WADA does Q&A with Marathon WR holder Paula Radcliffe

Bloody freak of nature wrote:

I might be in the minority but I still believe Paula Radcliffe was clean. I think she is one of those freak of nature athletes that come along once in while that take a sport to a new level and boggle our minds.

Edwin Moses won Olympic gold and broke the world record after only about six months of training for the 400H, then goes on a ten year unbeaten streak. I doubt anyone would accuse Moses of using PEDs. He was clean - a clean freak of nature. And I think Paula was too.

1) Paula, a freak of nature? She used to get dropped in the 90s, before the field would start accelerating. Like Farah in the last decade.

So either the two didn't train seriously (Perfect Paula, right?) or didn't find the right drug regime before turning 26/27.

Oh yeah, and after the IAAF flagged her for second time in 2005, coinciding with the onset of the 2nd generation EPO test, she turned from a 2:15 to a 2:23 marathoner. Freak of nature?

2) An American sprinter, unbeatable during the 80s, enough said.

This is like the Catholic church interviewing Jim Jones about red Kool-Aid.

This is like Bill Gates interviewing Hillary Clinton about secure email practices.

This is like the Journalism School interviewing Joseph Goebbels.

This is like the Better Business Bureau interviewing the CEO of United Airlines about customer service.

This is like King Kong interviewing Godzilla.

This is like Dick Pound interviewing Dick Held.

Bloody freak of nature wrote:

Edwin Moses won Olympic gold and broke the world record after only about six months of training for the 400H, then goes on a ten year unbeaten streak. I doubt anyone would accuse Moses of using PEDs. He was clean - a clean freak of nature. And I think Paula was too.

Moses also had a math and engineering background and put serious analysis into his workouts and performances. He's the epitome of winning the race before you ever lace up your spikes.

As for Radcliffe - something doesn't sit right with me and her performances. But once you're in Nike's orbit, you're protected from things that would normally destroy most athletes. The cynical part of me also thinks she's the "great white hope" for marathoning, and thus, she's given the benefit of the doubt.

You're a fool to suggest Ed Moses was dirty. You obviously don't even know who he was, because he wasn't a "sprinter". He stuck to the one event he was perfectly designed for. He had none of the tell-tale signs of a doper back then. He trained like a machine year after year perfecting his craft.

This is like interviewing George W. Bush on how to improve IQ tests.

Or just a really greedy person.

Darrington wrote:

If she doped (and I think she did) then only a sociopath would continue this clean sport charade of hers.

It's in her best interest on two levels to promote stringent testing:

1) Makes her look virtuous

2) If testing becomes effective, it slams the door on anyone getting her record, ever.

Ashenden's Shadow wrote:

Ashenden says her blood levels were not natural (anomalous) and there was a case to answer.

Ed Moses was a great runner in an amateur sport, and had a day job for the most part. Apples, oranges.

Don't get your point on Moses he would be head and shoulders above anyone competing nowadays.

Ashenden's Shadow wrote:

Ashenden says her blood levels were not natural (anomalous) and there was a case to answer.

That is indeed Dr. Michael Ashenden's opinion, an on general level he is totally right that even when the samples have been collected and analysed in non-standardised ways, there is a suspiciously high amount of fluctuations, high OFFscores and low reticulocytes in the leaked data. Actually many blood datasets of the past (XC-skiers of 1990s) are suspicious and do prove the prevalence of blood doping without it being possible to convict any individual athlete based on only one or two samples.

Even when honest people could debate whether Paula Radcliffe blood doped or not based on some of the released data, many parts of the IAAF response to the allegations still do paint Michael Ashenden in a very suspicious light in a manner that simultaneously there exists the "scientific" Dr. Ashenden who wants to follow the scientific procedure to the point and develop methods to detect drug cheats and then the inquisitor-Ashenden who has cynical view of every athlete and win-at-all-cost mentality to prove that they doped.

Maybe I haven't followed him too closely, but honestly I can't recall one instance when there was an athlete he actually defended against blood doping accusations and said something like "these fluctuations look normal".

I don't deny at all that he is the foremost specialist on the subject and has done some splendid work and I actually do tend to sympathise with him on some points, for instance when he was pissed off when he heard that UCI left cyclist Tyler Hamilton go unpunished in June 2004, when the head of the medical committee Mario Zorzoli had on his desk lab results showing the presence of another persons red blood cells in Hamilton's bloodstream.

That actually was an airtight test with no false positives, but the method wasn't validated until a month or two later if I recall correctly.

The burden of proof is on the athlete to prove innocence - Ashenden sits on the prosecutor's bench so to speak.

While I actually do agree with the spirit of your comment, I am not referring to violations based on the ABP-program, but about his expert testimony in cases like Albert Contador and on his public comments like Armstrong's comeback, when he always seems to finds only suspicious things in the blood data.

As I mentioned above, I haven't followed the issue too closely nor am I a specialist on this issue, and it might even be just in the nature of the arbitration process, that he always ends up on the side of the prosecutor.

Aragon wrote:

While I actually do agree with the spirit of your comment, I am not referring to violations based on the ABP-program, but about his expert testimony in cases like Albert Contador and on his public comments like Armstrong's comeback, when he always seems to finds only suspicious things in the blood data.

As I mentioned above, I haven't followed the issue too closely nor am I a specialist on this issue, and it might even be just in the nature of the arbitration process, that he always ends up on the side of the prosecutor.

Perhaps it is sufficient that he shone light on Radcliffe's obvious bizarre blood values, and merely wanted to know what was going on.

I have a fantastic theory: Paula Radcliffe is Kaiser Soszay.

In the movie, Kaiser started as a "small-time dope-runner."

Then Kaiser "showed these men of will, what will really was." -- By somehow managing to have Hct levels no one had ever seen, and running a faster time for a woman than even the Kenyans of today think is possible.

And, in the process, got a lot of powerful men to do her dirty work. Like a deep money Harvard boy to pace for her.

Then Paula took on the role of anti-doping advocate. Just like a kingpin who rises to power through illicit means, and then "takes out the competition" who want to rise the same way, runners who might take the mantle needed to be disposed of.

Kaiser took out a gang of Hungarians. Paula found her foes east of the Berlin Wall as well -- in Russia. Through years of "talking too much" (like Verbal Kint) against doping, she convinced even WADA that she was clean, and then, with the help of a small German reporter (think of the lawyer, Kobayashi), she blew up the Russian scene from behind the scenes, and no one ever suspected. Then she went after Kenya. Like dominos they fell. Liliya, Rita, Jemima, and more to follow.

Song & dance may have been made about her numbers when she was investigated. Like Verbal Kint, she "stuck her nose, out, came this close to getting caught, ... and then like that -- (s)he was gone" from the headlines.

And now, this tight in with WADA, she'll have it crumbling from within like the genius mastermind that Kaiser Soszay, err, I mean Paula really is.

"The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing you to believe he didn't exist."

Curious how the biggest doping busts have all been women, and all women who are marathoners.

"Keaton once said, 'I don't believe in God, but I'm afraid of him.' Well, I do believe in God, and the only thing I fear is Kaiser Soszay."