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Ah! I see! It's either pseudoscientific bollocks (with no obvious physiological basis and significant risks), or it's a cover for blood doping, then?
Soooo lemme get this straight, you're suggesting prem clubs are using this as an elaborate cover to enable their players to dope? Do you think footballers would benefit from blood doping so much that it would warrant all that palaver? I don't.
steve_b77 - Member
There was a story last week about now redundant Spurs manager AVB aiming to get two players 'match fit' by spinning their blood, essentially removing a bag of blood a while before a game and then letting them have it back just before the game.
Bit different, used as an injury recovery technique, it's harvesting plasma from the blood and imjecting it back in to speed recovery. Not doping in the sense of "more blood cells" to give an EPO effect.
Not for a moment suggesting there's no doping in football, just that they talk openly about spinning because it's legal - suspect there's lots of drug used, both recreational and performance enhancing, that get kept quiet. Was loud whispers about certain dominant Italian teams, some interesting growth hormone use (Messi) and all sorts of links to that Fuentes chap. Plenty of money in football.
A mate of mine used to compete at a good level in air gun shooting. It seems that there are drugs for that too. He had tales of people using beta blockers to reduce adrenaline production. It seems at least [url= http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=olympics-shooter-doping-propranolol ]one person has been stripped of Olympic medals[/url]
The same report suggests the stuff he used has an application in golf too.
There are pro sports that are clean?
EPO was first used by cross country skiers and biathletes I believe. I wonder if they have the level of testing that cycling does?
Soooo lemme get this straight, you're suggesting prem clubs are using this as an elaborate cover to enable their players to dope? Do you think footballers would benefit from blood doping so much that it would warrant all that palaver? I don't.
Well, one might suppose that blood spinning would require a lot of the same equipment you'd need to set up a blood doping programme. Given how lax drug testing is in football, you might as well just give them all EPO though.
Was loud whispers about certain dominant Italian teams, some interesting growth hormone use (Messi) and all sorts of links to that Fuentes chap.
This. I am fairly sure I saw a game on TV where Messi's use of HGH (which, being fair, may have a TUE) was being discussed by the commentating team completely matter-of-factly without any suggestion it might be a bit dubious. Can't imagine that in cycling.
I think there is an interesting question about ethical definitions in "doping".
1) From a high minded ethical point of view, you could argue that ingesting anything other than "normal" food and any medical treatment intended to reduce recovery time is "cheating".
2) Probably the "normal persons" opinion on boundaries would allow the use of protein supplements etc and normal medical treatments for pain relief and recovery from medium-long term injuries. But nothing more.
3) You can then move up to the definition used by the doping authorities, that having any banned treatment in your system is doping - whether it is detected or whether you are caught or not - is cheating.
4) Finally you get to the definition used by elite athletes in many/most sports. If you get caught you are a cheat. If you don't get caught you are a clean athlete. This is what leads to very wealthy elite athletes using Dr Ferrari / Puerta etc. They will happily pay experts to allow them to get the very maximum benefits from any and all supplements and drugs - so long as they won't test positive!!
This is why many elite athletes trully believe they are "innocent" when they get caught. They operate under definition 4 above, because they assume that all of their competitors are.
ratherbeintobago - MemberI am fairly sure I saw a game on TV where Messi's use of HGH (which, being fair, may have a TUE) was being discussed by the commentating team completely matter-of-factly without any suggestion it might be a bit dubious. Can't imagine that in cycling.
In his case, it was whn he was very youmg, 11 or 12 or so, and he was unusually small for his age, Barca put him on a programme of it. But still.
Tennis, where the sports governing body claimed that PED isn't an issue as it wouldn't provide any advantage in a game predominantly of skill. Comical really. And how many other sports do you find where a fair few of the highest ranked players are desperately calling for more testing?
Exactly.
Success at the top level of Tennis is all down to recovery from a 3-5hr match one day for another 3-5 hour match 24-48hrs later. And repeat for 40-45 weeks of the year!
Of course drugs will help.
Success at the top level of Tennis is all down to recovery from a 3-5hr match one day for another 3-5 hour match 24-48hrs later.
That man Fuentes [url= http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/cycling/9834122/Operation-Puerto-doctor-Eufemiano-Fuentes-treated-tennis-players-athletes-footballers-and-a-boxer.html ]gets everywhere.[/url]
May I ask clubber what the inside line was regarding one particular very successful rower of the last 25 or so years, who I am led to believe, is a diabetic and able to use insulin unhindered?
http://www.4dfoot.com/2013/02/09/doping-in-football-fifty-years-of-evidence/
Doping is just as much a problem in football as it is in tennis, athletics, swimming and cycling. It’s part of daily life. I’ve worked with footballers. They use Testosterone, EPO, Ephedrine and Stimulants.
~ Stefan Matschiner
As for me personally, I have a special method to remain at top level: the injection of my own blood. Several times a month, my friend Manfred Köhnlechner draws blood from my arm, and re-injects it in my butt. This causes an artificial inflammation As a result, the amount of red and white blood cells goes up.
~ Franz Beckenbauer
I can remember well, a season or five ago, just before the away game against Real Madrid, we received a white pill, and also something in a capsule. We called it Hagelslag [chocolate sprinkles] I have no idea what it was. You felt very strong and never were out of oxygen. The bad thing was that you lost all saliva in your mouth.
~ Barry Hulshoff
But the fact is, everyone knows about it, because in the Bundesliga it is common gossip. Especially before start of the season it’s a topic with new players. How much they swallowed at their former club, and what it preferred at their new club. Doping is just as much the norm in football as in other sports.
~ Paul Breitner
Early in my career, when I was 16 or 17, I received two to three injections at monthly intervals. They gave me more strength to train. I gained mass without compromising speed and agility.
~ Zico
When the 1998 World Cup started, some of the players started taking injections from Glenn’s favourite medic, a Frenchman called Dr Rougier. After some of the lads said they’d felt a real burst of energy, I decided to seize any help on offer. So many of the players decided to go for it before that Argentina match that there was a queue to see the doctor.
~ Gary Neville
etc, etc...
slackalice - Member
May I ask clubber what the inside line was regarding one particular very successful rower of the last 25 or so years, who I am led to believe, is a diabetic and able to use insulin unhindered?
Simple answer is nothing. Redgrave 's biggest asset wasn't his ability to pull (push!) hard though undoubtedly be could do that pretty well. It was his unrelenting attitude and drive. Once the GB team stopped being just him and Pinsent and the Searles I guess, he was rarely at the top of the erg results but in the boat... And that's a very large part of why he was in the crew at Sydney. He certainly wasn't the most individually physically capable by that point.
Not quite sure the point you're asking about diabetes. Suggesting that it could be a result of previous doping or that it allowed him to dope legally? Can't really say either way but I'm not sure that either really stack up with what I know.
The question re. Redgrave is that insulin is used in power sports for recovery.
It works like this: get back from a training session and consume a shed load of food... inject insulin and marvel as the hormone shuttles all those nutrients into the body's cells.... particularly carbohydrates into the muscles to replenish depleted glycogen stores.
I assume he needs a certificate for therapeutic use?.... but once he has that what's to stop him using/abusing his insulin as a training aid?
With exogenous insulin you can absorb nutrients at a rate that would be impossible with a natural/normal pancreas producing normal amounts of insulin.
I can't really comment beyond what I've said but I can say that his results weren't very good in the last couple of years so if he was trying to use insulin to cheat, it wasn't working very well. There was some discontent about him being in the top crew at the time.
Fair shout, thanks clubber. I wasn't trying to insinuate anything as I hold no opinion on the matter, it was however a comment someone made to me the other week that got me wondering how diabetic's deal with testing, allowable limits etc etc.
As said the more you look into other sports, there's always some mention of doping.
As an aside, a recent tweet about the U.S Postal team salaries
https://mobile.twitter.com/thebikeshow/status/413786159538790400/photo/1?screen_name=thebikeshow