, companies do the sponsoring of sports. Ban the companies, but only the ones you can prove broke the rules. Let the innocent run free....
I had a good chat with Crammie about the drugs business 10 years ago. You know the weirdest thing is, he doesn't really believe in drugs anyway.
He is confused and conflicted about the whole issue. But he also has to play the roles of spokesman, confidante and motivator. So he doesn't know what is the best way to express his frustration.
Look at em wrote:
Like to go back and drug test Crammie in his prime
ISBN wrote:
Cram was tested loads of times and there is no evidence of suggestion from the trajectory and progression of his career that he doped.
Radcliffe and Coe were tested too, BY UK ATHLETICS.
Of course they were dirty and there can be no question of that.
Absolutely no question. People who question the obvious are just a waste of space. A culling of such types would be a great service to those of moral upstanding, a benefit to all human kind.
The Scot wrote:
Crammie just being interviewed on BBC and suggests whole Aden group should be banned by association in the same way Russia has been even if it sweeps up innocents (if there are any).
I am not sure that's fair because I know athletes who have trained with a dirty coach and athletes, but did not dope themselves. Sometimes when your training is going well and you are having good results, an athlete doesn't want to change their setup. Also, with in a training group, doping is often hidden from athletes who are perceived as not receptive to it. A good friend of mind was offered dope by her coach and refused it, but she continued to train with this coach because it was too close to a global championship to make a change and she felt she didn't need it to succeed.
Btw, aggressively going after the coaches is one of my top-3 things to clean up the sport. Rarely does an athlete dope on their own. The average athlete does not have the sophistication required to successfully dope. Since coaches aren't tested, you have to go after the money. Doping will often have a money trail that leads back to a coach or someone in the support group,
Come on steve wrote:
The same Aden who works with Barry Fudge and Mo Farah? Yeah ban anyone associated with him.
You misunderstand. Aden is the only person British Athletics could find to qualified to operate a stopwatch.
Mr. Fudge's credentials, or lack thereof, also an interesting story that's not been followed up.
pop_pop!_v2.2.1 wrote:
Come on steve wrote:The same Aden who works with Barry Fudge and Mo Farah? Yeah ban anyone associated with him.
You misunderstand. Aden is the only person British Athletics could find to qualified to operate a stopwatch.
Mr. Fudge's credentials, or lack thereof, also an interesting story that's not been followed up.
Ah, it us not just stopwatch operation, but also hold the watch in a proper fashion, and calling out the time correctly at the required point. Those are skills only a few have: Salazar and Aden are two of the best.
Uk athletics were sending athletes to train with Aden's group, Grice for a start.
It has to be the athletes who get banned, do you think Aden is going to stop coaching for 4 years just because he was "Banned"?