Japan has produced the most marathon winners outside of any African country. Are their athletes clean though? If they're clean, how good would they be if they doped?
Japan has produced the most marathon winners outside of any African country. Are their athletes clean though? If they're clean, how good would they be if they doped?
We just need to use conditional probabilities. Let C denote the event that a given Japanese runner is clean. Let G denote the event that that runner is really good. We know that the conditional probability that someone is really good given they are clean, P(G|C), is 0. We need to find using Bayes rule P(C|G), the probability the runner is clean given they are good, as follows:
P(C|G) = P(C and G) / P(G)
But we know that P(C and G) is 0, so P(C|G) is 0
Thus, if your starting premise is that Japanese runners are really good, the answer to your latter question is they are already operating at their peak. In case this explanation doesn’t compute for you, I can make it significantly more elaborate and belabored.
Of all countries, Japan probably has the fewest dopers. Why? Their culture.
What about their culture says you can't take drugs in sports?
Their culture is strictly hierarchical, seniority-based, first and foremost. To be someone in Japan, after the basic "be Japanese" requirement, you have to have been at your job for a while and earned status.
Seems to me a top Japanese elite would be precisely where they could dope with impunity, with the system covering for them.
Two things: the Japanese highly value the concept of honor. You are feted for working very hard and doing things the correct way. This is very ingrained in the Japanese mindset.
The Japanese also have a national inferiority complex. They see Americans and Europeans as advantaged both physically and intellectually. To successfully compete, they assume that they must do far more work and suffer far more to overcome their assumed disadvantages.
Combining both things together would dissuade the vast majority from doping. I imagine that there are some that have used PEDs but, getting caught would be a huge deal and you would become a national pariah. Over here, very few people give two spits about runners that cheat. Less than 1% of the population have heard of Shelby Houlihan so her transgressions are a non-story. If a highly ranked Japanese marathoner or ekiden champ got popped, it would be a national scandal. Multiple people (coach, physio, the marketing guy that oversees the corporate team, etc.) would lose jobs and face, his family would disavow him, and the athlete would become persona non grata for their remaining days.
Two things: the Japanese highly value the concept of honor. You are feted for working very hard and doing things the correct way. This is very ingrained in the Japanese mindset.
The Japanese also have a national inferiority complex. They see Americans and Europeans as advantaged both physically and intellectually. To successfully compete, they assume that they must do far more work and suffer far more to overcome their assumed disadvantages.
Combining both things together would dissuade the vast majority from doping. I imagine that there are some that have used PEDs but, getting caught would be a huge deal and you would become a national pariah. Over here, very few people give two spits about runners that cheat. Less than 1% of the population have heard of Shelby Houlihan so her transgressions are a non-story. If a highly ranked Japanese marathoner or ekiden champ got popped, it would be a national scandal. Multiple people (coach, physio, the marketing guy that oversees the corporate team, etc.) would lose jobs and face, his family would disavow him, and the athlete would become persona non grata for their remaining days.
But this doesn't address the hierarchy issue. Yes it's a scandal to get caught, but I don't believe people with enough status are necessarily at any risk of that. Japan is a feudal nation at heart, the only real rule is what the emperor, or your shogun or daimyo says, and so forth down the pyramid of authority. Social morals are an accessory to that power structure.
So if an elite like, say, Kawauchi is so legendary that they are like a high-ranking samurai, who can catch them but someone who ranks even higher? Noone, I suspect.
That's not just for Japan of course. I have no doubt there are protected elites all around the world, not only by national feds but by WA itself.
Japan has produced the most marathon winners outside of any African country. Are their athletes clean though? If they're clean, how good would they be if they doped?
The questioned is answered by another: is the sport clean?
According to the Jamaican whistleblower, Renee Ann Shirley, doping is present at the top of every sport and in all countries.
Of all countries, Japan probably has the fewest dopers. Why? Their culture.
What about their culture says you can't take drugs in sports?
Their culture is strictly hierarchical, seniority-based, first and foremost. To be someone in Japan, after the basic "be Japanese" requirement, you have to have been at your job for a while and earned status.
Seems to me a top Japanese elite would be precisely where they could dope with impunity, with the system covering for them.
As a long-time observer on LetsRun, it never ceases to amaze me how much people are willing to fetishize other cultures and completely misunderstand them. You’re going to get a lot of downvotes here because people desperately want to believe that someone who works hard and smiles, generally is pleasant and correct in manner and bearing, well surely they did it the right way. Therefore, if I imitate them, I will also be able to achieve my best as well.
In my life, I saw this initially with Ma’s Army, then East Africans, and many other runners as well. Regina Jacobs and Eddy Hellebuyck had a large number of defenders.
The kind of provincial and naive thinking that goes on here prevents many posters from confronting the fact that there are a large number of competitors that have a realistic and pragmatic view towards doping. The sad thing is that only luck and ‘gotcha’ OOC testing allows us to catch a small number of the bad actors.
As a side note - for the people who think we should just give up on doping, look at the excesses and tragedy in the GDR sports machine and keep in mind that a lot of competitors would be doped by state-sponsored programs and would have no control or knowledge of what they are on.
Two things: the Japanese highly value the concept of honor. You are feted for working very hard and doing things the correct way. This is very ingrained in the Japanese mindset.
The Japanese also have a national inferiority complex. They see Americans and Europeans as advantaged both physically and intellectually. To successfully compete, they assume that they must do far more work and suffer far more to overcome their assumed disadvantages.
Combining both things together would dissuade the vast majority from doping. I imagine that there are some that have used PEDs but, getting caught would be a huge deal and you would become a national pariah. Over here, very few people give two spits about runners that cheat. Less than 1% of the population have heard of Shelby Houlihan so her transgressions are a non-story. If a highly ranked Japanese marathoner or ekiden champ got popped, it would be a national scandal. Multiple people (coach, physio, the marketing guy that oversees the corporate team, etc.) would lose jobs and face, his family would disavow him, and the athlete would become persona non grata for their remaining days.
"highly value the concept of honor"- NOPE!
Japanese business practices of lately have seen many high profile business scandals.
Japan has produced the most marathon winners outside of any African country. Are their athletes clean though? If they're clean, how good would they be if they doped?
Do people who ask "are they clean" questions really expecting a definitive answer? I don't know if they're clean or not but there is nothing that makes me believe otherwise. But that's just a belief.
Has there been many or any Japanese marathoners that have been popped? If there haven't been any or many, then that's pretty remarkable, and admirable.
Most Japanese marathoners don't train at altitude, right? They just do heavy milage?
As to whether they're clean or not, I would like to believe they are, and do believe they are.
Also, as was said, if they are doping, you would think they would be beating the Africans. And winning Berlin and Boston every year, and New York.
Since they aren't doing that, I would assume they aren't doping. Or doping doesn't work. Or everyone is doping and the Africans are still beating everyone anyway.
The questioned is answered by another: is the sport clean?
According to the Jamaican whistleblower, Renee Ann Shirley, doping is present at the top of every sport and in all countries.
Do you have a source for this? 10 min google searches don't pop anything up for Shirley, and the quote you posted previous related to this doesn't come up with any search results except your post. I'd like to believe you on this, but your bias is so overwhelming, that it's way too easy to dismiss.