MPFG wrote: » My point was about 'off the ball' and balanced coverage when it comes to drugs in sport...I thought Maradona was one of the best footballers ever but (mayeb because) he was excused alot becasue of his talent (hough he was not the only drug user in football) As for his 'recreational' drug use and no cheating behaviour here is an extract from a BBC report on Maradonna and how he was banned from football during his carrer for drug use and references his shady criminal links"Maradona played the best football of his career between joining Napoli and leading Argentina to World Cup triumph in 1986. He was feted as a god by the tifosi as he inspired Napoli to two titles and Uefa Cup success, and the adoration blinded him as he became embroiled in vice and corruption scandals. He became inextricably linked to Naples' own crime syndicates and it is said that in the seething southern Italian city, the Camorra and cocaine did for Maradona. After leading Argentina to the World Cup in 1986, the time-bomb ticked away under him. After a controversial Italia 90, a positive dope test in 1991 not only triggered a 15-month ban but hinted why at times during the World Cup, Maradona played not so much like a man possessed but like a man deranged. He returned and arrested his slide by getting his act together to play in the 1994 World Cup in the USA. Suspicions of flakiness were turned into confirmations of near lunacy by another positive test that saw him thrown out of the tournament, officially for use of ephedrine, probably just one ingredient in a witches' brew of drugs coursing through him."
ozzy jr wrote: » Having just looked at that youtube Late Late Show clip, I'd love to see Stephen Roche, David Walsh and Pat Kenny sit down again and have a 30 minute chat, now that the general public knows a lot more about doping, masking etc.
wonderfullife wrote: » it's interesting to note that the so-called expert doctor in the audience defending Roche got his facts fairly wrong, synthetic EPO was available in europe in 1987 contrary to his assertions. Also, looking back, Roches defences such as - "why would i take PED's during training?" are almost laughable. There's 1 very simple fact of life, evolution and sport - almost uniform across all sports - and that is athletes get stronger and faster each generation. As diets, coaching, facilities, equipment, training, nutrition, etc etc improve athletes get faster and better. Yet this years TdF Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome rode far slower with a much lower power output in watts to the tours of the Armstrong era. On a trend basis, almost all sports follow this fact: Tennis - Average Serve Speeds progressively faster over time. Now something like 45 of the top 50 fastest ever recorded serves are from the past decade. Golf - Average drive length increased decade by decade. Football - Average distance covered around the pitch increased progressively. This applies to mostly all sports. The difference between those sports and cycling is you rarely, if ever, come across a massive statistical imbalance. 1903 TdF - average speed 25.67 km/ph 2012 TdF - average speed 39.83 km/ph Yet in cycling the general trend towards faster, stronger, higher sees a huge imbalance in the 1987-2009 periods. Where the rate of improvement sky rocketed then plummeted. The average speed of any grand tour will be affected by the total distance and crucially the terrain, of course, but when you add together average speed and power output in watts, it's more than telling that the riders of the 2012 Tour have seemingly become the first sport to go backwards against the tide of evolution. Even despite all the advantages they have on the Armstrong generation and before, with better bikes, better training programmes, dieting, nutrition etc they don't come close to the power output or average speeds. It just baffles me that the likes of Roches winning tour can produce an average speed of 36.645 km/ph over a distance 800km longer than the 2012 tour and on a course that contained a time trial up Mont Ventoux, climbs up l'alpe D'Huez, the Galibier, Madeleine, plus at least 4 tough climbs in the Pyrenees, yet Wiggins and the rest of them can only produce 39 km/ph over easier courses and less distance with slightly worse power-to-weight ratios on better bikes. Either the cyclists these days are just pure muck or they are actually at least trying to race clean. Or of course the previous eras were doped to the eyeballs including some of our own cyclists :cool:
corny wrote: » You can't infer that tbh. It could easily be the case that a team could deliberately tap out a slower, more human, rhythm in order to avoid suspicion. If you control the pace for the majority of the race....
M three wrote: » That doesnt make sense. Then whats the point in doping if they're just going to restrict themselves to their "natural" pace?
M three wrote: » ^^ Good post. <snip>
ANDY Murray has called for more out-of-competition doping tests to be carried out in tennis.
In 2004, Dick Pound, at the time the president of the World Anti-Doping Agency, told the New York Times that records in track and field were no longer being broken because “there were a lot of doped-up performances out there.” If that’s the case, perhaps the state of the long jump isn’t that remarkable. Rather, it’s amazing that records are broken so frequently in other track events.
buffalo wrote: » Meanwhile... in other spots:http://www.independent.ie/sport/other-sports/murray-more-drug-testing-required-in-tennis-3277755.html
"The one thing I would say with a sport like cycling is it's purely physical, there's very little skill involved in the Tour de France. "It is the power, how many watts you're producing, whereas with tennis you can't learn the skill by taking a drug. "I think tennis at the top level has been pretty clean compared to most sports. But that isn't to say more can't be done to make 100 per cent sure there are no issues."
ednwireland wrote: »
wonderfullife wrote: » it's interesting to note that the so-called expert doctor in the audience defending Roche got his facts fairly wrong, synthetic EPO was available in europe in 1987 contrary to his assertions.
There's 1 very simple fact of life, evolution and sport - almost uniform across all sports - and that is athletes get stronger and faster each generation. As diets, coaching, facilities, equipment, training, nutrition, etc etc improve athletes get faster and better. Yet this years TdF Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome rode far slower with a much lower power output in watts to the tours of the Armstrong era.
On a trend basis, almost all sports follow this fact: Tennis - Average Serve Speeds progressively faster over time. Now something like 45 of the top 50 fastest ever recorded serves are from the past decade. Golf - Average drive length increased decade by decade. Football - Average distance covered around the pitch increased progressively.
The average speed of any grand tour will be affected by the total distance and crucially the terrain, of course, but when you add together average speed and power output in watts, it's more than telling that the riders of the 2012 Tour have seemingly become the first sport to go backwards against the tide of evolution. Even despite all the advantages they have on the Armstrong generation and before, with better bikes, better training programmes, dieting, nutrition etc they don't come close to the power output or average speeds.
Either the cyclists these days are just pure muck or they are actually at least trying to race clean. Or of course the previous eras were doped to the eyeballs including some of our own cyclists :cool:
Nwm2 wrote: » In terms of motor skills, absolutely true surely? Shut up legs and turn the pedals.
Wibbs wrote: » With the exception of football(though old stylee leather balls would slow down a game) the increases have a lot to do with technology as well as technique and training. Carbon fibre rackets/clubs will transfer the power of the player far better than wood.
Tombo2001 wrote: » I'd mention here Sonia O'Sullivan......I'd be fairly confident she was a clean athlete. One of the best this country has produced. The women who beat her in many of her key races, most notably the Sydney olympics when Sonia won silver, would be ones who have questions to answer.
Vladimir Kurtains wrote: » I'd like to put him on a bike and ask him to chase the peloton down some Pyrennean descent
wonderfullife wrote: » It's a combination of athleticism and ability to harness the equipment. In both sports. Ability to handle the bike and ability to control the racket to execute the shots you want.
mcgratheoin wrote: » Very true, however the major difference between a club level cyclist and a professional cyclist is almost all based on the pro having much higher levels of athleticism and physical abililty
mcgratheoin wrote: » Yep, Sonia's 8:24:61 in '94 should most likely have been a world record - the only times faster at that point were run over 2 days at that infamous Beijing meet in 1993. I wouldn't be throwing much in Szabo's direction to be fair to her. She was an outspoken critic of drug users in the sport - she threatened to boycott the 5000 in 2001 over Yegerova being allowed to run and she was sued by Szekely over calling her a "druggie".
Wibbs wrote: » Try cycling in a fast moving club level bunch, never mind a pro peloton and then get back to me. It takes a lot of practice, skill and balls. As Vladimir Kurtains notes, try going down a French alp doing 60-70 mph on tyres 20 mm across and not dying. Not easy at all.
Nwm2 wrote: » but let's not pretend that it is primarily a skill-based sport unlike others.
Lumen wrote: » Kelly & Harmon were talking about this during the Tour this year. Apparently there are a bunch of riders who have got to Pro Tour/World Tour/whatever it's called and been freaked about by how terrifying the experience is, particularly the bunch sprints. And that's starting from from lower level pro racing, not local club races. Sprinting aside, what really brings it home to me is seeing team cars being unable to keep up with the riders on a wet descent at 80kph or whatever. Have you tried cornering in the wet on any road, flat or downhill, at the same speed as a car or even motorbike on the limit? I have, and it ended badly.
mcgratheoin wrote: » but the original point here is that it's so close to the purely physical side of the sporting spectrum that PED have a comparitively greater influence than on some other sports.
