Re:
Now, we must point out, however, that for all the fuss she attracts in this thread, Marit Bjørgen HAS shown signs of deteriorating with age; while she is still capable of dismantling a field with a destructive performance like that Olympic 30k, there was a time when she was doing that in nigh on every race, and performances like that have become much more infrequent. But the fact that she's still capable of doing that at this point in her career does make a lot of people baulk, not least because of all of the other noise that has surrounded the team, whether true or not, of late, and given her physical frame which is against the historical precedent for what you'd expect of a 30k racer. For a cycling comparison, imagine if Valverde was performing like he still is to this day, only he had never been suspended, and had Indurain's frame. You can argue that that's a very superficial way of looking at it - and you would also be right. After all, older skiers always tend towards the super-endurance as their explosivity dwindles, and for the most part the marathon skiing events on Visma Ski Classics are filled with elder statesmen of the sport, so it makes sense that Marit may become less successful in the shorter events but hold on to her level in the longer ones for longer. But you also can't deny that in terms of the kind of people that are able to perform at that elite level in the 30k - and to do so consistently - historically, Marit Bjørgen is, physically, very much an outlier.
Just like Bolshunov finding form or Niskanen borrowing Johann Olsson's traditional season plan.
I was not questioning what was most dubious, I was framing the discussion prior to my post as a discussion of which was most dubious, and then making a statement that both the likes of Bjørgen and the likes of Bolshunov are outliers, just at other ends of the distribution. Racing form, and indeed career trajectory, is like a bell curve. All things being equal, some people can hold form for longer, some people will get race fatigued quicker. Over the course of a season, people will have some periods with better form and some with worse form. People whose results jump up enormously at a given point will always attract suspicion, but people who never have a bad day also attract it too. People whose performance capability suddenly jumps up several years into their career justifiably raise some eyebrows, but people who don't deteriorate with age do too.Oude Geuze said:My only point here is how you guys ripped into Bjørgen winning by 2 minutes while completely glossing over the fact that the same happened in the usually much more competitive men's 50k, and they did it while absolutely demolishing the (according to the regulars here) most doped up, doped skier in modern times. And hilariously, now some start arguing that maybe MJS did'nt dope "as much" during this olympics due to media/CAS/WADA scrutiny. At the same time, the same people were outraged at the TUE's and amount of corticosteroids the norwegians brought to Korea, and took it as proof of systemic cheating. You can't have it both ways.
The core of the problem here seems to be the anger at the "veil of innocence" shrouding the norwegians in the public eye. And this makes a lot of you go ballistic. But, it's possible to critique norwegians without being a russian apologist and constructing elaborate, far reaching conspiracy theories to defend them.
I must admit though that its kind of fun to see some of the mental gymnastics, like the otherwise well informed LS questioning what is most dubious, winning only in championships/most important race in the season, or winning all throughout the season for 15 years? As if she suddenly knows nothing about how dopers cheat detection.
Now, we must point out, however, that for all the fuss she attracts in this thread, Marit Bjørgen HAS shown signs of deteriorating with age; while she is still capable of dismantling a field with a destructive performance like that Olympic 30k, there was a time when she was doing that in nigh on every race, and performances like that have become much more infrequent. But the fact that she's still capable of doing that at this point in her career does make a lot of people baulk, not least because of all of the other noise that has surrounded the team, whether true or not, of late, and given her physical frame which is against the historical precedent for what you'd expect of a 30k racer. For a cycling comparison, imagine if Valverde was performing like he still is to this day, only he had never been suspended, and had Indurain's frame. You can argue that that's a very superficial way of looking at it - and you would also be right. After all, older skiers always tend towards the super-endurance as their explosivity dwindles, and for the most part the marathon skiing events on Visma Ski Classics are filled with elder statesmen of the sport, so it makes sense that Marit may become less successful in the shorter events but hold on to her level in the longer ones for longer. But you also can't deny that in terms of the kind of people that are able to perform at that elite level in the 30k - and to do so consistently - historically, Marit Bjørgen is, physically, very much an outlier.
Just like Bolshunov finding form or Niskanen borrowing Johann Olsson's traditional season plan.