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Doping crossover

onm

Sep 2, 2009
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Right,

As we all know, 'doping' in sport divides opinion about 80/20; 80% thinking it is bad, and 20% not caring / thinking it is funny / thinking it is cool. Whatever.

I think it would be fair to say the same ratios exist when speaking about performance enhancing drugs in competitive cycling.

This is a fairly simple good vs. evil / 'cheating is bad mmmkay' situation, and can be dealt with in the minds of those who dwell on it fairly simply; if you take drugs which make you go faster in a bike race, it gives you an unfair advantage. There is a big long list of drugs and techniques which if you get caught doing, you get kicked out, etc. Simple.

But how about this...

Say if there was an athlete who came to 'Sport NOW' from 'Sport THEN'. In 'Sport THEN', they were not competitive, but took some performance enhancing drugs which at the time of consumption were not illegal, but have since been banned, would / should that effect anything that now goes on in 'Sport NOW'?
 
Are you trying to tell us you doped to get that 26.20 on Shiraishi? I might have to report you to Strava for punishment.
 
Right,

As we all know, 'doping' in sport divides opinion about 80/20; 80% thinking it is bad, and 20% not caring / thinking it is funny / thinking it is cool. Whatever.

I think it would be fair to say the same ratios exist when speaking about performance enhancing drugs in competitive cycling.

This is a fairly simple good vs. evil / 'cheating is bad mmmkay' situation, and can be dealt with in the minds of those who dwell on it fairly simply; if you take drugs which make you go faster in a bike race, it gives you an unfair advantage. There is a big long list of drugs and techniques which if you get caught doing, you get kicked out, etc. Simple.

But how about this...

Say if there was an athlete who came to 'Sport NOW' from 'Sport THEN'. In 'Sport THEN', they were not competitive, but took some performance enhancing drugs which at the time of consumption were not illegal, but have since been banned, would / should that effect anything that now goes on in 'Sport NOW'?
I reckon that every NOW and THEN, you have far too much time on your hands which leads to verbal (or in this case, typal) diarrhoea ;)
 
Is this another case of someone having to help you understand what this means in simple English?
 
That's a real tricky on as caffiene levels over a certain gravity was banned at one point.

But many of the drug back THEN were illegal and the drugs that were not, were not invented. I would be interested to know WHAT drugs you are refering to.

In regards to PED's this is why there is a call for "Life" bans as the effects and benifits stay with you forever through muscle memory and with some products genetic recoding.

At the end of the day the biggest concern is that dopers or athletes that have taken PED's are repeat offenders, the win at all cost attitude, the need to improve or beat others overides the moral compass of fair play and if you listen to many riders that ride clean and have done from the start the overwhelming cry is for dopers and ex dopers to stay well away.
 
That's a real tricky on as caffiene levels over a certain gravity was banned at one point.

Right, that is a whole other aspect to all this; where is the line drawn? One could argue that someone constantly spiking themselves with High5 ZeroEXTREME tablets on a ride (me) is doping, whereas someone who is only on water is more pure. I realise this takes us into the same territory as the cut-off point for Veganism, however, which is about as dry and cringe a discussion as one could hope to be engaged in.

But many of the drug back THEN were illegal and the drugs that were not, were not invented. I would be interested to know WHAT drugs you are refering to.

This is kind of a theoretical, so no one specific drug of note.

At the end of the day the biggest concern is that dopers or athletes that have taken PED's are repeat offenders, the win at all cost attitude, the need to improve or beat others overides the moral compass of fair play and if you listen to many riders that ride clean and have done from the start the overwhelming cry is for dopers and ex dopers to stay well away.

This is the most interesting part. I see the rationale behind it, but is this not the same kind of thinking that would prevent an ex-junkie from getting gainful employment, regardless of current status, education, and skill-set, merely for the fact that they previously got caught up in drugs?

I suppose another part of this, and actually kind of an answer to one of your questions that I avoided before; if, say a person was 'doping' in a certain sport with something that could not possibly have any benefit in another sport, would that have less of a detrimental effect on opinion in the new sport; example, if some alcoholic snooker player was in the habit of necking beta-blockers before a game, to get their hand ultra steady, should they be chastised for such activity if they then ditched snooker and decided to take up 100m sprinting, and did so clean?
 
Is there any chance substances used now will be banned in the future? As has happened in the past what does it take for a substance to become illegal? There must be painkillers and the like widely used that are allowed who draws the line and why?
 
Is there any chance substances used now will be banned in the future? As has happened in the past what does it take for a substance to become illegal? There must be painkillers and the like widely used that are allowed who draws the line and why?


Right, excellent point! And further to this, if said substances were banned, should all those people who took them when they were legal be blocked / condemned as dopers for the rest of their lives?
 
This is why the biological passport is such a good idea (If run properly) - lets say they ban caffiene again WADA give fair warning that the substance is now on the banned list. Athletes then take action to stop using it as a suppliment. they then continue with the passports update process and show that the levels of caffiene are not over the limits both in and out of competition.

Riders that then red flag receive the appropriate punishment...... it's very straight forward and clear cut.
 
Well, yeah, that is a good idea for sure, but what if a person was taking a certain substance when it was legal, but is now banned, and does not have one of these biological passports?
 
They should lose all their strava KOMs, but not their mates, well they might lose their jealous mates who didn't get in before the ban.
 
That is another angle to it all, isn't it. What do you think about performance enhancing drug use for people who have no intention of racing? Pretty much every body-builder is on something, going by the immense amount of posts on every forum related to the subject, and also the huge market for legality skirting pro-hormones, etc. Road biking has proven itself to be a hotbed for drug use, so I wonder how many amateurs are getting juiced up in order to smash the hell out of Strava?
 
Interesting to see this topic,

My wife was just telling me last night that if I want to build muscle in quicker fashion then I should take BCAA supplements to speed muscle generation, and I looked in to it wondering if this is "fair-play".

Going beyond the semantics of what each person defines as doping I believe for recreational/non-racing cyclists it becomes a matter of legality and morals, for instance if I went on a ride with new group and got left for dead and subsequently found out that the group was all doping then I would not ride with them again, and this is because I don't enjoy walking into a knife fight and finding out that everyone is packing guns, it's simply not fair to the dude not juiced-up, and I would not want to risk guilt by association and get in trouble with the law.

Taking caffeinated gels and whatnot and the vegetarian argument is something that I would scoff at if that was said to me, if you choose to have that dietary lifestyle then you made your bed, but I do not and as a non-racer it's totally fine, fair, and legal for me to pound High5 extreme until my left arm goes numb and I fall off my bike. My prerogative.

Study break over...
 
it's totally fine, fair, and legal for me to pound High5 extreme until my left arm goes numb and I fall off my bike. My prerogative.

No argument there. What if all of a sudden High5 ZeroEXTREME tablets were banned though. Should the fact that you took them when they were legal be counted against you in any way?
 
What is a performance enhancing drug, and who decides what is allowed and what isn't?

I take creatine and protein powder after heavy work outs. (Is creatine on the banned list?) Does that mean I'm cheating when I cane some poor hapless on Arakawa who trains half as much as me?

If I took something else, like anabolics, would it mean I was cheating when I caned the same poor hapless on Arakawa who trains half as much as me, and would it matter?

Basically until you enter some kind of formal race (With very specific rules) it doesn't really matter what you do, because you aren't cheating anyone. No one has signed up to prove themselves against you, (Unless you count the random wheel suckers that lurk around every corner)
 
No argument there. What if all of a sudden High5 ZeroEXTREME tablets were banned though. Should the fact that you took them when they were legal be counted against you in any way?
No.

I can't predict the future, and being non-racer it's not something I or people like me should care too much about, but EPO, testosterone, and the like are different story and one should use their common sense if handed a needle before a big ride ;)
 
Is this another case of someone having to help you understand what this means in simple English?
Oh yes please. Thanks for offering. And please don't use any words over two sillyballs please. Much obliged ;)
 
What is a performance enhancing drug, and who decides what is allowed and what isn't?

I take creatine and protein powder after heavy work outs. (Is creatine on the banned list?) Does that mean I'm cheating when I cane some poor hapless on Arakawa who trains half as much as me?

If I took something else, like anabolics, would it mean I was cheating when I caned the same poor hapless on Arakawa who trains half as much as me, and would it matter?

Basically until you enter some kind of formal race (With very specific rules) it doesn't really matter what you do, because you aren't cheating anyone. No one has signed up to prove themselves against you, (Unless you count the random wheel suckers that lurk around every corner)

Yeah, and you take that Creatine to enhance your performance, right? But you can buy it in shops, and as far as I am aware it is not on any banned list. So it is OK for everyone, including all the professionals to take this, even though it is essentially giving you an artificial edge...

No.

I can't predict the future, and being non-racer it's not something I or people like me should care too much about, but EPO, testosterone, and the like are different story and one should use their common sense if handed a needle before a big ride ;)


Aside from the legal side of EPO and Testosterone (only illegal without a prescription, and used in a bid to unfairly compete at a professional level, right?), I don't see why those two in particular get all the negative attention, when there is a whole world of legals out there which people take to give themselves the edge...
 
Substances that are banned in professional competition used by amateurs who have no intention of fighting for the top spots is fair game as far as I am concerned.

I've seen discussions about having two separate fields of athletes; those who dope and those who don't. Never the twain shall meet and the paying spectator decides who to throw their money at. I'd love it but a line is drawn somewhere along the idea of looking out for the participants health and well being.

There are a myriad unregulated synthesized drugs out there that the highest bidder can have and use until it is discovered and banned. I think retroactive banning of athletes would need to show some sort of skulduggery at play, for instance actively hiding it and using it secretively.
 
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