Baron Coe, cleans?

[veganrob]

Who knows why Maaninka admitted to blood doping? Do you? Maybe he felt it was wrong even though it was not illegal.
What does he have to gain by implicating others? Nothing. So why should he drag them down? Maybe he feels his head is now cleared and leave the others to live with their own guilt if they even feel it. And that is the key, Most of the cheaters down even feel like they are cheating. Doping etc. is merely a means to win. That is all. No room for timid.

 

[sniper]

HISTORY [of autologous blood transfusions among athletes]

The first alleged use of blood boosting in sport was in the 1960s, when a French four times winner of the Tour de France (1961–1964) was named as one of the first cyclists to use the technique. Widespread use among endurance athletes (especially running, cycling, and cross country skiing) started after the 1968 Olympic Games, in Mexico City which is situated at an altitude of 2300 m.1 Here the athletes from higher altitudes performed better in the endurance events because of various physiological acclimatisation adaptations, including increased red blood cell (RBC) mass.5 Blood boosting was the method adopted by many athletes after Mexico to increase their aerobic performance.6 It did not come to general public attention until the early 1970s when it was termed “blood doping” by the media.7,8 This followed a Finnish steeplechaser using the technique before winning two gold medals in endurance runs at the 1972 Munich Olympics.1 The technique became more popular during the 1980s and was used by distance runners (5000 m, 10000 m, marathon runners), cyclists, and skiers.1,9–11 Specific accusations were made against the Russians, Italians, Finns, Americans, and East Germans, particularly during the 1980 and 1984 Olympics.1,9,10 Athletes who admitted using the technique included the Italian cyclist who beat the one hour world record in 1984 and a Russian distance runner who specifically admitted to autologous transfusion with two units by team doctors in 1980.1 The US Olympic cycling team also admitted to having received homologous transfusions from friends and family before achieving outstanding results in the 1984 Olympic games, winning a record nine medals despite not having performed well in past Games.

The IOC forbade blood boosting after the 1984 Olympics, despite the fact that no methods had been devised for unequivocal detection.7

Blood boosting became less widespread after 1987 (despite admitted use by a US Nordic skier in that year)9 with the invention of rHuEpo to stimulate erythropoiesis in patients with renal failure. rHuEpo was soon adopted as the standard drug by which athletes could illegally boost their RBC mass, and the need for blood boosting diminished.

http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/38/1/99.full

 

[DirtyWorks]

Re:

Athletes such as John Tracey, Steve Cram, Ray Flynn, Eamon Coghlan, and Steve Ovett, all competed successfully during this period, and I know for certain that none of them doped, and neither did Sebastian Coe.

For the first time in at least 20 years of the TdF, they gave the winner a microphone on the podium.
I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. But this is one hell of a race. This is a great sporting event and you should stand around and believe it. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it.

Meanwhile, IAAF just plainly lied about Oregon's no-bid 2021 Championships and his words about the last IAAF scandal does not suggest someone who has a strong ethical grounding required to perform clean.

Was he clean? I have no idea. But, patterns of behaviour do not suggest he was clean.

 

[Catwhoorg]

I believe Ovett and Cram were clean and unusually I mean really clean not WADA clean.

Probably some supplements and the like, but nothing even too dodgy.
Outside of an actual passing acquaintance with Cram due to family and proximity I don't have much more than my gut to go on for that.

Coe, I am less sure of.


I wouldn't go out on a limb on those feelings though.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Day 2: Seb Coe on Trust and Doping.

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/02/day ... nd-doping/

If you dissolve those philosophies to anything less than that, then you’ve lost it (the sport). It’s really important that we hold hard to that. Yes, you have to educate young people. Yes, you have to have systems that are in place that are non-negotiable and uncompromising. Yes, you need to keep up with the illegitimate side of science. You need to go on committing resources – and I would treble those resources if we have to – but there also is a moral imperative here. Sooner or later, you have to sit down with young people and say, ‘Actually it is cheating. It’s cheating. You don’t need to do it. Plenty of athletes have reached the very highest level and have achieved at the highest level without doing that.’ You (Brendan Foster) and I are good examples of that. ‘And your success is predicated on good coaching, hard work and training smarter than the next person.'”

Seb Coe responds when asked when the day will arrive that the sport is totally clean:

“It’s probably never going to arrive because we are not utopian – we are not living in la-la land here. There always will be a group of people that want to chance it. What we have to make sure is that those that do (cheat), get caught, they get sanctioned properly and they are removed from the sport. And you do it not simply because you want to make an example of them, but because your fundamental responsibility is to protect the clean athletes that want to do it with integrity.

And you can’t (have athletes starting) off at the age of 10 or 12 and (thinking) , ‘Actually my ambitions and my horizons are limited as sooner or later I’m going to hit a glass ceiling where people are not going to be competing legitimately.'”

 

[sniper]

Re:

I believe Ovett and Cram were clean and unusually I mean really clean not WADA clean.

Probably some supplements and the like, but nothing even too dodgy.
Outside of an actual passing acquaintance with Cram due to family and proximity I don't have much more than my gut to go on for that.

Coe, I am less sure of.
I wouldn't go out on a limb on those feelings though.

Was Cram a nice guy?
Juergen Tschann is one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet. Modest, kind.
In an interview I recently posted he explains how, throughout the late 60s and 70s, ca. 90% of the peloton (including himself obviously) drugged themselves, putting needles in their arses on a daily basis, in and out of competition, amphetamines, cortisone, everything they could get their hands on basically, just to make a living.
Why would athletics and a guy like Cram be so different from cycling and a guy like Tschann?

 

[JimmyFingers]

I think people are arguing the toss here. There's no way of knowing either way, it's just guesswork. So long ago, clearly it was going on at the time so they were successful against some doped athletes, but to my knowledge there has been no whispers, no whistle-blowers, no anecdotal evidence. That is no more proof of being clean than the former is of being doped, but we know most of the historical demons in cycling, even if they didn't get caught during their career.

But I do get the point of this place is to speculate in either direction, but you'll never get closure here. The modern athletes there is a chance at least.

 

[JimmyFingers]

And I'll agree with the conspiracists here: if Coe did cheat, and got away with it, the position he is in now it would take a very committed journalist with something akin to what Walsh had on Lance to really go after it, and make it stick. The reality is if there is anything out there it has been buried very deep by someone very meticulous and clever. Both of which Coe is.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Re: Re:

I believe Ovett and Cram were clean and unusually I mean really clean not WADA clean.

Probably some supplements and the like, but nothing even too dodgy.
Outside of an actual passing acquaintance with Cram due to family and proximity I don't have much more than my gut to go on for that.

Coe, I am less sure of.
I wouldn't go out on a limb on those feelings though.

Was Cram a nice guy?
Juergen Tschann is one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet. Modest, kind.
In an interview I recently posted he explains how, throughout the late 60s and 70s, ca. 90% of the peloton (including himself obviously) drugged themselves, putting needles in their arses on a daily basis, in and out of competition, amphetamines, cortisone, everything they could get their hands on basically, just to make a living.
Why would athletics and a guy like Cram be so different from cycling and a guy like Tschann?

Cycling and Athletics have rather different dynamics when it comes to the inner circle. Sure, there have been state sponsored doping programme's in many countries in athletics. But there is no evidence that such a programme ever existed in Great Britain. Any individual has the propensity to dope when the benefits outweigh the risks, its a trait of humanty unfortunately. There are many who did not choose the back ally, and Steve Cram is one of those individuals who kept their hands clean.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Re:

I think people are arguing the toss here. There's no way of knowing either way, it's just guesswork. So long ago, clearly it was going on at the time so they were successful against some doped athletes, but to my knowledge there has been no whispers, no whistle-blowers, no anecdotal evidence. That is no more proof of being clean than the former is of being doped, but we know most of the historical demons in cycling, even if they didn't get caught during their career.

But I do get the point of this place is to speculate in either direction, but you'll never get closure here. The modern athletes there is a chance at least.

Take Sebastian Coe though, a highly prolific athlete. It's been thirty odd years since he was competing. It's more likely than not if any thing suspicious was going on with Coe that something would have emerged, but nothing has ever come out that would sway the masses since that time. And I doubt that anything ever will. The odds are heavily stacked in Coe's favour to being a clean competitor.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Critical Analysis of Sebastien Coe's Training.

http://www.slideshare.net/hattersley4/seb-coe-analysis

 

[Freddythefrog]

If I remember correctly, sometime, David Coleman was filling in the time before a big event and he was talking about blood doping. My memory says about 1976 and the Montreal Olympics but I may be out by a couple of years. The account ran that it was accepted that the Finns were going high, taking blood and then re-infusing it in the days before a final. This is my first recollection of encountering blood doping. Coleman and his fellow punter were of the opinion that whilst it was not banned, it was a step too far. They then speculated about how many rivals would follow the lead or already had.

By 1984 we have Chris Commical and the rest being asked to bring family members along to donate blood for use at Los Angeles (strangely quiet on this is Connie Carpenter, although most of the rest of Team USA cycling squad have confessed). We have Alan Wells' great rival, the late Peitro Mennae confessing to blood doping for 1980. We have Wells' own sprint relay team-mate confessing to drug use and identifying that it was systemic in the British sprint team. That made him official leper number one. We have Andy Norman, (Steve Ovett's best man at his wedding and BBC anchorman Jonathan "I don't jump on Sundays" Edwards' agent) with a stack of stories to rival Lance. Amongst these were that he arranged for Met Officers on hand at his events to provide clean urine samples if ever a star was asked to provide one at one of his promotions. We also have the Dubin inquiry identifying that the UK had a program of providing PED advice specialising on athlete safety, but taking the pragmatic view that "athletes dope" so try to make sure they don't take their lives in the process. This was based in four centres in the UK with Dr Jimmy Ledingham at the centre. Was it two years ago or thereabout that it was revealed that West Germany ran a doping program through the 70's and 80's that tried to match that of the GDR?

I know for a certain generation of Brit it will be nearly inconceivable that Cram, Ovett, Edwards, Coe, Daley and the rest doped. The "Yanks were missing - 80" & "the Soviet athletes were missing - 84" story is about as convenient as "2012/13, post Lance and with the intro of the Blood Passport - the peloton was clean" is for Wiggins and Froome. I don't bother discussing this period of T&F with many of my peers, they find it too uncomfortable. However, in life, I find the good guys tend to keep company with the good guys and the bad guys tend to keep company with the bad guys. I don't think anyone is going to say Andy Norman was a good guy.

As for Coe - blood doping wasn't illegal. Do I think he did it - as sure as I could be without proof - I just don't think he would disadvantage himself in his quest for glory.

In my book, blood doping when its use was known by the international Federations and yet they did not ban it, is a grade down from looking at the widespread use of EPO or Aicar when these were not detectable, but banned, and deciding to use them.

For myself, I will go with Mary Peters as clean. I won't write off all Brit success. I think there are places where victory at the top table could be achieved by clean athletes, but it won't be in headline grabbing events.

As for 21 Karat idiots, how about David Hemery. Would any sane person put money on him being clean ? Those strops in Sports Superstar were jaw dropping. John Akki Bua, who beat him at Munich, was feted by Idi Amin and fled Uganda when Amin was toppled and was in a refugee camp in Kenya before Execs at Puma got him freed and he moved to Germany. Does anybody have any money on Akki Bua being clean ? Sadly, there is what we see and what is hidden from us.

 

[The Hitch]

Re: Re:

I think people are arguing the toss here. There's no way of knowing either way, it's just guesswork. So long ago, clearly it was going on at the time so they were successful against some doped athletes, but to my knowledge there has been no whispers, no whistle-blowers, no anecdotal evidence. That is no more proof of being clean than the former is of being doped, but we know most of the historical demons in cycling, even if they didn't get caught during their career.

But I do get the point of this place is to speculate in either direction, but you'll never get closure here. The modern athletes there is a chance at least.

Take Sebastian Coe though, a highly prolific athlete. It's been thirty odd years since he was competing. It's more likely than not if any thing suspicious was going on with Coe that something would have emerged, but nothing has ever come out that would sway the masses since that time. And I doubt that anything ever will. The odds are heavily stacked in Coe's favour to being a clean competitor.

What an idiotic argument.

Indurain admits to taking EPO and yet in 24 years since his TDF no actual evidence has come out against him and the majority of the cycling world and his fans seem to still think he was clean.

FFS people need to think things through before they post sometimes.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Re: Re:

I think people are arguing the toss here. There's no way of knowing either way, it's just guesswork. So long ago, clearly it was going on at the time so they were successful against some doped athletes, but to my knowledge there has been no whispers, no whistle-blowers, no anecdotal evidence. That is no more proof of being clean than the former is of being doped, but we know most of the historical demons in cycling, even if they didn't get caught during their career.

But I do get the point of this place is to speculate in either direction, but you'll never get closure here. The modern athletes there is a chance at least.

Take Sebastian Coe though, a highly prolific athlete. It's been thirty odd years since he was competing. It's more likely than not if any thing suspicious was going on with Coe that something would have emerged, but nothing has ever come out that would sway the masses since that time. And I doubt that anything ever will. The odds are heavily stacked in Coe's favour to being a clean competitor.

What an idiotic argument.

Indurain admits to taking EPO and yet in 24 years since his TDF no actual evidence has come out against him and the majority of the cycling world and his fans seem to still think he was clean.

FFS people need to think things through before they post sometimes.

Dear Hitch, when did Indurain admit to taking EPO. That's the first time I have heard of it anyhow. So perhaps maybe you should think before you post. Now whether or not Indurain took EPO or not, no one actually knows that for sure. You don't know that and I don't know that. But EPO did not even exist as a PED when Coe was competing. The level of skepticism in here is staunch. As I have already said you cannot prove one way or the other whether or not someone is doing drugs. But you can have your suspicion's. There is absolutely no way that Sebastian Coe ever took performance enhancing drugs. Why is that so difficult for you to understand. I mean, do you know how good these guys actually are. If you were to start an 800 metre (even with training) race along with these guys, as with 99% of the worlds population, you would not stay with them for 20 seconds, if even that. It's only then that you would realize how good some of these athletes actually are, and your level of respect and opinionated perspective and false perception would change your faithless view of athletes like Sebastian Coe. It is very cowardly of people to come on here and give a false name and accuse any one they prefer in order to suit their own agenda. There is a world of difference between Indurain and Coe. Oh and please for your own sake mind your language, you only making your self look bad. Thank you.

 

[More Strides than Rides]

MagnificentMerckx, you are not making an argument. Being fast does not mean he was clean. Being hardworking does not mean he was clean. Him being faster than me does not mean he was clean.

The argument that the culture of elite sport is and was doping, is a strong one. That is the cause for suspicion. It is backed up by his link to Conconi.

You have not shown that either of those aren't true.

We are waiting for something more definitive, but we also know that the absence of evidence is the evidence of absence. Does Coe have to prove he was clean? No. It'd be nice, but no.

Do you still have to prove that he was exceptional, morally and physically? Yes. You have done nothing to backup that claim.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Re:

MagnificentMerckx, you are not making an argument. Being fast does not mean he was clean. Being hardworking does not mean he was clean. Him being faster than me does not mean he was clean.

The argument that the culture of elite sport is and was doping, is a strong one. That is the cause for suspicion. It is backed up by his link to Conconi.

You have not shown that either of those aren't true.

We are waiting for something more definitive, but we also know that the absence of evidence is the evidence of absence. Does Coe have to prove he was clean? No. It'd be nice, but no.

Do you still have to prove that he was exceptional, morally and physically? Yes. You have done nothing to backup that claim.

The link to Conconi is nothing more than hearsay. I would not hold everything that Race Radio says as the Gospel and hang on his every word. There were no link between Coe and Conconi. I mean that is just absurd. All I can say is, I am absolutely certain that Coe never took performance enhancing drugs. And I do not need to prove that. I am satisfied that he did not. There is nothing that will change my mind of this certainty.

 

[SeriousSam]

Surely you can see why people would be annoyed when someone repeatedly states something without offering any reasoning or evidence in its support whatsoever.

Where does the certainty come from. Are you just plain irrational or are you privy to information regarding Coe we are not aware of? Information that would actually warrant being certain he is clean?

Since you won't say, I'm trying to come up with why you might be so certain but drawing blanks. Surely it's not the fact that he's an upstanding British citizen of seemingly great character, a Lord even, that would never do such a thing. No, that would be just too absurd.

 

[neineinei]

Re:

So here is a teaser for the skeptics, and by all means skepticism abounds when it comes to sporting performance, I cannot deny that. But.........

Why is Kaarlo Maaninka the only athlete, to my knowledge, to later admit to blood doping, during the 1980 Olympics ?
As far as I know he is the only track athlete to admit to blood doping during a period when it was not outlawed ?

Alberto Cova and Salvatore Antibo have admitted they were using blood transfusions for the 1984 Olympics. Cova won the 10,000m while Antibo came 5th. Antibo was upgraded to 4th after Maaninkas compatriot, Martti Vainio, had his doping sample found postive for a steroid. Cova and Vaino were in a league of their own.

Alberto Cova (ITA) 27:47.54
Martti Vainio (FIN) 27:51.10 DQ
Mike McLeod (GBR) 28:06.22
Michael Musyoki (KEN) 28:06.46

The Italian Athletics Federation were working with Dr. Conconi. They had been inspired by Finlands great success with blood transfusions.

 

[blackcat]

Re: Re:

All I can say is, I am absolutely certain that Coe never took performance enhancing drugs. And I do not need to prove that. I am satisfied that he did not. There is nothing that will change my mind of this certainty.

projecting much?

would your worldview be destroyed if you found out Coe and Redgrave and other Brits did indeed dope?

I think you oughta see an analyst to discuss why you place so much self-worth in this cause

 

[blackcat]

oh, Freddythefrog, great contribution <thumbsup>

 

[blackcat]

Re: Re:

How very true, you are correct of course. There is very little between athletes at this level from a physiological perspective. The variances are small. I don't disagree with that. But there can only be one winner !!.

yes, and if a field was clean, there needs to be a winner. therefore, the logic clean=doping, is a survivor fallacy. and incorrect.

however, the field was not clean then, but lets forget the late 70s and 80s when Cramm Ovett and Coe were rolling around.

The non-epo WR times, do allow someone to make an analysis, in comparison across eras.

 

[MagnificentMerckx]

Poor Sebastian Coe, jealously will get you nowhere folks.

 

[veganrob]

Re:

Poor Sebastian Coe, jealously will get you nowhere folks.

Nobody here posting sounds jealous or bitter in the least. You on the other hand are taking this discussion very personally.

 

[SeriousSam]

Seems like MagnificientMerckx is afraid to state the reason it's a certainty Seb was certainly clean. Probably for good reason.

 

[blackcat]

Re:

Seems like MagnificientMerckx is afraid to state the reason it's a certainty Seb was certainly clean. Probably for good reason.

cos the nitwit picked a doped rider as his handle