Curious to see how soon people will go after Michi Weiss again, or possibly Beth McKenzie

Clearly winter sports in Hawaii are in bad shape.

If I was a nordic skier based in Hawaii, sure I will sip some blood bags, waiting for the snow to come in...

OK :-)

will sip blood bags only 11 month out of 12

Maybe the same doc Lance used.

You really think that there was only one ?

How about dirtbagS, plural ?

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Do they ever say it was triathlon specifically? Or are we just assuming that it's triathlon because it happened in Hawaii?

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
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Assumption since it is the main event

i'm going to be a cynic and say that doping hasn't 'just reached' triathlon. it's been there a good while.

anyway, i would actually be happy with some positives, in a way. i (again, cynically) believe that doping is widespread in tri as in many other sports, so hopefully shining a light and busting people will send a message.

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https://lshtm.academia.edu/MikeCallaghan

http://howtobeswiss.blogspot.ch/

Am I misunderstanding though that I thought the blood doping thing was a recovery tactic during the grand tours? Usually they'd throw in a bag somewhere in the mountains to "freshen up"

How would that be relevant in tri?

Or is it just the traditional "more is better until you get caught".

Nope, it allows you to increase concentration of red blood cells by pumping additional blood in the system. It's closer to a low tech version of EPO :)

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What's your CdA?

what he said. basically you remove, say, a pint of your own blood. then you spin the red blood cells out and put them in the fridge. train/eat/rest as normal for a while to rebuild you blood you lost, and then open the fridge and re-inject the old red blood cells.

it's a poor man's EPO and one of the older (but more effective!) doping techniques. basically just quickly and durably jacking up your RBC (and therefore O2 carrying capacity) the easy way.

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https://lshtm.academia.edu/MikeCallaghan

http://howtobeswiss.blogspot.ch/

Triathlon is and has been dirty just like anything else. Anyone who would claim otherwise is deluding themselves.

Regarding bloody bags in the middle of Grand Tours, there is a good amount of literature as to what happens to blood volume, RBC, etc during a GC. In that sense a blood bag helps recovery. Regardless in these sports, more RBC = more good. :) There is a boost the moment you stick it in you and its not related to recovery at all.

Am I misunderstanding though that I thought the blood doping thing was a recovery tactic during the grand tours? Usually they'd throw in a bag somewhere in the mountains to "freshen up" //

What do you think triathlon training and racing is? It is one season long grand tour, for the pros doing ironman, training 4 to 8 hours a day. Of course recovery is the biggest element of succeeding at that. so EPO(blood doping manually) is the best thing a doper could do for themselves. Just ask Nina Craft how well it works...

If people haven't listened to the Nordic Nation podcast with the interview of Karel Tammjärv, you REALLY need to. There's not just the infusion of stored blood, but the removal of it after an event, key training session, or training block. That removal is what renders the biological passport concept so useless in this method. The whole interview was totally disheartening in so many ways.

https://fasterskier.com/...nias-karel-tammjarv/

This.

That was a disheartening but great interview.

Might be paddle board :-)
Marathon ?
XTerra ? (ok, triathlon also)

I dunno... are there never any elite swimming competitions in the whole state? Track? Is it possible it could be college? Maybe if there is a drug positive in hawaii it is highly likely to be triathlon, even with no other info. I don't know.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

And they receive treatment from a german doctor?

Kona in October and a European doctor. That is like 1 + 1 = 2.

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10k - 30:48 / half - 1:06:40

There is the Honolulu Marathon each December....With an invited elite field.

Where does it say Kona in October? All I read is Hawaii, and no time for that is given whatsoever.

I've proven the concept in reverse. I had the bright idea of donating blood right before a TTT. I remember the start. Then I remember waking up in some grass at the side of the road next to my bike. To my credit, I was apparently able to pull off and dismount before passing out. I'm super glad I didn't take out my teammates - they were already mad at me for lasting about 2K out of 40K.

To me that gives some indication of the incredible power of RBC volume.

IIRC, you need a couple weeks to recover your blood volume from a withdrawal.

I can't imagine someone flying to Hawaii with a chilled cooler of blood bag(s) unless you have a private jet. That shit would look mighty suspicious to the TSA.

So that means anyone blood doping for IM Hawaii would have to arrive to the island early enough (at least 2-3 weeks?), and have some experienced to withdraw and store it at the proper temperature. The day before the race it would be infused.

You want to catch someone doing it? Checking arrival times on the island before the race is the first clue..

can i relate a story, and i hope i get this right, because it's from, i dont know 12 or 15 years ago maybe? a certain person connected with the ITU - back when the ITU was at war with WTC - passed around a fax that came into the ITU's offices from a WADA lab, about an adverse finding from hawaii during IM week. that fax was to be expected because WADA labs - per the code - fax an AAF to WADA to the testing authority and to the sport's IF.

as i recall, this was framed at the time as, "see, our version of tri is clean, the iron version is dirty."

come to find out it was an ITU athlete observing kona, caught in an OOC test.

if i misremember this i'm quite open to hearing how i misremember it and i'm happy to make amends. and, this was ancient history. lots of water under the bridge. the ITU and ironman are very happy family campers now.

i only bring this up as a cautionary tale. i would not jump to conclusions. yes, it's very possible blood doping occurred in kona. it's also possible it occurred on maui. or, not in triathlon at all. i wouldn't get over my skis here if i were you.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman