Is the sport cleaner than ever?

This year the men's shot put record that was about 30 years old was broken, the men's 400M hurdles was beaten twice and the second time the record was taken to Steve Austin/Usain Bolt land, the women's 400m hurdles record was beaten in a similar Bionic Woman way and another record from the 90's was beaten in the women's triple jump.

Unless it's one of the great coincidences of all time then something is up.

So you are saying the authors didn’t know it was non-sense, but just speculated that hasty responses and mechanistic responses could lead to something they described as a “serious problem” and “potentially significant overestimate”.

Thanks for the important distinction.

Keep in mind, besides the survey, these response times were the only thing that the study actually measured, so they likely speculated this beforehand and included it in the study protocol.

As for the rest, we’ve been through this 100x - so I’ll try to be brief.

I don’t ignore any of your “actual statements” from the paper, but interpret all of them rather differently than you.

As explained in the paper, and in much more detail in the supplements the authors wrote, in their own words, and published with the paper, they performed the deletion exercise, then make further “conservative assumptions” to arrive at their lower bound estimate.

It is this lower bound (which varies from 29% to 31.4%), that they suggest is unlikely to be an over-estimate, because after the deletion, and conservative assumptions, they have addressed all of the positive biases they identified, and there are only negative biases left.

You can watch this series of steps play out in that order in the Appendix in Section 4.

Here is a direct quote from the paper, which proves me right — you will find it in a box called “Key Points” just after the abstract you keep misinterpreting:

But as I have said earlier, what the UQM authors write and believe and suggest matters very little when the protocol they used can lead to “inflated” estimates, as described in the 2012 paper.

Armstronglivs wrote:

This thread has become appropriated by those think academic discourse can answer the question of whether running is cleaner when no study has been conducted to answer that question - and nor can it. The reason is glaringly obvious. Doping is a black market. It cannot be measured because none of its participants can be identified outside the very few who are caught committing a violation. The closest we have come to an indication of the extent of doping (in championship T and F) is the confidential athlete surveys, argued endlessly on these threads, that the doping apologists seek to minimize or discredit.

…

In other words, it is mostly mythology and religion, and those with the strongest faith must be the most right.

Down with the IDMC wrote:

This year the men's shot put record that was about 30 years old was broken, the men's 400M hurdles was beaten twice and the second time the record was taken to Steve Austin/Usain Bolt land, the women's 400m hurdles record was beaten in a similar Bionic Woman way and another record from the 90's was beaten in the women's triple jump.

Unless it's one of the great coincidences of all time then something is up.

Are you suggesting that drugs didn’t work for 30 years, but now they do?

Armstronglivs wrote:

This thread has become appropriated by those think academic...

A serious question for you to think.

Your almost only input into the doping-discussion are either (in your mind) snarky one-liners with no real added value into the discussion or you reciting lengthy and sophorific credos about how you have the secret knowledge about the doping-reality and history told you by the Angel Gibriil. Because you possess this gnosis and it is eternally true, even discussion about the source material (material, which isn't even needed, because you know the truth) means having inner doubts about your credo by needing a confirmation of what Gibriil told you which is equivalent of a Bid'ah - type heresy.

Honestly, there shouldn't be a shortage of activities even in the COVID-19 world, therefore I don't see the point of someone spending the scarce time in a discussion forum if he has zero interest in discussing/debating/debunking the source material or even zero motives into finding new material to back up his claims.

I actually agree on with casual obsever on surprisingly many items of which one is his observation that I don't spend that much time here anymore of which my borderline obsession with the source material isn't one of them.

rekrunner wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

This thread has become appropriated by those think academic discourse can answer the question of whether running is cleaner when no study has been conducted to answer that question - and nor can it. The reason is glaringly obvious. Doping is a black market. It cannot be measured because none of its participants can be identified outside the very few who are caught committing a violation. The closest we have come to an indication of the extent of doping (in championship T and F) is the confidential athlete surveys, argued endlessly on these threads, that the doping apologists seek to minimize or discredit.

…

In other words, it is mostly mythology and religion, and those with the strongest faith must be the most right.

The mythology and religion is with those who think the academic studies provide the answers to a question that can't be decided in a laboratory.

Armstronglivs wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

In other words, it is mostly mythology and religion, and those with the strongest faith must be the most right.

The mythology and religion is with those who think the academic studies provide the answers to a question that can't be decided in a laboratory.

As I said, there is no data, so we are just exchanging opinions.

All these things that you say happened, are happening now, and happened before WADA was formed.

We have seen evidence that anti-doping acts as a deterrent, even when the guilty are not caught.

This helps form my opinion.

The human nature you describe is just your interpretation of human nature — largely a reflection of you, and not necessarily humans in general.

I would say you ignore that it is the nature of most athletes to compete cleanly, so they can take personal pride in their achievements, and the human nature you describe is in the minority.

My point was that detailed debate of the academic studies will not answer the question posed by the thread, of whether the sport is cleaner today. No study addresses that question and nor can it. Doping is an illicit activity whose subjects are not available for laboratory or case-study analysis. Or even counting.

The question posed by the thread is best answered by an understanding of what motivates athletes to achieve - a point no one addresses and yet is crucial to the question -coupled with the opportunity athletes have to enhance the possibility of that success without likely penalty. Allied to this is that it is known that enormous amounts of money are spent on the doping black market. The sport cannot be cleaner today.

So what exactly are you debating here amongst yourselves?

rekrunner wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

The mythology and religion is with those who think the academic studies provide the answers to a question that can't be decided in a laboratory.

As I said, there is no data, so we are just exchanging opinions.

All these things that you say happened, are happening now, and happened before WADA was formed.

We have seen evidence that anti-doping acts as a deterrent, even when the guilty are not caught.

This helps form my opinion.

The human nature you describe is just your interpretation of human nature — largely a reflection of you, and not necessarily humans in general.

I would say you ignore that it is the nature of most athletes to compete cleanly, so they can take personal pride in their achievements, and the human nature you describe is in the minority.

In most instances I would say that is an utterly naive view of human nature but in yours it rises to the level of delusion. Ironically, your determination in believing athletes are mostly clean is the same character trait that drives many athletes to dope. And we know many do. That horse has long bolted.

As for your point that antidoping acts as a deterrent - that is more in hope than belief, because it presupposes antidoping is effective. It mostly isn't. It is very hard for an athlete to be caught. I would suggest that 10.54 at Haywards Field has just shown that again, when a sprinter today has run faster than the best non likely wind-assisted time by an athlete that every informed view agrees was doping.

rekrunner wrote:

Down with the IDMC wrote:

This year the men's shot put record that was about 30 years old was broken, the men's 400M hurdles was beaten twice and the second time the record was taken to Steve Austin/Usain Bolt land, the women's 400m hurdles record was beaten in a similar Bionic Woman way and another record from the 90's was beaten in the women's triple jump.

Unless it's one of the great coincidences of all time then something is up.

Are you suggesting that drugs didn’t work for 30 years, but now they do?

No, he isn't. That is a stupid but predictable inference. But we are now seeing performances that match or exceed those in the past when doping controls were scarcely existent in the sport. It is a significant coincidence that these latter-day performances have occurred during the pandemic, when OC testing has been reduced. Athletes are finding new ways to dope and get away with it.

props to anyone who tries to argue with armstronglivs. you've got better luck convincing him to admit the sky is red than the possibility that anything he spews is less than the stone-cold, irrefutable truth

Armstronglivs wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

Are you suggesting that drugs didn’t work for 30 years, but now they do?

No, he isn't. That is a stupid but predictable inference. But we are now seeing performances that match or exceed those in the past when doping controls were scarcely existent in the sport. It is a significant coincidence that these latter-day performances have occurred during the pandemic, when OC testing has been reduced. Athletes are finding new ways to dope and get away with it.

So it’s wrong because drugs aren’t working now either?

Maybe we are seeing what can happen when athletes are not over-raced, combined with new shoes and new tracks and new lights. Pandemic means regular competitions have been cancelled or reduced, so athletes are fresher and not injured.

As you say, doping exists today and has always existed.

boring wrote:

props to anyone who tries to argue with armstronglivs. you've got better luck convincing him to admit the sky is red than the possibility that anything he spews is less than the stone-cold, irrefutable truth

Proving the sky is red is too easy. See this 1982 documentary on the phenomenon:

Armstronglivs wrote:

In most instances I would say that is an utterly naive view of human nature but in yours it rises to the level of delusion. Ironically, your determination in believing athletes are mostly clean is the same character trait that drives many athletes to dope. And we know many do. That horse has long bolted.

As for your point that antidoping acts as a deterrent - that is more in hope than belief, because it presupposes antidoping is effective. It mostly isn't. It is very hard for an athlete to be caught. I would suggest that 10.54 at Haywards Field has just shown that again, when a sprinter today has run faster than the best non likely wind-assisted time by an athlete that every informed view agrees was doping.

You may not be the best person to speak about who is deluded.

We know many dope, and our best (or worst) estimates suggest many more do not.

My hope and belief is supported by data and academic papers.

They did not think it was non-sense. That was simply one of their speculations ("sensitivity analyses"), which - when ignoring all the other potential problems - led to your preferred 31% of dopers. And yes, the IAAF PR focuses on the "at least 31%" for obvious reasons.

Another one of their speculations ("sensitivity analyses") was that some dopers didn't admit to their doping, which - when ignoring all the other potential problems - led to 63% of dopers:

Of course you prefer to ignore that analysis. Like you ignore all the other ones that leads to values above 43.6%.

If I - or anyone else here - would be as extreme as you but on the other side, they would insist and insist and insist that the 63% is the correct value after the "necessary correction". Seriously...

Finally, when considering everything, i.e. all "sensitivity analyses", they concluded that the 43.6% was not an underestimation. I really do not understand what's so difficult to grasp there:

That's pretty much the opposite of 43.6% being "non-sensical", even you can't deny that. Obviously a bit on the low side, ok, but "non-sensical"? Hahaha.

The sport is not clean. When we can go a decade without a single failed test then I will say the sport is clean.

rekrunner wrote:

We know many dope, and our best (or worst) estimates suggest many more do not.

LOL, again, no. We know over 40% dope, and that might very well be over 50%, see above.

rekrunner wrote:

But as I have said earlier, what the UQM authors write and believe and suggest matters very little when the protocol they used can lead to “inflated” estimates, as described in the 2012 paper.

Here are several more problems with your argument, that your preferred 2013 paper (published online in 2012) about one survey on 203 hobby athletes and 297 amateurs and 13 semi-pros somehow disproves the numbers of the 2018 paper (published online in 2017) on world championship (and Pan-Arab) athletes by discounting the method:

1) The paper is outdated by 5 years (2013 vs 2018).

2) The journal is vastly outclassed (IF 2.819 vs 8.551).

3) The main author is vastly outclassed (Petróczi from Kingston University, h index 42, 6244 citations vs Pope from Harvard, h index 130, 76282 citations).

4) The collaboration is vastly outclassed (Kingston University + Eötvös Loránd University vs University of Tübingen + McLean Hospital + Harvard Medical School + Swansea University + Kingston University + The University of Sheffield + Molde University College + University of Northern Colorado + Colorado School of Public Health + University Mainz).

5) All scientists quoted here a few pages readily accepted the 43.6% dopers from the 2018 paper. (Ha! “non-sensical”, you wish!)

6) The method used in the 2018 paper was actually praised here in another 2018 paper:

(That scientist also uses the 43.6%, as expected. Ha! “non-sensical”, you wish!)

boring wrote:

props to anyone who tries to argue with armstronglivs. you've got better luck convincing him to admit the sky is red than the possibility that anything he spews is less than the stone-cold, irrefutable truth

So what's your proof that the sport is cleaner today? Or is that an argument you are similarly not equipped to make.