Susan_B_Agony

Honestly, why even bother? It occurs to me that Mr. McCormack has been ordered to go on the offensive, but that's for the conspiracy theorists.

Honestly though, is he any different from the simple internet troll? Is this anything more than a bid to get some attention? Could you say that he's trying to put himself in a corner, just like he did when he was gearing up for kona?

If it were me (and because you are oh so interested in my opinion) I wouldn't even give him the time of day. Not because of some turn the other cheek thing, but because if he gets attention, he wins. If he gets to go on other mediums and talk about this (also slipping in some self advertisement), he wins. How do you beat him?

Don't acknowledge it. Because it really is beneath you. Not in some feel good shit way, but because you are so much more now. An honest aggregator of triathlon news. Him? He's irrelevant. Yes, he's won some major Championships, but outside of that... What's his relevancy? What's he done? TRS is actually more relevant to the sport, now, than he is.

This is what I imagine the Webster be like after that post:

I would just like to say that my entire success is built upon the objectification of both men and women. But mostly women. And bad poetry, now.

I would also like to add that I united this forum with a topic that promotes peace, love, boners, and lady boners, instead of one that spread hate, loathing, and distaste.

I am Susan B Agony and I approve this message.
Paid for by Message Boarders for Susan B Agony and August of Agony

I believe Mr. Baucco is the one on the left; both are for the viewing pleasure of the ladies (and men of course) of this thread

This was all brought about by the discussion on the podcast about "doping" (the Siri Lindley one). I don't mean any ill-will towards Ben or Joel; they are more the triggers for this rant than anything else.

Try to think of this as a General Public Announcement/Request

Here’s the short version: y’all don’t know shit about doping. Pursuant to this, in my opinion, if you don’t plan to do something about it, you should all just shut the hell up about doping.

Now, the long version? Well, let me preface this with an ass-load of disclaimers.

DISCLAIMER #1: I swear a lot. If you don’t like it, fuck off. It helps me express my feelings.

DISCLAIMER #2: If you want to maintain your innocence about current and past sports figures, then take the blue pill. The story will end, you will wake up in your bed, and you will believe what you want to believe.

DISCLAIMER #3: Very little that follows is what you would call “Hard Facts”. Why? Because nobody has a fucking clue about the true extent of doping activity. Think Brad Katsuyama trying to figure out how deep the electronic scalping game goes in the stock market. Nobody has a clue.

DISCLAIMER #4: I feel very strongly about this topic. But unlike all of you, I rarely talk about it when a 'major news story breaks' because me talking about it isn’t going to do shit to resolve the issue. Still, as I have a lot of rage about doping, there may be points in the post below where my vitriol against the notion of doping overflows into my criticisms of the “outrage” of the general public. Deal with it.

DISCLAIMER #5: I am not an expert in this. What follows is an attempt to show everyone how little they know about the topic, thus proving my main point that In general, people don't know anything on the topic and should stop acting like "discussing" is is doing any good. At the very least, you could do the bare minimum and google shit about it and learn things like, in the 60's, there was a plethora of college athletes were taking steroids. But, nobody does, because they don't give a fuck, they just want to complain about how bad it is for the sport.
…
Alright. Now that everything has been disclaimed, strap the fuck in because this is a long ass post.
...
Let’s begin with a thought exercise. Paula Radcliffe is the current world record holder in the women’s marathon. Her time? 2:15:25, a full three minutes ahead of the next best time EVER, which was run by Mary Keitany of Kenya… a full 11 years later.

Paula Radcliffe has been cleared by WADA from any doping allegations and for most, the story ends here. But for others, it continues, with numerous suspicions and allegations. And that’s my point. Paula Radcliffe has run faster than any woman, even known dopers, by a large margin. To put it in perspective, using the Mercier score calculator, a woman running a 2:15:25 is somewhat equivalent to a man running a… 1:59:54.

Now, let’s be clear; Mercier scores are an attempt to approximate equivalent times by using a statistical analysis of all performances in Athletics, blah, blah, blah, read about it via the link provided below. Anyways, this is why people think Paula’s record is so questionable. And the point of all this is to show that #1) nobody knows for sure, and #2) the entire world of doping is allegations and suspicions.

Speaking of Hearsay, here’s the best analysis I’ve ever seen about doping. Keep this in mind, always:

Principle #1: The cheaters are (almost) always ahead of the testers. The hardest thing for people to understand is that negative test results truly don't mean a thing. They really don't. Whether or not an athlete has never tested positive is absolutely, completely and totally irrelevant. Marion Jones passed 162 drug tests during a period of time when she was using a designer steroid, EPO and HGH.

Principle #2: Doped up athletes are good for business. If you want to sell more tickets and attract more eyeballs to more TV sets, then doped athletes will unquestionably help your bottom line. It is also true of governing bodies. As I have posted before, our own governing body performed pre-testing prior to the 1984 Olympic Trials and Olympics in order to aid our own athletes and avoiding detection

Principle #3: You should never be surprised by who tests positive. The most surprising thing about a positive test is that someone actually slipped up and got caught. The very best quote I've ever seen regarding this point was by KevinM when he said in reference to Floyd Landis that "When the Amish kid tests positive, no one can be above suspicion."

Principle #4: Cheaters are extremely skilled liars

Principle #5: I can't define it but I know it when I see it. (author’s note: these are the OP’s words, not mine. He/She is more involved in this sort of culture)

Principle #6: Logic means nothing, and everything. This is the part that most people can't get past. They apply logic to PEDs ("it doesn't make sense that they would use PEDs because . . .") PED use doesn't conform to our logic.

See all of this text? Yeah, this is about 1/100th of what the OP had written on the topic. I had to cut it down for brevity’s sake-there's no way I could have explained it all in any concise way. This is more to my point. You all don’t have a clue. I have recorded what amounts to a lake of research on this topic and it won’t even scratch the surface of the ocean of truth that’s still out there. But, from here on out, think back to these principles. If you want to know who's doping and who's not. Which is nearly everybody in a sport that pays actual good money.

That being said, you all heard the Babbitt interview with victor conte, right? Wow, what a jarring revelation! How has all that been kept so secret for so long? Good thing you listened to the podcast- You all must know so much about the doping life, right? Everything has been revealed, right?

If you answered “Yes” to the above, let me tell you about who Angel Heredia is. Angel was a man just like Victor Conte, except even more prolific. And just like Victor Conte, nobody’s asking him for advice, of which he has plenty. For instance, he gave this interview in 2008.

- SPIEGEL: With Marion Jones ...

Heredia: ... it was about the recovery phases. In 2000 she competed in one event after another, and she needed to relax. I gave her epo, growth hormone, adrenaline injections, insulin. Insulin helps after training, together with protein drinks: insulin transports protein and minerals more quickly through the cell membrane.

...

- Heredia: With precision. You want an example? Everyone talks about epo. Epo is fashionable. But without adding iron, epo only works half as well. That’s the kind of thing you have to know. There are oxygen carriers that make epo work incredibly fast – they are actually better than epo alone. I call my drug “Epo Boost.” I inject it and it releases many tiny oxygen molecules throughout the body. In that way you increase the effect of epo by a factor of ten.

- Heredia: Oh yes, of course. There are tablets for the kidneys that block the metabolites of steroids, so when athletes give a urine sample, they don’t excrete the metabolites and thus test negative. Or there is an enzyme that slowly consumes proteins - epo has protein structures, and the enzyme thus ensures that the B sample of the doping test has a completely different value than the A sample. Then there are chemicals that you take a couple of hours before the race that prevent acidification in the muscles. Together with epo they are an absolute miracle. I’ve created 20 different drugs that are still undetectable for the doping testers.

...

Heredia: It’s a small world. It gets around who can provide you with something how quickly and at what price, who is discreet. The coaches approached me and asked if I could help them, and I said: yes. Then they gave me money, $15,000 or thereabouts, we got a first shipment and then we did business. At some point it led to one-on-one cooperation with the athletes.

...

SPIEGEL: Was there a regimen of sorts?

Heredia: Yes. I always combined several things. For example, I had one substance called actovison that increased blood circulation – not detectable. That was good from a health standpoint and even better from a competitive standpoint. Then we had the growth factors IGF-1 and IGF-2. And epo. Epo increases the number of red blood cells and thus the transportation of oxygen, which is the key for every athlete: the athlete wants to recover quickly, keep the load at a constantly high level and achieve a constant performance.

SPIEGEL: Once again: a constant performance at the world-class level is unthinkable without doping?

...

SPIEGEL: Testosterone, growth hormone, epo – that was your combination?

Heredia: Yes, with individual variations. And then amazing things are possible. In 2002 Jerome Young was ranked number 38 in the 400 meters. Then we began to work together, and in 2003 he won almost every big race.

SPIEGEL: How were you paid?

Heredia: I had an annual wage. For big wins I got a $40,000 bonus.

SPIEGEL: Your athletes have won 26 Olympic medals. How much money did you earn?

Heredia: I can’t answer that due to the investigations. But let’s put it this way: 16 to 18 successful athletes each year at between $15,000 and $20,000 per athlete. I had a good run. I had a good life.

...

SPIEGEL: Is there doping at every level of athletics?

Heredia: Yes, the only difference is the quality of the doping. Athletes with little money use simple steroids and hope they don’t get tested. The stars earn 50,000 dollars a month, not including starting bonuses and shoe sponsorship contracts. The very best invest 100,000 dollars – I’ll then build you a designer drug that can’t be detected.

SPIEGEL: Explain how this works.

Heredia: Designer drugs are composed of several different chemicals that trigger the desired reaction. At the end of the chain I change one or two molecules in such a way that the entire structure is undetectable for the doping testers.

...

So, let’s revisit my favorite question. You still think you know something about all this?

Which leads me to my problem with all this discussion of “Doping”. It’s similar to my problem with all the discussion of the “Human rights violations!”, “TriEquality!” and any other topic that results in a public outrage. This shit has been sitting under your noses, easily accessible to anyone with internet access and knowledge of google, for YEARS. But, the only time anyone ever cares about it is when it reaches international attention. Then, everybody looses their minds! They're outraged!

Being outraged doesn’t do shit. You, expressing your distaste on twitter, contributes fuckall to solving the problem. With your right hand and a basket full of outraged tweets in the other, you could probably jerk off. Unless you’re a lefty. What happened to all the vitriol against Bahrain 13? What happened to the entire TriEqual movement? Why did it suddenly disappear? I'll tell you why: it faded away because people don't actually give enough of a shit to do something about it. TriEqual is actually a bit of an exception to this, because they made an organization about it, but nothing's really happened since.

The amazing thing is, as I alluded to above, if you know where to look, or you know how to use a google search bar, this shit isn’t even hard to find. There are actual published articles in magazines that document peoples’ journeys taking PEDs and their experiences. With a little bit of searching, you can find out that steroids are very useful for endurance athletes, most athletes are on HGH (which is mostly undetectable), and that by taking 100mg of test (or, testosterone for all you noobs) per week will put most men in the upper quartile of the normal range.

This means that people can take testosterone, it helps them recover, and they will not test positive.
If you literally copied and pasted the underlined portion above, it will lead you to a body-building forum post that will describe, in detail, how to do this.

Even more to the point: Ever heard of micro dosing? Ever heard of IGF-1? What’s Dynepo? What’s Actovegin? Dianabol? Winstrol?

And even if you have heard about these, and understand their context in doping, you’re still behind the curve. It is very much like Wall Street shenanigans. You only hear about and come to understand the latest shady deals after the perpetrators have moved on to the next best thing. Some cycling teams have been found with experimental drugs that haven’t even been completely studied in clinical trials.

So let me ask again. What exactly are you achieving when you talk about doping? Because from where I’m sitting, all I see is cocktail party conversation and wasting of time. This information is easily available for those that look for it and nobody is looking for it because they don't care. You seriously think Adrian Peterson can come back from tearing an ACL and rush 2000+ yards without the help of drugs? Do you think that the NFL doesn't know about this? They and the fans want gladiators.

So! What are the morals of this story?

MORAL #1: UNLESS YOU PLAN TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT, SHUT THE FUCK UP.

MORAL #2: PEOPLE CHEAT IN CROSS-COUNTRY-FUCK-SKIING. YOU CAN’T STOP IT.

MORAL #3: PEOPLE JUST WANT TO COMPLAIN ABOUT IT. ACTUALLY DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT WOULD LIKELY INCONVENIENCE THEM.

And this last point is probably why this post will wither and die/flamed into oblivion. Because in addition to not actually wanting to do something about it, people don’t like the truth to be shoved in their faces. But as long as you get to complain about it, I reserve the right to yell at you all to shut up.

Link to Mercier Scoring for those who give a shit: http://myweb.lmu.edu/jmureika/track/Mercier/Merc99.html .

Why do triathletes have to explain their sponsorship choices to anyone?

Would there be this same level of scrutiny of roka Athletes if roka wetsuits were made in sweatshops? Or if trek was widely know to have a culture of sexual harassment against women?

Why isn't Helle being questioned about Nike's dubious manufacturing practices? Or, do we only care about questioning the obvious ones?

Neither Roka or Trek do these things, but let's pretend. I'm interested in why people think they are owed anything from professionals, let alone an "explanation"

The King of all Technology
Should give women an apology

For he hath implied those with purses cannot fight
(what nonsense, has he seen Rhonda's vicious right?)

Or perhaps I'm the one in the wrong
For stereotyping those who wear the thong...

Dammit, deeper and deeper goes this hole I dig
Each passing line, I make myself more of a pig

So excuse me, I say,
while I join my bretheren in the mud and hay

P.S.
The Lubrication haiku was written in the middle of the night! Everything sounds like it has five syllables at 2:03 am!!

Fvck all the haters
Haikus are acceptable
Refrigerator

Why are American women so much better than other women? In general, not just triathlon...

Oh! Oh! Or, why are the American women better then the American men?

The purpose is awkward tan lines