In a message dated Mon, 16 Oct 2000 12:10:05 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
"Mcewen, Brian T" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
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Ahhhhh ....
EPO became available. It was so much more effective than blood-doping, and
you could drive your hematocrit up so much higher (than re-injecting your
own RBC's) without the risk of clotting and stroke.
Jacking your blood up like that made musculo-skeletal system fatigue the
limiting factor in Distance doubles. The cardiovascular systems became so
strong (and they do not need "recovery time" per se) that the muscular
systems got beat up too much by the pace of the Olympic/World championship
level racing that "doubling" was now too difficult.
Olympic distance runners always doubled in the 5k/10k. The 50's guys (Kuts
and Zatopek) are somewhat irrelevant ... but even in the 64 and 68 games,
most of the top guys ran both the 5k and 10k. Gammoudi, Clarke, Temu, etc.
In 1972, 1976, and 1980, many guys doubled successfully at the highest
levels:
72) Viren (2 gold), Puttemans (2 silver), Shorter (gold, 5th place), Keino
76) Viren (gold, gold, fifth) , Foster (5k/10k), Lopes (5k/10k I think?)
80) Yifter, Maaninka, Kedir, Kotu, Viren
Some of these guys won double gold, some double medals, some just ran what
were, for them, very good doubles. However, doubling in the longest (and
therefore most destructive) track events in the Games was very common from
1964-1980.
Additionally, the 5k was won in the mid-13:20's in '72, '76, and '80. The
10k was won in 27:38-42 in the same three Games.
Once EPO use became widespread, the training mileage dropped, and the stress
you could put on your muskulo-skeletal system in an Olympic final became too
great. The 1984 games did not fully demonstrate this because there were too
many boycotters, but there was a huge escalation in performance in the
distance finals after that.
5k's were won in 13:05-13:11 ... every Games. The 10k (when actually raced
for real) was won in 27:07-27:22. And people stopped doubling.
Some people claim that the fields have gotten much more competitive and
therefore the double (or marathon triple) makes little sense.
If you look at the finish of the '76 5000m, or the 1980 10,000m .... you
will know that it has NOT GOTTEN more competitive ... just faster.
The ability to run faster (due to higher RBC's) breaks down the
muskulo-skeletal system too much to attempt 2-3 rounds of a 5k after doing
the 10k ... not to mention attempting the marathon.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Wrong. 1987 was the beginning of the rise of the Kenyans. Often the victims
in last lap sprints in championship races, they began taking the bull by the
horns and running away from people (or at least trying to). An athlete could
no longer just cruise through 9600 meters and then kick, and then come back
in the 5K.
sideshow
