Fri with DDD: drugs and lifetime bans

iPete

DonDaddyD wrote:

iPete wrote:

So if I took steroids down the gym for years, built myself up much quicker than clean then stopped and maintained my size without cheating, that wouldn't warrant a lifetime ban?

Yeah but that's what I've been saying and people have been shooting down with an uzi.

I would argue that you would be much bigger anyway because of the steriods. And even after stopping you'd still be bigger than you should have been had you trained completely clean.

if there is a long term benefit (after effect - increased strength, muscle mass, increased Vo2 etc) then yes life time ban.

If not then no.

Agree, was trying to back you up with an example...

shouldbeinbed

DonDaddyD wrote:

http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/drugs-and-rumours-mar-cyclings-year-28710

I read the article above and I got to thinking,

I hover around the 15 - 16 stone area, have done since I was in my early 20s. When I was a teenager I weighed around 13st (early teens) 14st (mid teens) and 15st (late teens).

Knowing this, if I took weight and fat reducing, muscle building drugs when I was a teen I would have built up a physical prowess to a level I probably wouldn't have done without the drugs. If I keep training with or without the drugs I would be able to maintain near to that drug fuelled level.

So, I become a successful athlete get caught (for doping), do my time and come back to the sport. I still prove myself to be competitive and successful in the given sport. Thing is without the drugs all those years ago I probably wouldn't have the physical abilities post ban so in a way I'm still benefitting from the drugs.

So with that in mind, and please discuss the accuracy of the above, should we hand lifetime bans for drugs cheats based on the principle that they would never have been that good even after they stopped taking the drugs?

hmmm, if you read Paul Kimmage Rough Ride it seems that cyclists are good enough to make the grade clean but to progress and thrive at that level need a little help. of course it could be that he's taken a position on doping to keep him on the journo gravy train for life but considering TdF to drag myself over 100 miles a day for a month and up the Tourmalet one day and Ventoux the next at 25mph, I'd be pumping in anything I could get my hands on.

cyberknight

Having nearly finished reading laurent fignon`s autobiography i have reached the point where he describes what EPO did to the sport, guys who could never blow him away were suddenly at the front churning 50 kph because they could.
laurent insists that he never took drugs apart from a couple of occasions and we are talking amphetamines as a one off and it was the change in the way the sport became due to EPO making everyone ultra athletes that made him hang his bike up.

So yes i think that a ban is called for, at least till your body has "normalized " its capacity.

UndercoverElephant

We used to have a retired racing greyhound who had, unfortunately, earlier in his life been given steroids. We got him at the age of five, and right up until his death he never looked like a normal, clean greyhound. He always had huge sheets of muscle over his shoulders and hocks which the non-raced greyhounds never had, just his normal, very short walks would keep him looking that way.

Look at Arnold Swarzenegger these days, I'm pretty sure he's been clean for many years now, but if I was to stand next to him, as a pretty big, but always natural guy, like he was when he was a kid, he'd dwarf me. The drugs can change your skeletal structure too.

squeeler

Getting to a high level of fitness / muscle in the first place is surely the hardest bit, impossible for some, while maintaining that level of fitness or muscle mass is surely easier?
Therefore if you've cheated to get up to a level that you may never have otherwise achieved then you are reaping the benefits of cheating for long after you stop taking the drugs?

snailracer

spen666 wrote:

...
No one doubts taking a drug can boost performance for a relatively short period.

There is nothing to say this is permanent. in fact everything I have read, including the reference to the very unreliable wikipedia suggests the effect is not permanent

"Based on the characteristics between doped and non-doped powerlifters, we conclude that a period of anabolic steroid usage is an advantage for a powerlifter in competition, even several years after they stop taking a doping drug.”— Dr. Anders Eriksson, Professor of Psychology at Florida State University.

tarquin_foxglove

I think top athletes are pushing their physical envelope to enable them to compete in peak condition.

If we take Bradley Wiggins as an example, it's been reported that when he isn't training he is resting, to the extent that he can't play in the garden with his kids.

So Cyclist A is training at 100% and performing accordingly. Cyclist A has now doped which allows him to increase the amount and intensity of his training and reduce his rest time and is gaining an increase in performance.

When he stops doping he will need to reduce his training load back to his normal max otherwise he will overtrain, get injured, ill etc.

Obviously there will be a period were he has stopped doping but is still having a residual performance benefit, but I can't see that that could be maintained for years by an endurance athlete without resorting to regular bouts of doping.