Doping In Athletics

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roundabout

roundabout

Jun 7, 2010
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You're usually more verbose than that

meanwhile

Perhaps most important is the new pacesetter formation. Robby Ketchell, a sports scientist and an expert in aerodynamics, who also consulted on Breaking2, told me that he decided to completely rethink how best to shield Kipchoge from the head wind created by running at thirteen miles per hour. Using software for computational flow dynamics, and his experience of working with the Ineos cycling team, he experimented with hundreds of different scenarios. Eventually, he hit on what he believes is the best design
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...

Ketchell estimates that this formation, if everyone did their jobs perfectly, would save Kipchoge a minute and fifty-two seconds, compared with Kipchoge running alone. In reality, Kipchoge won’t receive that benefit. It takes ten seconds each time the pacers swap in and out, every three miles. Also, there are parts of the course, like the turns, where the formation will splinter somewhat. Still, if the V shape works, it might be this project’s masterstroke innovation—its Fosbury Flop.
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https://www.newyorker.com/sports/sp...to-break-the-two-hour-marathon-eliud-kipchoge
 
brownbobby

brownbobby

Sep 27, 2017
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brownbobby

brownbobby

Sep 27, 2017
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fmk_RoI said:
What are the physiological impediments that stop a man running 13 mph plus for 2 hours?
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Vo2 max, efficiency and lactate threshold...I think I once read that in testing Kipchoge had freakish LT, that his body hardly produced any lactic acid at all

The one thing that struck me most about yesterday, and I watched it in full, is just how effortless it all looked. He never wavered from the target pace, he sprinted the last km in 2mins 40, then was running around the finish areas for minutes afterwards celebrating before giving his interviews seemingly fresh as a daisy...sure that could have been adrenaline after what he’d achieved, but it was startling, none of the usual collapse we often see at the finish line of the marathon, no outward indication that he’d just pushed himself to his absolute limits.

Compare all of that to the Monza attempt

I’m convinced he could have gone even quicker than he did yesterday by a significant margin
 
A

Alpe73

Dec 27, 2012
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F_Cance said:
But it allows 2h3m runners to go 5% faster
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Yes … but that potential advantage is negated, in turn, by "Clinic Drag" … the slowing down (of the athlete) in anticipation of The Clinic putting the boots to a commendable athletic performance. Think Merck Index had the formula up some time back. Or maybe it was FMK or BB. Can't remember.
 
Red Rick

Red Rick

Feb 20, 2012
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brownbobby said:
Vo2 max, efficiency and lactate threshold...I think I once read that in testing Kipchoge had freakish LT, that his body hardly produced any lactic acid at all

The one thing that struck me most about yesterday, and I watched it in full, is just how effortless it all looked. He never wavered from the target pace, he sprinted the last km in 2mins 40, then was running around the finish areas for minutes afterwards celebrating before giving his interviews seemingly fresh as a daisy...sure that could have been adrenaline after what he’d achieved, but it was startling, none of the usual collapse we often see at the finish line of the marathon, no outward indication that he’d just pushed himself to his absolute limits.

Compare all of that to the Monza attempt

I’m convinced he could have gone even quicker than he did yesterday by a significant margin
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Gotta wonder if everyone is gonna wear those shoes now lol
 
fmk_RoI

fmk_RoI

Sep 16, 2010
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brownbobby said:
Vo2 max, efficiency and lactate threshold
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Back when sports science began in the 1890s with guys like Philippe Tissié, most of the thinking involved finding ways of overcoming the pain barrier. This involved doping, a part of sports science but not the totality of it. Stimulants allowed the body to be pushed further, other products dulled the pain.

In the 1970s or so, sports science began to look at oxygen delivery and uptake., VO2 max and lactate threshold (the latter can be calculated as a function of the former). That became the dominant thinking through to the noughties. Now I mentioned Moser's Hour earlier. At the time, that Hour was fully legal. It was only in later years that the way it worked around the oxygen limitations - blood transfusions - were made illegal (and it was only years later that the technology of the bike was deemed illegal). Oxygen uptake wasn't the only part of Moser's Hour, there was some counter-intuitive thinking with regards to the bike (it was heavier than then traditional thinking said it should be). Like this sub-2 run, all areas were considered, but we tend to focus on one as the key element.

In the last decade or so, the science seems to have moved on from oxygen to fuelling and we're having to get our heads around things like L-Carnitine and Ketones. Get past the laser pacing (similar to a technique used by by the American rider Willie Hamilton in his 1898 Hour record), the allegedly counter-intuitive aerodynamic formation, the pacing strategy, and the shoes, and the narrative for this sub-2 run revolves around fuelling. In the last attempt, they say they got the fuelling wrong at the end, hence his ragged finish then. This time, they say they got it right.

Point here is that setting the physiological limits of man as oxygen-based seems to miss where the thinking is actually at today.
brownbobby said:
I’m convinced he could have gone even quicker than he did yesterday by a significant margin
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I would have thought that that was a given? The strategy was to break the sub-2 barrier. This is the way with records. from the Hour to the pole vault and all in between: generally speaking, you aim to break the record, only rarely do you aim to put in on the shelf and thoroughly smash it.

So if the the guy had a pacing strategy to get sub-2 without tripping over his lactate threshold - and a fuelling strategy that enabled that pace to be held to the end - then the flags you're seeing at the end, him not being on his knees and crawling across the line like we imagine a true hero should, aren't really flags.

But, then, we're back to where the physiological limits are: if you insist the physiological limits make sub-2 physically impossible then you're not going to accept that the new record is already ripe for breaking.
 
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Tricycle Rider

Tricycle Rider

Feb 9, 2013
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brownbobby said:
About 240quid I think....incredible weekend of marketing for Nike....even I had a quick look on google to see if they were in stock in my size, and I can’t run for s*#t
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I was about to say Kosgei wore the Nike Next% shoes (same as Kipchoge the other day), they go for around $250. (I had to google them myself, even though I haven't run in about 15 years. :tearsofjoy:)

You just know Nike is about to make a sweet mint on those kicks with all the exposure they got this week, all other running shoe manufacturers need not apply for the time being .
 
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gregrowlerson

gregrowlerson

Aug 6, 2010
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Possibly having been missed amongst the World Championships and world marathon records, the great Kenenisa Bekele is still competing. And more than just merely competing, he is still astonishing us; winning Berlin a fortnight ago in 1:01:41; just two seconds off the (official) world record. Bring on Tokyo.
 
JosephK

JosephK

Jul 24, 2016
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Shoes . . . yeah. Just thinking about Abebe Bikila in the 1960 Rome Olympics marathon. Dude didn't need no shoes . . . also set a world record on the way to gold. No EPO back then, either. So the world record (for men) in real race conditions has come down about 14 minutes since that day. It has taken a while to threaten 2 hours.
 
proffate

proffate

Jul 10, 2012
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In the runnersworld thread about Kipchoge's sub 2 most posters were of the opinion that the shoes were a form of cheating and I have to agree. There are literally springs inside the soles. The only reason these shoes are currently permitted is that the springs are tucked away from view, bc if their action were external and thus visible to the naked eye, they'd be banned immediately.

That said I'm sure he doped too.
 
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