Ritzenhein finally speaks out and says USADA made right call to ban Salazar: "I stand behind the findings of the panel."

Abuse of power comes as no surprise wrote:

It is in this realm -- in which the prosecutor picks some person whom he dislikes or desires to embarrass, or selects some group of unpopular persons and then looks for an offense, that the greatest danger of abuse of prosecuting power lies. It is here that law enforcement becomes personal, and the real crime becomes that of being unpopular with the predominant or governing group, being attached to the wrong political views, or being personally obnoxious to or in the way of the prosecutor himself.

You seem to be implying that USADA just randomly went after Salazar. Far from it.

At least 3 different people went to them indepedently of each other.

1) Danny Mackey. After seeing high T levels in the blood work of NOP athletes , he was stunned when the head of the Nike lab told him that Salazar's athletes were on T and thyroid and don't get bused for it.

2) Magness

3) Gouchers

I think there are more - Masseuse, etc .

fking hell wrote:

Ever hear about a guy named Victor Conte? The guy who ran a huge doping scheme and famously said, "The dopers are always ahead of the testers?"

Oh yeath. That's another reason to be suspicious of Salazar/Rupp. Salazar was a client of Contes as well.

Edward Snowden Runner wrote:

This is a joke, there is no evidence that Alberto gave drugs to an athlete. A doctor prescribed it, if that doctor did so without evidence of its need, then they should be thrown in jail and their license should be revoked. I really hope this goes before a court and that it is made public. Those people involved in slander should be help accountable. I really hope those people at USADA that made this ruling, find themselves jobless. Although, this type of thing seems to be common in our culture today. Hope they meet the same demise.

Are you joking? So you are saying Dr. Brown's license should be provoked.? Well shouldn't Alberto then be in jail? One thing he's clear. He repeatedly violated US prescription drug laws. He gave Kara prescription pills that weren't for her. He gave his own sons testosterone that they weren't prescribed. He repeatedly was giving people prescription drugs that they didn't have prescriptions for for performance enhancing reasons.

One thing is clear. Alberto repeatedly violated US prescription drug laws.

Everyone seems to forget this. At a minimum , he made stars like Ritz and Kara extremely uncomfortable. Take these pills or else. A top athlete should not be forced to take pills they aren't prescribed. Period. Any other company would be fearful they'd be sued to high water for something like that. One of the supplements was shown to cause cancer. If Ritz ever gets cancer, expect a lawsuit for 8 figures.

same as it ever wuz wrote:

Here comes the horde of NOP d!ck riders to bash Ritz.

The first post I looked up confirmed that the same guy defending the NOP is posting under 4 different handles. "Naked Moralist Runner" , "Thomas Julias Jefferson", "Edward Snowden Runner", and "Kara, Adam, Dathan and Magness should all Face Charges for Admit" are all coming from the same IP.

If Ritz stands by the findings of the panel then why all this baseless, unproven conjecture about the athletes at NOP doping? The panel didn't find it, and the process was "comprehensive". But hey, glad to see the site owners are down to spread the rumors themselves.

rojo wrote:

same as it ever wuz wrote:

Here comes the horde of NOP d!ck riders to bash Ritz.

The first post I looked up confirmed that the same guy defending the NOP is posting under 4 different handles. "Naked Moralist Runner" , "Thomas Julias Jefferson", "Edward Snowden Runner", and "Kara, Adam, Dathan and Magness should all Face Charges for Admit" are all coming from the same IP.

Nice work, rojo.

Laughablee wrote:

semi_pro wrote:

Seems like a guy with lots of integrity. Works hard and cares a lot about the sport. I'm sure its been a hard process for him.

Hilarious. Notice everyone who goes against Alberto does so after they leave Nike and go to a competitor. Not one person has said anything and about Nike that has retired. Only people who move to another company or are fired.

Exactly. People are just jealous of NOP's success

I give you a hard time on other matters but it’s great to see you do the right thing and call these posters out.

Run007xx wrote:

semi_pro wrote:

Seems like a guy with lots of integrity. Works hard and cares a lot about the sport. I'm sure its been a hard process for him.

You have truly mastered the art of sarcasm.

Not sarcastic. Just a literal statement of how I feel. Plain and simple.

Gotta say this is pretty spot-on - I feel the same way about Rupp and Farah.

Also, I guess I'm a Nike shill as well because there's just no actual evidence here.....

rojo wrote:

You seem to be implying that USADA just randomly went after Salazar. Far from it.

At least 3 different people went to them indepedently of each other.

1) Danny Mackey. After seeing high T levels in the blood work of NOP athletes , he was stunned when the head of the Nike lab told him that Salazar's athletes were on T and thyroid and don't get bused for it.

2) Magness

3) Gouchers

I think there are more - Masseuse, etc .

I haven't seen you go after the Gouchers for being dirty, as into this thyroid stuff even before Salazar, and likely only flipped on him when they burned bridges for personal reasons, and also discovered themselves already under investigation.

Over the next several years, spurts of good health gave a glimpse of his talent, but it seemed that almost every solid stretch of training and racing was derailed by more setbacks—everything from lower back pain and a groin injury requiring surgery to a nagging Achilles problem and a hypothyroid condition. Goucher wound up taking most of 2002 off to try and get healthy, and 2003 wasn’t much better, despite signing a new sponsorship deal with Nike.

Banana Bread wrote:

Naked Moralist Runner wrote:

Absoulutely, if Dathan (who I thought was the greatest!) has admitted to cheating, then he should have all of his records stricken. He has taken the moral high road, and now should be happy to return those records to the rightful people. If he does this, I will post a pic on all my social media, stating my belief that he is the last moral man in America and that we should vote Dathan for President.

At least Trump never doped. Imagine Trump on EPO.

Actually, it's plain as day that Trump's a *gigantic* doper. He's the first president in modern history who is clearly, literally a drug addict *while in office*. (W appears to have been a bit if a coke-head in his younger days, but was pretty well cleaned-up by the time he occupied the WH.)

Trump is almost certainly seriously addicted to snorting Adderall, and popping Sudafed. (Yep, Sudafed addiction is a real thing.) The revelation the other day of what's seen in the background of his *moronic* Taco-Bowl picture from three years ago gives huge credence to that theory.

And *no one* who watched his televised speech the other day, with pupils dilated like giant freaking black olives (he truly looked like something out of a *cartoon*) believes that that guy wasn't wired out of his *gourd* on something.

No chance it's EPO, but we've *absolutely* got a president (for the moment) who's a freaking drug addict.

(It *might* be true that he never drinks, so if you think *that* makes him 'clean and sober' somehow, then I guess you can feel better. Of course, that would also make you a freaking *imbecile*, but hey, whatever makes you happy.)

Exactly.

This whole thing is a non event.

So, a coach gets done for pushing the boundaries? Big deal. I mean, it might be a big deal from an ethical POV if you're not into rubbing testosterone on your kids, but from a sporting perspective it hardly rates a mention. It's astonishingly naive to think that elite athletes and their support networks aren't constantly looking for an edge, black, white or grey.

Show me an athlete that was juicing on Nike's watch -- better yet, show me an entire squad/'project'/whatever -- and I might be interested.

Until then, this whole thing is about as big a joke as Travis Tygart.

Based on results and reports of his dodgy hearing, Mo was crooked well before he touched down in Oregon.

And Rupp has always been a consistent performer.

Does that mean they weren't on the gear under Alberto? Clearly not.

But until someone shows me they were, this thing is a sideshow.

Thank you ? rojo wrote:

I give you a hard time on other matters but it’s great to see you do the right thing and call these posters out.

You just thanked him for revealing that it was a single poster. Not posters.

I guess there will be no more happy endings

At least until you rub down Kenenisa...?

Didn't know a lot of this.

Looking forward to your reporting on it.

Vindicated much? wrote:

Didn't know a lot of this.

It has been pointed out here a number of times, and most of it can be found in the decision pdf. I'd add the "likely doping" status of both Rupp and Farah in 2016, and Rupp's alleged jump in testo during his marathon build-up (see USADA's leaked preliminary report).

But all these observations get drowned by the huge PR offense on letsrun.

Evidence Front wrote:

Kara testified under oath that Salazar gave her a pill of Cytomel to take -- Cytomel is a prescription drug, Salazar had a stockpile, and it requires a TUE....

Cytolmel is not prohibited by WADA and does not require a TUE. Other than that, good job...