Doping git thread

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400bhp

Guru
There's a lot of TUEs floating around, aren't there? It's actually extraordinary how many pro cyclists have asthma when you think about it.

Maybe someone should be collecting data on this. Not just cycling but across the board. We're all guessing to some extent how prevalent asthma and other "respiratory problems" exist in some athletes. The first step would be to determine iof there's any statistical uptick in professional athletes above the normal population.

Data data data. All big business rely on this to enhance and build business. Why not professional sport? Probably because it's essentially being run by a ,oad of amateurs who couldn't run a succesful business.
 
Maybe someone should be collecting data on this. Not just cycling but across the board. We're all guessing to some extent how prevalent asthma and other "respiratory problems" exist in some athletes. The first step would be to determine iof there's any statistical uptick in professional athletes above the normal population.

Data data data. All big business rely on this to enhance and build business. Why not professional sport? Probably because it's essentially being run by a ,oad of amateurs who couldn't run a succesful business.


Asthma symptoms are common in high-level athletes - one study showed that 70% of British top level swimmers and around a third of Team Sky were registered asthmatics

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/apr/29/orica-green-simon-yates-positive-test-administrative-error

Which seems an awful lot but without knowing more, it's hard to draw a sensible conclusion.
 

400bhp

Guru
Asthma symptoms are common in high-level athletes - one study showed that 70% of British top level swimmers and around a third of Team Sky were registered asthmatics

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/apr/29/orica-green-simon-yates-positive-test-administrative-error

Which seems an awful lot but without knowing more, it's hard to draw a sensible conclusion.

I probably should have googled it, but let's just assume for now there is statistical bias. The next question is to find what the possible reasons are which may or may not lead to an unsavioury conclusion.
 
I probably should have googled it, but let's just assume for now there is statistical bias. The next question is to find what the possible reasons are which may or may not lead to an unsavioury conclusion.
THe link in the quote provides some fairly good explanations, which seem entirely plausible.
 

GrumpyGregry

Here for rides.
Doctor failed to apply for TUE apparently. Seems a bit of a big mistake to make if that's the case. Terbutaline doesn't really give enough of a performance kick to risk it. So hoping this can be cleared up.

Marginal gains is what it is all about. From a different sport but the theory works out the same way...

https://www.propublica.org/article/elite-runner-had-qualms-alberto-salazar-asthma-drug-performance

"Alberto set up an appointment in Portland, during allergy season, with a doctor who had seen many other runners. He had a specific protocol ... you would go to the local track and run around the track, work yourself up to having an asthma attack and then run down the street, up 12 flights of stairs to the office and they would be waiting to test you. So that's what I did and I failed the test, and the doctor prescribed Advair for during the racing season when pollen counts were the highest, and albuterol, which is a rescue inhaler."
-and-
"After I got the medication, he explained to me that this is going to be great for you, so many athletes once they got on this, did so much better than they'd ever done before. And he described the ways that could happen: there's a glucocorticosteroid in [Advair], and there's a possibility that some of that could get systemically into your body and give you an advantage, and you can legally take it because you have asthma ... He encouraged me to push to be on the highest dose of it year round, which was something different than what the doctor had said."

imo it is about time the whole TUE bs got dumped in the gutter. Too easy to game it. Race clean, or not at all.
 

GrumpyGregry

Here for rides.
There's a lot of TUEs floating around, aren't there? It's actually extraordinary how many pro cyclists have asthma when you think about it. It's a very high percentage; far higher than that in the rest of the population. This allows their doctors to issue them with prescriptions for broncho-dilators which of course eases their asthma.

Cynical, me?
See my post above. Laura is a straight up and down person.

It is amazing how many pro-athletes in all sporting disciplines have asthma and have TUE's for asthma drugs...
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
"Alberto set up an appointment in Portland, during allergy season, with a doctor who had seen many other runners. He had a specific protocol ... you would go to the local track and run around the track, work yourself up to having an asthma attack and then run down the street, up 12 flights of stairs to the office and they would be waiting to test you. So that's what I did and I failed the test, and the doctor prescribed Advair for during the racing season when pollen counts were the highest, and albuterol, which is a rescue inhaler."
To me, that says that if you suffer from asthma and run around in 'allergy season' then you will probably have an asthma attack, which sounds like a good reason to be on the meds! :okay:
 

Dogtrousers

Kilometre nibbler
To me, that says that if you suffer from asthma and run around in 'allergy season' then you will probably have an asthma attack, which sounds like a good reason to be on the meds! :okay:
A good reason to have the meds available, but the point of that particular article is ...

He [Salazar] encouraged me to push to be on the highest dose of it year round, which was something different than what the doctor had said.

There was this whole other level it seemed of how to use the medication, and it made me feel uncomfortable
 

GrumpyGregry

Here for rides.
To me, that says that if you suffer from asthma and run around in 'allergy season' then you will probably have an asthma attack, which sounds like a good reason to be on the meds! :okay:
to me that says almost anyone, including elite athletes at the peak of fitness, can work themselves up into a state, under particular circumstances, where they present the symptoms of an asthma attack. And if they then present said symptoms to a friendly medic they can get the meds, meds which will enhance their performance outside of those particular circumstances but it is ok because they will have a TUE and are a diagnosed asthmatic.

That doesn't mean they have chronic asthma that needs to be treated and controlled by drugs. Clearly Laura Fleshman decided she wasn't an asthmatic and that she was gaming the system.
 

GrumpyGregry

Here for rides.
btw though no part of me is an elite athlete, I am a chronic asthmatic. I don't take any meds to control it, and I don't carry a reliever. Why not? Because my asthma only presents under very specific circumstances, two of which are being over 15st 8lbs and not taking enough CV exercise and then there needs to be an environment trigger (temperature change seems to be one). Oddly my lungs coped fine with temperature changes of more than 35 degrees this winter because I'm running regularly and weigh a stone less than the threshold weight.
 
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