I remember back in the day, watching a local kid doing well in local running races, on the local cable access channel. A black kid from Toronto. He was fast, and kept getting faster. I was watching him as a 14-15 year old. Solidly built kid, but fast. Over time he got bigger and faster. His coach went on about all the training he did, how focussed he was and so on.

I took particular interest in his career since he was local. Ben, Ben something. Yeah, that's right, Ben Johnson! I still vividly remember hearing about him getting busted in Seoul. I couldn't believe it. He hadn't got big and fast, overnight like a typical steroid user, he'd done it gradually. I couldn't believe it, but it was true.

Now, after Ben, and Lance, I don't believe anyone fast is clean. I just assume they haven't gotten caught yet. The recent retesting of samples that passed previously, has unfortunately, shown me to be justified.

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

I used to be with you. I used the innocent until proven guilty line with Lance. There have been so many fast/strong people that have professed innocence, until they get busted, and even after that I no longer fall for their lines. I think many top athletes are juiced. I don't think it's possible these days, for a clean athlete eating the right foods, doing the right training etc, to beat a juiced athlete. The juiced guys are doing all the same stuff as the clean guy and just adding the juice like icing on the cake. No way a clean guy can win.

My disillusionment has recently trumped my faith in humanity, and that certainly hasn't made my life better. :-(

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Go dig those rosy glasses out of the closet, drink some Kool Aid (tm), and enjoy the show! Don't forget to buy Geico insurance, ask your doctor about Nexium, and have a cool refreshing, Coors Light...

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Jim Jones Kool Aid?

Funny you should mention Kool Aid. I often have to explain myself when I tell young employees to "Never drink the company Kool Aid" :-)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

If any swimmer were going to come up positive, it would be Phelps, yet he has been tested for about 16 years now and he has had all clean results. He may have been an irresponsible drinker in the past, and taken a few bong hits, but as far as we know he is clean from the doping standpoint. Same goes for Lochte over past 12-14 yrs, and Ledecky over past 4 yrs. Sure, maybe Phelps and his coach Bob Bowman are running a very clandestine doping operation, but that does not appear to be the case.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Stupid kids... My manager is 15 years younger than I am, occasionally I'll mention something and I'll get a "deer in the headlights" expression from her...

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

I hope you are right. This is one time I'd love to be wrong.

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

You're preaching to the choir brother. Been there done that. Now I have a boss the same age a me. Saves tons of time having to explain stuff :-)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Oh, there are a few others who I have my suspicions of, but just that, so I'll leave that there...

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

IIRC, you are a former professional alpine ski racer. Did you ever think your fellow competitors were doping, and/or were you ever offered any dope, maybe steroids to build bigger, stronger thigh muscles??? Or amphetamines to make you hyper-alert???

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Yup, I was a pro skier, and that was even in the 70's. I was a freestyler (not a racer) then instructor and coach.

Back then, doping was smoking weed. Like most people back then particularly freestyle skiers, I doped. In fact it was a contributor to my less than stellar career, that switched me from competing to teaching. It was definitely not a performance enhancing drug, that is for sure.

Amphetamines were available, but I never partook. I saw what it did to others and figured there was no way I could ski on that stuff, let alone compete. I was never offered any (PED) drugs by coaches, but did share a joint with one several years later.

I doped for fun. I never even conceived of doing any kind of drugs to perform better. Hell, I didn't even like taking pain killers when I was injured. The only exception was when I blew my clavicle into a thousand pieces in a ski accident. I rolled over one night, almost passed out from the pain so took some Tylenol 3.

I've broken my back twice (once learning how to flip on skis) and my neck once. I was in pain for sure, but simply sat still for as much as I could for 6-12 weeks. I didn't even take a normal Tylenol for those (shoulda gone to the doctors and got pills in hindsight, or even an op to fix them as they cause considerable grief for me now. Crushed vertebrae ain't much fun when you're old).

Now the only drug I do these days is Bourbon (I make my own, it's legal here in New Zealand). The only affect is that it makes me really funny, and an awesome dancer :-)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Same thing could be said about Lance. As said in a previous post it is not believable when a "clean" athlete busts juiced athletes.

"And, already knowing that the majority of three generations of athletes were conveniently chemically-aided outside their own rules..."

Not saying anything 'bout current athletes unless maybe they have already been at the top of world class level for the last few generations and benefitted previously outside the rules but back then undetectable.

So let me get this straight: basically your view is that ALL medal winners at the Oly are doping???

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

They are more the norm than the exceptions. Even in disciplines like archery they take anti Parkinson and blood pressure reducers to have better a steadier hand.

Think about it for a second. You have devoted your life to this. You have burnt most bridges that lead to other career paths. There is the economic incentive. The juice is readily available (it can even be ordered over the internet). It is undetectable if you do it well. And above all, you know that others are doing it and getting a significant advantage over you if you don't. What are your choices? Not making the games or having a chance at winning.

Of course you can still believe in fairy tales. The honest, hard working American or Brit that can beat the dishonest, but hard working Russian or Chinese that has all the state resources behind him to juice him to the max. Dream on.

Sure, why not? Or the other way around. There are many factors that go into a good performance, and doping is only one of them. It's certainly plausible that a once-in-a-generation raw talent can beat dopers.

The tragedy of doping is that we just don't know who those once-in-a-generation talents are.

Just look at the medal numbers. Raw talent happens to grow in the US and GB only? Meanwhile Russians and Chinese have to dope to the gills to have a slim chance of beating clean Americans and Brits.

Nice plot for a fiction movie.

A lot more goes into medal numbers than "raw talent." Just looking at swimming the U.S. has very healthy swim leagues at the youth, high school, and NCAA levels. The best NCAA swimmers aren't far off world-class. That's something very few countries have to the same level. There might be some countries that have state-sponsored camps where they try to identify talent young and fund their development, but that's a far cry from having 10's of thousand of kids swimming their asses off in youth leagues.

And China and Russian do better at some things where they have a natural, competitive talent pool. Russian gymnastics. Chinese table tennis and diving. It's not like the Russians focused their doping on gymnastics. It's likely the biggest factor is that it's just what they do. They have a deep history in it. Same with Chinese and diving. At the pool, the best U.S. athletes go for the Phelps events. In China the best athletes head up the stairs to the diving board. Because it's what they do.

Doping is effective. But it's just the icing on the cake compared to other factors.

Well, if doping is going on in American swimming, it must be very, very well hidden. If Phelps were on steroids or EPO or whatever, then I would imagine the accusations would've been flying back in 2008 after he won his 8 gold, i.e. "yeah he won 8 gold but only b/c he's juicing". And the accusers would've been especially livid at Jason Lezak pulling out the fastest 100 lcm relay split out of thin air, essentially swimming about a full second better than his best 100 free, to win the 4x100 free relay.

Taking it down to just a slightly lower level, the ST poster "tallswimmer" finished 4th in the 200 IM in the 2008 U.S. Oly Trials, and the three guys who beat him were Phelps, Lochte, and Eric Shanteau, who's the American record (AR) holder in the 200 breast. So in essence he was beaten by three guys who were all AR and/or WR holders, but did he come on here and complain that those guys were doping and he was clean??? NO, you can bet you fricking ass he did not; he just said he had a great career and came up just a little short of Oly qualifying.

Similarly, there is another ST posters known as "govols" who swam with Melvin Stewart back in the early 90s when Melvin was the WR holder in the 200 fly from 1989 to 1995. In the 1992 Games, Stewart won gold in the 200 fly, gold in the 400 medley relay, bronze in the 800 FR relay, and took 5th in the 100 fly. So, govols and Melvin swam side by side for two full years (1991-93 IIRC) through around 1600 practices and roughly 100,000 repeats, yet govols said he was never ever able to beat Melvin on even one single repeat. Their 200 yd fly times were only about 2-3 sec apart but yet Stewart's drive would not let him lose a single repeat in a single practice. Did govols say "oh sure but that b/c he was doping and I was clean"??? NO, he simply said that Stewart trained harder than any swimmer he'd ever seen.

In yet another example, I know two guys at the pool i swim at, one who swam at the U. of TN and one who swam at Indiana U. Both swam with guys who made the Oly team in either '08 or '12. Do they say that the reason those guys made the team was b/c they doped??? No, they just say those guys were faster than they were.

TAKE YOUR UNFOUNDED DOPING ACCUSATIONS AND SHOVE THEM UP YOUR ASS.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I think you didn't understand me. You only need to dope if you belong to a doping axis of evil country. You know, Russia, China, an ex-Soviet Union country, maybe Spain if you are a cyclist, etc.

If you are American or British you don't need to dope, it's all about hard work, ethics and the magic that happens when you combine them both. That can beat dope an axis of evil doper any day. And the good thing is everybody will believe you. Everybody will believe grade IV cancer can make you a better cyclist or that you can turn from not being in the UCI top 200 at age 25 to the most dominating cyclist in history in one year. You know, physiology and logic no longer matter, and in case you need them, you can always use insults and bad language as an alternative.

And obviously you did not understand me either, as you addressed zero of my assertions about doping in swimming. TBH, I could care less about cycling, it is just a necessary evil to do most triathlons. I really do not care what Lance did or did not do, period.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."