It will never be TOP priority for WTC. Never. Ever.

WTC is a corporation. Their top priority is making money and making sure their shareholders are getting a return on their investment. Why aren't there more AG'ers tested?? Because it costs money and cuts into WTC's profit.

But I do believe that AG testing has become MORE of a priority in recent years. 6-7 years ago, I think it was pretty rare to hear about an AG'er getting tested. Nowadays.... much less rare. Though, there will always be room for improvement.

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blog

As someone who comes in 20th-26th place 30-34 age group in half ironman events...I dont really care about age group testing (I want it there, but not cost prohibitive). I want races to be crazy profitable. But when it comes to testing, I would rather see the money going to pay for, and keep, high quality events for me to participate in. But that's just me as someone who isn't really going to sniff Kona (and honestly couldn't afford to go if I did qualify). Though, I 100% understand people at the front of the pack wanting more testing. I have seen the proposal of having people that take slots to Kona being required to pay for a drug test to make sure they are clean. I think that is a great solution for people that want clean sport at the front of the age group pack without requiring the rest of the field to pay for the tests so WTC can keep their margins. I know this cuts both way financially...

Now for the pros...yes, I want them tested. That is the highest level of the sport and I want integrity there. But, If the investment banker/lawyer/engineer is putting money out for performance enhances and crushing me by 45 mins, so be it.

i didn't intend to be, and in retrospect after reading i don't see where i was, combative. we're not talking about the same things. maybe i didn't explain it well enough. the question was whether somebody test at IMAZ was going to end up in USADA's dbase and, it seemed to me, the reason for the request is that the person tested was going to be on edge until he or she knew the test came back negative. what i wrote is that, the last i checked, albeit some years ago, and according to memory, if ironman was the testing authority (if it was "their" test), that wouldn't end up on USADA's dbase of tested athletes, even if USADA was the contractor ironman used to perform the test.

this might not be a bid deal, except: 1) to the person tested, going back every day for 6mo looking for his or her name on a dbase that was never going to host that athlete's name; and 2) it would be nice if there was a unified dbase, so that we could see the entire scope of the testing that happens at ironman events.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Bingo. And does that investor want to see the balance sheet and $XYZ going towards testing age-group amateur athletes? They'd think it was crazy.

I had obviously had my head buried in the sand for years, and like any old fool out there could not have imagined people doping for a hobby. It was only when I was informed by a good source about a local athlete, "well you know why so-and-so has improved so much, right?" - I was incredulous. The guy at the time was a 45 year old professional working stiff like the rest of us, who seemed like a decent athlete. I said "what?!?" .. the answer was, "oh yeah, he got on it.. the guys on his team said yeah just go to your doctor and ask, he told me it was a piece of cake." Obviously "it" was T. Then I found ST forum a year or so ago and couldn't believe what I was reading every time AG doping topic came up.

I disagree that people don't care. Maybe we aren't forming committees and screaming from rooftops. We do care, in a mutter under our breath and get pissed off kind of way. It's a hobby. It's not paying the bills. I don't care for pros that dope but I understand the game. I have zero respect for an amateur that dopes to improve their recreational athletic performance. None. They rank right up there with Joe Amateur who wrecks his family because they eat into his IM training time.

I think a better question is why would you want USADA to handle results management unless you are a true amateur sport?
'
The USADA received $14m in federal funding. Why should that go to a money making pro-sport? If you're a pro league/sports business why would you want an outside agency doing any of your management? Testing is a different matter as long as you control the information.....from a business perspective.

The USADA years ago (went looking for business) hit up most of the major professional sports leagues in the US and they politely said no. Something like the USADA needs to exist for amateur sports but the time the USADA got some egg on their face was in their fight with the UCI and professional cycling. Again a money making business. I can understand why WTC does their own results management. The USADA results management is best for amateur sports....in my opinion.

There are about 3-5% of inhalers which contain terbutaline sulfate and other banned substances which you will test positive for.

95% are legal, sadly I think most agers read that as “all inhalers are fine”

Maurice

And I believe that is still how it is today. Many AG'ers have been tested at bigger WTC races (kona, 70.3 worlds, IMTX) and have never shown up on that USADA list.

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blog

this is insane. Integrity is not a conditional concept.

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Eric Reid AeroFit | Instagram Portfolio
Aerodynamic Retul Bike Fitting

“You are experiencing the criminal coverup of a foreign backed fascist hostile takeover of a mafia shakedown of an authoritarian religious slow motion coup. Persuade people to vote for Democracy.”

*shrugs*

We care about the integrity of our SCOTUS Justices a whole heck of a lot more than those of a local magistrate.

I disagree with your whataboutism...

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Eric Reid AeroFit | Instagram Portfolio
Aerodynamic Retul Bike Fitting

“You are experiencing the criminal coverup of a foreign backed fascist hostile takeover of a mafia shakedown of an authoritarian religious slow motion coup. Persuade people to vote for Democracy.”

because, ironman at it's very top, somewhere in some office somewhere in china, doesn't really care whether some guy gets popped for doping. a results management process can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars if the guy returning an adverse finding decides to fight it to the hilt, which he may well do depending on what he has on the line (hedge fund manager? executive of a large corporation? church pastor? schoolteacher? firefighter? politician?)

if you're that CFO in china you may choose not to spend a quarter-million dollars on that fight. you may let that guy go. usada's mission is not to return a profit. it's to catch and "prosecute" dopers and those who promulgate doping in sport. for sure, sometimes USADA also cuts deals. george hincapie doped for his entire long career, it appears, and got for his sentence not racing from xmas thru easter. lance got lifetime. nevertheless, USADA's point in all of that was not to save money, but to take down a major doping apparatus.

to me, USADA doesn't get egg on its face very often. when you turn USADA down for results management - whether you're IM, the NFL, MLB, NBA - the onus is on you to explain why. in the case of the NFL, i can see why you'd make that choice if you have USADA on one side and the player's union on the other, if USADA takes the hard line on WADA code violations (the NFL doesn't operate per the Code). IM doesn't have a player's union on the other side. i can think of reasons why IM wouldn't want USADA to have results mgmt authority, but if i were truly interested in anti-doping i'd just like those explained.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

"Whataboutism is a variant of the tu quoque logical fallacy that attempts to discredit an opponent's position by charging them with hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving their argument."

I wasn't doing ^that^ at all. No part of what I said was about hypocrisy. What I said was analogous to the thinking of we (as a society) generally hold people at the top of their professions to a higher standard than those on lower rungs.

right, and I disagree that your argument is true. It's not. Nor should it be.

Also, it's irrelevant. We're talking about triathlon, not jurisprudence.

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Eric Reid AeroFit | Instagram Portfolio
Aerodynamic Retul Bike Fitting

“You are experiencing the criminal coverup of a foreign backed fascist hostile takeover of a mafia shakedown of an authoritarian religious slow motion coup. Persuade people to vote for Democracy.”

Fair enough.

Time for a bike trainer session.

So where do you draw the line? What if 18 of those people ahead of you are putting out money for performance enhancers? Would you care then? It's insane to think I'd be expected to pay for a drug test should I want to race Kona. With 2500-ish competitors racing IM races, the increase would hardly be noticeable to the athletes. You're already willing to shell out $900 for a race, would you really consider not signing up if it cost $920?

I'm generally ignorant to the topic and strategy, and I'm sure it's been proposed ad nauseum before, but regarding age groupers, why not test the top finishers at IM events to exclusion? For instance, if M 34-39 offers 2 spots, collect finish line samples from the top 5 or 6 finishers and immediately test the qualifiers. That way, if the top 2 were both doped, the next two in line can be tested and potentially qualify. Would this be more or less testing than already takes place?

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https://connect.garmin.com/modern/profile/domingjm

I think that you make a no exceptions given pre-qualification question. They used to have it way back in the day when you could race for Kona spots at Olympic distance and Half distance races. Before the days of corporatism in Ironman.

You had to declare that you were racing for a qualification spot. I don't know what would happen if you won your age group, and then decided that you wanted to go even if you picked no.

So, you declare that you're competing or a spot. You have separate waves or starts. And, these athletes know full well that they are likely to get tested. If you don't sign the yes box, then you don't get to go. No ifs, ands, or buts.

If you're an MOP athlete that wants to finish an IM, so be it. You just won't qualify nor would you get anything other than a finishers medal should you do super well. It would count towards your legacy spot if you are trying to do that and if they still do that. And, you won't worry about getting tested.

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Brandon Marsh - Website | @BrandonMarshTX | RokaSports | 1stEndurance | ATC Bikeshop |

Over the years I've had numerous athletes tested at IM's and 70.3's. Many were tested in the few days before Kona during registration.

3 or 4 have been tested post IM. Most of those athletes placed top 3 in their age group and KQ'd and/or won their AG & KQ'd and/or were the top AG athlete and/or in the top 8 athletes overall on the day.
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All the 70.3 testing was done after athletes won their age groups at the 70.3 WCs.

I just searched USADA's database for the years I can remember athletes getting tested and none of them appear on those lists.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Sounds completely reasonable to me.

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https://connect.garmin.com/modern/profile/domingjm

Yes, lets do this. Basically just handle it like allowing wetsuits in a non wetsuit situation. Have them go off last and not be eligible for awards.

Similar to Joe Rogan's or Adam Carolla's (can't remember who) theory on doping in MMA fighting, football, and bodybuilding - Have a clean category and then let everybody else dope to their gills for our own spectator entertainment. Eat steroids like it's cereal if you like, but don't check that box that you're in it for the real championships.

As entertaining as that sounds, cheaters cheat to get an advantage. So the ones that dope now would definitely be the ones to dope in the "clean" category in this new world.

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Too old to go pro but doing it anyway
http://instagram.com/tgarvey4

Right. But you charge extra AND test all the candidates. How do you become a candidate? You have to already have a race result within top 10% in a half or full.

They tried that in bodybuilding. It didn't work. A "natural" category was created for bodybuilders who did't want to dope. But that category ended up being overrun by dopers anyway.

My understanding is that it doesn't. All sports, amateur or pro, pay USADA to perform tests. The $14M (which is pennies, in my perspective) does things like fund full-time staff (e.g. Tygart's salary), pay rent and utilities, Web site, and funds some research. It does not fund the activity of drug testing. For example, USOC pays USADA to perform the testing of Olympic teams.