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Study suggests Tramadol enhances TT performance by ~ 5%

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I was a long time prescribed user due to back pain, up to 400mg per day over many years.
Eventually the performance gains dissapear but it's always a big appetite suppressant, it hugely increases motivation to train and aids sleep.
It's a real *** to get off though
 
Re:

warrior4life said:
I was a long time prescribed user due to back pain, up to 400mg per day over many years.
Eventually the performance gains dissapear but it's always a big appetite suppressant, it hugely increases motivation to train and aids sleep.
It's a real *** to get off though

Glad to hear you're off it. Did not know Tramadol is Boko Haram's drug of choice -
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-44306086
Another painkiller, Tramadol, is fuelling widespread addiction - and as the BBC's Stephanie Hegarty found out, it may even be fuelling insurgency in the north-east.
...
So why is it so prevalent in Nigeria? Firstly it is cheap - in Nigeria it's about $0.05 for 200mg as opposed to about $2.50 in the US, and secondly its ability to help people work. Across Africa, many people rely still on manual labour to get paid.

Mr Ayuba believes religion may have a part to play as well. Alcohol is forbidden in the majority Muslim communities of north-east Nigeria, but there is less of a taboo around prescription drugs.
 
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/lappartient-keen-to-end-giro-ditalia-and-tour-of-california-clash/
"Tramadol is a problem in cycling, we needed to do something about it," Lappartient said during the Road World Championships in Innsbruck in September. "Two-thirds of the tramadol detected in tests of athletes is found in cyclists and five per cent of cyclists tested show positive results for it.

"It’ll be banned under our rules," he told La Gazzetta dello Sport. "The rule will come into force not from January 1, but I think, from March, in time for Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico. There are medical, technical and legal aspects we have to examine carefully with our medical commission. We won’t apply the WADA anti-doping rules, it won’t be an anti-doping test, we’ll use our health rules.

"The test only needs the taking of a drop of blood from a finger. It will be done before or after a race. Whoever is over the threshold will be excluded from the race or disqualified from the results if the test is done afterwards."

Yeah, we'll see in March what happens ...
 
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/tramadol-ban-to-come-into-effect-on-march-1/
The UCI has confirmed that its proposed ban of the painkiller tramadol will come into effect on March 1.
...
The UCI confirmed that the tests would be carried out during competition, but not necessarily as part of the usual post-race anti-doping procedures. The test will be done by taking a small amount of blood from the rider’s fingertip, which will be sent off to a laboratory for analysis. Results will then be sent to the UCI’s medical director within four to five days.

There is no lower threshold for the amount of tramadol a rider can have in their system, so any amount will be considered a positive test.

Both riders and teams will be punished for any positive tests. For a first offence, a rider will be disqualified from the race they are competing in and will be given a CHF 5,000 fine. Those not registered with a UCI team will receive a CHF 1,000 fine.

A second offence will see a rider disqualified and handed a five-month suspension. Any further offences will result in a rider receiving a nine-month ban.

For teams, if two riders test positive within a 12-month period, they will be fined CHF 10,000. An additional offence within that same period will result in a team-wide ban of anywhere between one to 12 months.
 
I think Tramadol use was pretty low wasn't it? WADA said 4% of doping controls with evidence of Tramadol use, so given there's typically 8 doping controls in WT races, that equates to around 7 riders in a typical 176 rider peloton. I think the only difference is riders will be using heavier doses of Ibruprofen or just riding with pain now. Definitely not been less crashes that's for sure. This spring has had lots of casualties already. Maybe even more than last year!
 
samhocking said:
I think Tramadol use was pretty low wasn't it? WADA said 4% of doping controls with evidence of Tramadol use, so given there's typically 8 doping controls in WT races, that equates to around 7 riders in a typical 176 rider peloton. I think the only difference is riders will be using heavier doses of Ibruprofen or just riding with pain now. Definitely not been less crashes that's for sure. This spring has had lots of casualties already. Maybe even more than last year!

huge crash in BAsque Country today despite riders not being sleeping while riding on tramadol anymore ;)
 
Not sure if anyone has used tramadol as an an IV opposed to a tablet. I have for medical reasons and the pain relief in unbelievable. I'm unsure how someone could actually stay upright on a bike while using it, but if they did they'd feel nothing at all.

I guess your muscles still need the power in them, but you'd be able to push through pain barriers. 5% sounds quite reasonable from my experience anyway.

Keeping an eye on comparable TT times this year would be interesting, anecdotally anyway. I also assume the peleton would be able to replace this drug by now anyway
 
The Tramadol illegal trade carries on in Africa -
https://www.dw.com/en/opioids-in-africa-cheap-and-accessible/a-49352237
The office of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODOC) has called the current situation a "crisis situation." "It's a very serious situation," Matthew Nice said in an interview with DW. Nice manages the so-called OPIOIDS Project at UNODOC. There are no exact figures, he says, but he and his colleagues recently alerted the UN to the severity of the situation in Africa, which especially affects countries like Ghana, Nigeria, Mali, Burkina Faso and Togo. The drug that mostly comes into focus is the painkiller Tramadol. "There's large scale trafficking of unregulated, illicitly manufactured sub-standard Tramadol throughout the region," he says.

One of the few countries which has reliable data on the crisis is Egypt. A UN supported study together with Egypt's health ministry found that around 100,000 people in the north African country are addicted to opioids, with half of them using Tramadol. It also found that two-thirds of patients being treated for addiction in Egypt's state institutions are addicted to Tramadol.

For over 15 years, the UN has warned countries about the illegal, yet increasingly professional trade in pharmaceuticals. "The synthetic opioid problem, in terms of the amounts seized annually, is on the same scale as global heroin seizures," says Nice.
 

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