Jon Marcus: " Alan Webb had 55 Hematocrit"?

JMar comes on here sometimes, perhaps he can reconnect with Alan and put this rumor to bed. If it was really 55, I think that's pretty insane.

Perhaps Alan needs to use Castrol GTX to prevent Viscosity Breakdown.

adfsadfad wrote:

My hematocrit was once measured at 53 and I can barely break 5:00.

You must have bad genetics for running.

yeah sure boy wrote:

the Viren family?

Close.

blood is BS wrote:

Renato Canova says that hemoglobin and hematocrit levels have no effect in a runner BORN, LIVING, AND DOING HIS SPECIAL HIGH VOLUME- HIGH INTENSITY TRAINING WITH SPECIAL BLOCKS AT HIGH ALTITUDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The amazing Gelindo Bordin had a HCT OF ONLY 39 when he won the gold medal at the 1988 Olympic marathon during the "Golden Age" of Italian marathoning with Bordin, Pizzolatto, and many other great Italian runners.

More evidence to support Coach Renato Canova can be found in the blood test/anti-doping test results for his former runner Rita Jeptoo (banned 4 years for EPO use) and her former training partner Jemima Sumgong, who was also banned 4 years for EPO use.

It was just another EPO coincidence.

The use of EPO had ZERO effect on Rita and Jemima.

They would have won the races anyway.

Renato has told many long stories about the incredible Bordin.

Bordin would not even take an aspirin for pain.

Bordin was against all foreign drugs added to his body.

However, it was OK to do an autologous blood transfusion before an important race...because it was not a foreign drug. It was his own blood...and it had ZERO effect on Gelindo anyway.

Bordin was a "WILD -TYPE MENTALITY."

Unfortunately, it turns out that Rita and Jemima were "WEAK-MIND-CHEATER-LIAR-FRAUD-TYPE MENTALITY."

Oh well.

This is got to be "rekrunner?"...anything EPO/blood doping related and he's like a Great White Shark on attack mode.

yeah sure boy wrote:

the Viren family?

No.

Years back, Viren was offered $1 million by a German magazine to tell the truth about blood doping. Viren agreed to tell his story, but that it would explain why he didn't blood dope. The Germans called off the deal. Viren has never once even hinted there might be more to his story.

Here is an interesting quote from historian John Gleaves who in his 2014 essay Manufactured Dope: How the 1984 US Olympic Cycling Team Rewrote the Rules on Drugs in Sports isn't fully convinced that Viren doped nor that there even existed accusations that he did so when the 1976 Summer Olympics began:

Though rumours of blood manipulation existed before the links to Viren... Viren often receives credit for being the first Olympic athlete to pursue transfusions. It is also high unlikely that Viren used blood transfusions prior to or at the 1972 Munich Games. Despite rumours alleging such practices, extensive archival research could not identify media accounts linking Viren to blood transfusions prior to the 1976 Montreal Games. This makes the earlier allegations likely inventions after the fact. Allegations that Viren used blood transfusions in Montreal still persists, though no evidence has provided certainty that the runner did so. The spirit of the paragraph is accurate even if there actually did exist at least some gossip linking Finnish runners to the practice in the early 1970s so much that journalist Don Steffens directly asked Viren about the issue in 1972. The public-at-large most likely first time heard about the accusations against Viren on July 26th, when ABC-TV commentators Marty Liquori, Jim McKay and Erich Segal discussed the issue during 10000m finale so the New Zealanders didn't invent the gossip but only spread it after they failed in their 5000m finale.

It should be emphasized that neither Rod Dixon ("He has got that extra blood in him") nor Dick Quax ("Lasse Viren is a mobile transfusion unit") could provide a single evidence against Viren, but instead succumbed to meaningless bitching and whining. It is equally weird that if the efficacy of the method had been widely known since 1972, nobody has provided any evidence why Finns were the only ones to follow the latest trends of the exercise physiology. It would be borderline embarrassing to conclude that this was because of Finland's close proximity to Sweden where a large amount of the research was conducted, because all the pertinent Swedish research had been publicly available since 1972, with all the necessary technical details about the autotransfusion-method provided as well ("Blood was stored in the Karolinska Hospital Blood Bank in ACD solution with the addition of adenine and kept at +4’ C...").

I've been trying to understand Canova's use of the English language for the last decade to no avail. I assume he just say Kenya dude use EPO so Kenya mofo is good EPO taste good too with marathon specific work. Run long run fast!!!! ?

The good thing about Jon Marcus choosing to spew so much drivel out there on a daily basis is that he will show just how little he really knows.

My guess is Marcus had no idea if Alan Webb actually had a 55 and it was exaggerated.

HCT is typically lower, not higher, in trained athletes than the untrained.

Not to sully Bordin in any way, but Renato was telling us a few years ago that Kenyans wouldn't even take medicines for malaria, let alone PEDs,

HRE wrote:

Not to sully Bordin in any way, but Renato was telling us a few years ago that Kenyans wouldn't even take medicines for malaria, let alone PEDs,

Malaria medicines do not bring untold riches.

If you tell a poor Kenyan barely able to feed his family that if they take whatever is in this needle they’ll make a million dollars, you can bet they’ll line up for miles to get that needle.

Could have un-diagnosed Hemochromatosis

Money honey wrote:

HRE wrote:

Not to sully Bordin in any way, but Renato was telling us a few years ago that Kenyans wouldn't even take medicines for malaria, let alone PEDs,

Malaria medicines do not bring untold riches.

If you tell a poor Kenyan barely able to feed his family that if they take whatever is in this needle they’ll make a million dollars, you can bet they’ll line up for miles to get that needle.

Exactly. Taking aspirin doesn't bring riches either. So I don't think Renato's comments about runners reluctant to take medicines mean anything as to whether they took PEDs. And again, I am in no way suggesting that Bordin did or did not take PEDs.

it doesnt matter if he did or he didnt....cause PEDs especially EPO doesnt make you better...in fact if he was taking PEDs he ran slower than he was capable of

basic intrinsic im out

I was reading an article last night that said that the 50 hematocrit limit in cycling was introduced not so much to 'stop cheating' but to stop cyclists dying from excessive EPO abuse which was happening at an alarming rate in the early 90s.

Coevett wrote:

I was reading an article last night that said that the 50 hematocrit limit in cycling was introduced not so much to 'stop cheating' but to stop cyclists dying from excessive EPO abuse which was happening at an alarming rate in the early 90s.

Yes...indeed. Check out TdF Champion Bjarne Riis' team "Gewiss–Ballan" during the years 94 -95. The team doctor was none other than Dr. Ferrari, who along with Dr. Concini, were obsessed with oxygen-vector doping. Look at the hematocrit variations with some of their top riders. Some are boosting levels near 20% from baseline! A lot of thick blood out there - very surprised they weren't dropping like flies.

Somebody (either Clerk or RJM) has a list of cycling deaths as soon as EPO got FDA approval, check the archives but it is quite a list. Eye opening.

A good story I heard from a friend years back was that some Italian cyclists (or members of an Italian based team) had such thick blood from all their doping that the team doctors were worried that their resting heart rate would fall too low and they would potentially die. So they were waking them in the middle of the night and putting them on their bikes (obviously attached to those indoor wind/roller trainer things) to lift their pulse rates and induce over training. Now obviously this is a bit of Chinese whispers and urban legend but gosh it was funny when I first heard it.

Coevett wrote:

I was reading an article last night that said that the 50 hematocrit limit in cycling was introduced not so much to 'stop cheating' but to stop cyclists dying from excessive EPO abuse which was happening at an alarming rate in the early 90s.

Yes. Same thing with the ABP, which - as has been demonstrated repeatedly - actually allows for higher values than an Hct of 50%, thus for more doping = faster times = more money. Plus, the so-called expert panel in case of an ABP violation leaves the control with the IAAF/UCI, instead of forcing them to ban their stars if they go above 50%. Win win win.

So: - Without more information, 55 HcT doesn't mean anything, with respect to deciding doping. - In the past, cycling used a "no-start rule", not allowing cyclists with more than 50% hcT to start. This was not a ban, but triggered a 15-day "timeout" for medical safety reasons. This was not considered a doping violation or a ban, which would require a higher degree of certainty. - Cycling has updated their "no-start rule" based on the biological passport data. - Athletics did not ever use a "no-start" rule, finding the measure too variable to be meaningful. - Today cycling/running treat hematocrit the same way -- they both ignore it.

legit? wrote:

This is a great podcast on coaching. Marcus then talks about Webb later on and he mentions Webb having a 55 Hematocrit. That raised my eyebrow.

Is this a legit thing?

Is that 55 a red flag of doping?

Why are the Tour De France riders banned above 50?

What's the difference between running/cycling on hematocrit?