Again, I'm asking for the basis for the claim, and a commonly held belief that "EPO is the most powerful endurance drug ever created".Without any observable effect, it is not different than religion.I'm not so much making any case, as observing the existing case has some odd patterns, unlike any other sport, and raises some unanswered questions.If the claim is true, we should be able to see the powerful effects in race times. "TLW" seems to agree.If we don't in America, it doesn't matter if Americans did not take EPO, took EPO wrongly, blood-doped before EPO, or that EPO was just ineffective -- American performances are not part of that basis, regardless the reason, because we do not observe a radical drop in national performances. Simarly for Europe, Australia, and all the other Western nations.Part of the basis is that, worldwide, we did see an amazing drop in many times, in the 90's, thanks to a handful of athletes El Guerrouj, Komen, Geb, Tergat, etc. (Notice that they are all African).But how do we reliably connect these amazing '90s performances to EPO, and not some other effect unique to this narrow population?Another part of the basis is the coincidental timing -- the '90s is the height of the unchecked EPO era. Just look at cycling in the '90s.But why is the observed effect limited to East and North Africans? That's the complete opposite of cycling.Is it European trainers? But Europe also had European trainers.Is it fear of testing? There was no test in the '90s, and the cyclists of the same era were not afraid.When we look at the track athletes of the 90's, how can we separate "EPO effect" versus "inherent African talent (110 pound athletes born/raised/trained at altitude)"? "deanouk" just told us the effect was "obvious", he doesn't see how anyone cannot see it, and happening "all over".I'm not the only one who thinks we should be able to observe the effects outside of Africa, unless "deanouk" meant "all over Afica".But what happens when we look outside East Africa, for the same evidence of the powerful effect of EPO and associated drops in times.We do we see some North African examples (Algeria, Morocco).Why don't we find this pattern in North, Central, South America, Europe, Russia, Australia, and New Zealand, for a period spanning three decades, much of which had no test for EPO?This looks like a highly unusual pattern -- the complete opposite of cycling, where most all of these nations were doping, thanks to universal availability of EPO combined with the complete lack of testing (with the notable absence of Africa).It's not fear of testing in the '90s -- as no test existed for EPO in running. There wasn't even a hematocrit check and a no-start rule.You proposed that Americans were already blood-doping, so the effect of the most powerful endurance drug ever created would be lost in the noise.Interesting theory, but one which undermines the "most powerful" attribute of EPO.Compare this again to cycling, which saw universal, game changing performance increases in the mid-90's.How do explain the near universal lack of effect outside of Africa, for three decades?How do you explain the opposite patterns to cycling of the same era?How is it that for 3 decades, only East Africans, some North Africans, some Spaniards, maybe the Chinese women, and Paula Radcliffe were the only ones able to figure out something that only took cyclists one year?Ooh, what about Cathal Lombard?He was a C-Level performer with a weak mind and a weak body. After taking EPO, and BTW, changing his coach, and radically changing his training, he overcame his weak mind, and strengthened his body, to become a B-Level performer, that could compete with pre-EPO records.How can we extrapolate the individual experience of Cathal Lombard to an A-Level runner with a strong mind and strong body? Is he the general rule, or an exception?What about the BBC reporter, and the French scientist, doping themselves, and evading blood-passport controls?Weak bodies, not professionally trained to their potential. Short term, non-blinded experiment. Actual running performance not measured.One blood test does not build a passport profile.What about other EPO studies proving increase in power and endurance?Short term non-blinded studies, on amateur subjects not professionally trained to their potential. Studies are often cycling to exhaustion, not running.What about Hajo Seppelt's findings in Kenya?Proved it is possible to pose as an agent, and find a doctor and a pharmacist willing to take his money. He found non-elite athletes taking EPO trying to become elite. Demonstrating a possible scenario is far from conclusively finding the cause of decades long worldwide domination unparalleled in any other sport.
HRE wrote:
How can you make a case for the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of anything when you can't tell whether or not someone is using the thing? Or if they're using the thing correctly or not? Or if they're using the thing in combination with other things or by itself?
I have heard stories of guys using EPO and talked about how well it worked and someone here mentions Cathal Lombard. It is VERY hard to look at his improvements and not think that EPO can be pretty stinking effective. And there are the Kenyans...