More Russian Positives

[DirtyWorks]

SIX Olympic Weightlifting athletes were sanctioned by RUSADA, two of them got 10 year bans for repeatedly failing the IQ test.

http://asia.eurosport.com/weightlif...etes-banned-for-doping_sto4062141/story.shtml

Two Russian cyclists, lower-ranked Women.
Elena Bocharinkova http://www.procyclingstats.com/rider.php?id=132163

Yana Bezrukova http://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/Yana_Bezrukova

Both riders are very young, low-20's and apparently no explanation given with the bans. Makarov's federation exhibiting phenomenal anti-doping controversy suppression with that kind of annoucement.

Russia must be into the 30's in terms of the number of sanctioned athletes by now.The mystery remains why so many from the Russian state got sanctioned this year.

 

[Benotti69]

SIX Olympic Weightlifting athletes were sanctioned by RUSADA, two of them got 10 year bans for repeatedly failing the IQ test.

http://asia.eurosport.com/weightlif...etes-banned-for-doping_sto4062141/story.shtml

Two Russian cyclists, lower-ranked Women.
Elena Bocharinkova http://www.procyclingstats.com/rider.php?id=132163

Yana Bezrukova http://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/Yana_Bezrukova

Both riders are very young, low-20's and apparently no explanation given with the bans. Makarov's federation exhibiting phenomenal anti-doping controversy suppression with that kind of annoucement.

Russia must be into the 30's in terms of the number of sanctioned athletes by now.The mystery remains why so many from the Russian state got sanctioned this year.

No mystery, Russia aint paying its dues

 

[Ney the Viking]

No mystery, Russia aint paying its dues

Hardly, it's so that Russia can use the "look we're tough on doping" card when they win 70% of the gold in the winter olympics, and then use the "we win because we have prepared hard on homefield" card afterwards.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Probably actually a mixture of the two. I recall last year Wolfgang Pichler, the coach of the Russian women's biathlon team, finding a lot of his methods of coaching unpopular with some of the regional bosses who preferred to stick to traditional methods. A lot of said "traditional methods", at least those when it comes to doping, are a bit less subtle than today's, which makes them easier to detect resulting in a larger number of Russian positives than of other countries who may be doping just as hard. RUSADA is actually a pretty hard-working anti-doping authority in recent years, but the size of the country and the scope of doping as well as the number of athletes over a huge amount of sports hampers some of their progress. They've likely stepped up the game in the last year or two because of the World Championships Athletics and upcoming Winter Olympics, to show a Russian commitment to clean sport whether of their own volition or under pressure from the IOC and WADA.

 

[python]

actually the increased number of russian positives can not be explained by simple counts.

some serious undercurrents are taking place, both visible (which are constructive mostly) and, as is their tradition, covert, unpublicized...

to gain a good reference, some comparisons always help to take the measure of the landscape. let's compare a well known french afld, one of the worls's best and leading ados, and the rusada.

afld's site lists 52 french positives this year whilst rusada site refers to almost 200 russians in the same period !! note, this is just a half of the big picture, because the afld's wada lab (lndd) typically processed TWICE as many samples in a given year as their moscow counterpart (the ratio may be a bit smaller this year as the total numbers are not yet available)

this is almost 4 times the yield on one half the effort !! it points clearly to both: the omnipresence and magnitude of doping in russia and the serious effort to finally to do something about it.

their doping problem, like their love of vodka, could be deeply cultural and, frankly, i do not see much prospect there as far as their mass national attitude (i mean, many athletes may WANT to be clean but they will not likely ever approach the attitudes of swedes or norges, for example)...however, i do believe their authorities are beginning to take things seriously and this may drive the change in a typical russian way - top to bottom. there are 2 main reasons for that.

1st, as was mentioned already, it is russia's prestige vulnerability thru tremendous exposure to sports politics, being a host to all sorts of international events - from sotchi to universiad to football etc. in this regard, they HAD to become more transparent and professional as that's what wada and various feds demand as a per-condition to hosting. this lead to the rusada birth (only a couple years ago) and to the a drastic upgrade of the wada lab in moscow. several leading wada labs have worked very closely with them to set up the process.

second, it is my personal opinion yet to be proven, russia's current leaders are seriously concerned by the horrible demographics and the waste that all drugs (street, alcohol, sports) impact on the young people.

there are of course, other variables. such as the the doping 'arms race' when the more sophisticated dopers in the west don't get caught as often. in this regard, it would be interesting to know what has the moscow lab (who's head i happened to come across) been tasked with ? are they pretesting the national team members to vet their doping programs or are they policing ? i suspect both as that's what my impression was of the lab's head attitudes.

 

[martinvickers]

Probably actually a mixture of the two. I recall last year Wolfgang Pichler, the coach of the Russian women's biathlon team, finding a lot of his methods of coaching unpopular with some of the regional bosses who preferred to stick to traditional methods. A lot of said "traditional methods", at least those when it comes to doping, are a bit less subtle than today's, which makes them easier to detect resulting in a larger number of Russian positives than of other countries who may be doping just as hard. RUSADA is actually a pretty hard-working anti-doping authority in recent years, but the size of the country and the scope of doping as well as the number of athletes over a huge amount of sports hampers some of their progress. They've likely stepped up the game in the last year or two because of the World Championships Athletics and upcoming Winter Olympics, to show a Russian commitment to clean sport whether of their own volition or under pressure from the IOC and WADA.

There have been well over 100 RUSADA positives this calander year. Most people will remember the Moscow lab debacle - since that, RUSADA seem to have upped the game considerably - probably a combination of factors, many of which yu highlight.

There can be little doubt that 'traditional' methods, and the 'traditional' mores that underpins them (i.e. coaches brought up in, and 'loyal' to, the CCCP mentality) is a major cultural problem in the former east, particularly Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Equally, it's clear that at least some people in RUSADA take this sh!t seriously, which gives grounds for hope. As bad as it looks, it's far better long term if Russia does this hard now - much more likely to make a decent and lasting crack in the culture.

 

[DirtyWorks]

There have been well over 100 RUSADA positives this calander year. Most people will remember the Moscow lab debacle - since that, RUSADA seem to have upped the game considerably - probably a combination of factors, many of which yu highlight.

There can be little doubt that 'traditional' methods, and the 'traditional' mores that underpins them (i.e. coaches brought up in, and 'loyal' to, the CCCP mentality) is a major cultural problem in the former east, particularly Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Equally, it's clear that at least some people in RUSADA take this sh!t seriously, which gives grounds for hope. As bad as it looks, it's far better long term if Russia does this hard now - much more likely to make a decent and lasting crack in the culture.

Completely agree.

Russian cycling did not even explain the positives tells you how the system really works. You have to wonder how much of that Makarov is involved with given he's the president of the federation: http://fvsr.ru/president-of-federation-english.html

Belarus gets some kind of prize for their nationally sponsored doping though. You can find many versions of this story as it was syndicated content:
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...henko-olympic-medal-standings-london-olympics

 

[DirtyWorks]

Russian Coach Gets Lifetime Ban

More anti-doping news from Russia, a cycling coach got a lifetime ban for unspecified offenses along with the two athletes mentioned at the top of the thread.

NP "RUSADA" based on the findings of the Disciplinary Committee of the Anti-Doping decided to disqualify coach Queen PG (Cycling) for life, starting from August 26, 2013, for violation of anti-doping rules.

That's from a Google translation..

http://www.rusada.ru/press/news/inf...smenov&usg=ALkJrhh6qWDnen9hf1wVyYkPiLq2N2bZnw

 

[martinvickers]

Completely agree.

Russian cycling did not even explain the positives tells you how the system really works. You have to wonder how much of that Makarov is involved with given he's the president of the federation: http://fvsr.ru/president-of-federation-english.html

Belarus gets some kind of prize for their nationally sponsored doping though. You can find many versions of this story as it was syndicated content:
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...henko-olympic-medal-standings-london-olympics

To be honest, i'm not sure I mentally think of it as Russian doping, so much as Soviet doping - a stinking cultural overhang of the cold war (and yes, of course the capitalist west has it's overhangs too)

But I do think it's worth highlighting that the Russian/Rusada situation - sh*t as it is, must be preferable to the Turkish one; were they've also had a sh*tload of positives - but outside the country. TurkADO aren't doing the catching.

Particularly at a Universiade, I vaguely recall, though I could very well be wrong there. I'm certain that a lot of the turkish positives were alarmingly young - though admittedlynone as alarming as a 14 yo swimmer in russia.

Meanwhile, just before Christmas the Turkish ADO 'exhonerated' Aslı Çakır Alptekin, convicted doper, on her latest blood passport offence. Even IAAF won't let this ride, I suspect, but it doesn't really suggest the Turkish ADO are taking matters terribly seriously.

Russia ain't perfect. hell, nowhere is. But I'm a sight more hopeful, medium term, for Russia than I am for Turkey. I'm not at all hopeful for Turkey. I get the feeling Madrid may have got something of a message from the failure of Madrid 2020 and the Fuentes/Puerto debacle. The general reaction to the Horner win may also have concentrated minds, if we're lucky.
I'm not at all sure Turkey has.

And I am at least slightly pleased, I admit, that the 2020 OG vote seems, in some way, to have been influenced by distaste for Madrid and esp, Istanbul's spotty anti-doping record. (even though I know Tokyo's economic power is the main winning point).

 

[Cloxxki]

Interesting to me is that Russians get better bans, no sweetheart deals, and there are no objections from athletes. They pick up their training and sit out the ban. In painful cases, some at times were allowed to hang out with their team abroad during the ban. Didn't look too good. At least they have team spirit...

Is Turkey really being Conta-Spanish about this case, or Pech-German?

 

[martinvickers]

Interesting to me is that Russians get better bans, no sweetheart deals, and there are no objections from athletes. They pick up their training and sit out the ban. In painful cases, some at times were allowed to hang out with their team abroad during the ban. Didn't look too good. At least they have team spirit...

Is Turkey really being Conta-Spanish about this case, or Pech-German?

Let Isinbayeva fail a test, and watch what happens.

AS for Turkey - if I was being generous,I'd say there is a touch of Modahl-ism at work here - they know Capir is well resourced, and don't fancy a court case and financial ruin. Easier to let IAAF take that heat.

 

[manafana]

they winter olympics are looking dodge too no proper testing in russia as the labs in pockets of the government