I remain undecided about how significant a current athlete's performance is viewed on the world all-time list. On the one hand, it was a very different playing field back in the 70's and 80's, but steroids were popular amongst sprinters not just throwers. It is too simplistic to believe top throwers are not impacting on the world lists just because of steroids, when sprinters are having an impact at 100, and to a lesser extent the 200 and 400. Instead it's equally about the lack of women competing in the throwing events. When you had state systems that selected ('forced'?) girls of a certain build and ability into training for the DT or SP, you're going to produce results. When that changes to a system where a girl can choose whether to take up a throwing event, you aint gonna get those results! What young girls of 13 or 14 want to take up the SP or HT? Unfortunately It is not socially rewarding/acceptable in a lot of countries for a girl to be big and strong and to be a thrower. And then, just imagine all of the technical knowledge lost when all those hundreds of GDR coaches were sacked after unification. It aint all about steroids.
And then, the flip side of this, is that in the 90's and 00's and now, we have a big increase in blood doping and EPO, which improve performances over middle and long distances. Since 89 women have been running super fast from 1500 to 10k and that is not just because they are more talented. In years to come we may be having discussion around not comparing performances to the long distance times set in 1990s, 2000s.
skiboo wrote:Good point, more of the top throws happened back when the old East Bloc was around. Do you think throwers benefit more from peds than athletes in other events?
I think definitely yes for the shot and discus (not the javelin because being big and strong is less important).
Why do I say that? Consider the difference between men and women in the sprints. Men have a huge strength and testosterone advantage over women, but are only about 10-12% faster.
But suppose men and women threw the same weights for shot and discus. I'd expect differences of over 30%, maybe even 40 or 50%.
The fastest female sprinters in the history of the world could make the top 8 in several NCAA Division 1 conference meets in the male sprint events, but the best female shot and discus throwers in history wouldn't have a hope of doing that anywhere in NCAA D1 if they threw the same weights as men.
So my opinion is that anabolic PEDs do make a bigger difference for the discus and shot than for sprints, because the size and strength advantages provided by those drugs make a bigger difference in the throws than in the sprints.
Just reviewing the women's AOY voting and notice Pearson's rated at #4 and deservedly so for a great year. Yet when reviewing event rankings, her season essentially came down to only .02 better than Dawn Harper. Dawn, apart from that narrow loss was undefeated, with great marks as well. Would .03 seconds have taken her high up the AOY charts (where she got no votes at all)? You wonder where someone like Pearson would have ended up with such a slight difference for that one race. This is truly a sport where miniscule amounts can mean the world.
odelltrclan wrote:Just reviewing the women's AOY voting and notice Pearson's rated at #4 and deservedly so for a great year. Yet when reviewing event rankings, her season essentially came down to only .02 better than Dawn Harper. Dawn, apart from that narrow loss was undefeated, with great marks as well. Would .03 seconds have taken her high up the AOY charts (where she got no votes at all)? You wonder where someone like Pearson would have ended up with such a slight difference for that one race. This is truly a sport where miniscule amounts can mean the world.
But it is worth remembering that Pearson and Harper hardly raced (as Pearson returned home from Europe straight after the OG). Harper's 'undefeated but once' status is thus a little misrepresentative
In justifying why he selected Eaton over Bolt etc, on the front page, gh makes the comment that he considered, inter alia, that if Eaton had competed numerous times he would have still dominated the others easily as he saw it, and that was a factor for him in his selection, but in selecting Adams over Ennis he makes the point that the same did not apply and that Chernova may have been snapping at her heels . Not so. Ennis thrashed Chernova by hundreds of points in the OG and beat her earlier in the year I believe? and would on the evidence we saw have done so again last year. Just somewhat illogical and strange comment about an event where no assumptions can be made over 10 and 7 events for physical reasons, if no other.
In any event my AOYs were Rudisha and...... Adams, but I still disagree with his reasoning as stated above.
odelltrclan wrote:Just reviewing the women's AOY voting and notice Pearson's rated at #4 and deservedly so for a great year. Yet when reviewing event rankings, her season essentially came down to only .02 better than Dawn Harper. Dawn, apart from that narrow loss was undefeated, with great marks as well. Would .03 seconds have taken her high up the AOY charts (where she got no votes at all)? You wonder where someone like Pearson would have ended up with such a slight difference for that one race. This is truly a sport where miniscule amounts can mean the world.
But it is worth remembering that Pearson and Harper hardly raced (as Pearson returned home from Europe straight after the OG). Harper's 'undefeated but once' status is thus a little misrepresentative
So if Pearson went ended her season after London, shouldn't Harper get more credit for racing more often?
Pearson ended her season (and almost lost the OG) due to her back injury rather than a lack of desire to compete. Should injury be held against her or enhance the value of her performances?
Almost never does an athlete without a No. 1 ranking get much support in the AOY wars (Blake's presence on the men's side notwithstanding).
With the always 100%-perfect reflection of hindsight, I would def. say that Harper got way shortchanged in the AOY department (as in, no votes). As you note, she and Pearson each had one loss (Harper's coming in the big one, so she couldn't be No. 1), but Harper (4 wins) clearly had a better DL record than Pearson (2 wins, 1 second). They weren't all that far apart that one should be No. 4 in AOY and the other not there at all.
gh wrote:mump is also apparently unaware of the fact that T&FN stats don't include marks from the Chinese National Games of '93 and '97 (the two with obvious "irregularities"), and Alptekin didn't make a dent in a list with those revised numbers either.
(see our all-time lists elsewhere on the site, with the Chinese marks given the heave-ho)
Why is it that the results have been removed from the all-time lists, but yet remain on the world records page?
because as it says at the top of the page "World Records are as ratified by the IAAF" (just as say about American Records and USATF).
We don't presume to usurp the role of those who are the "official" word on such things. When it comes to all-time lists, we're free to craft them as we see fit.
gh wrote:because as it says at the top of the page "World Records are as ratified by the IAAF" (just as say about American Records and USATF).
We don't presume to usurp the role of those who are the "official" word on such things. When it comes to all-time lists, we're free to craft them as we see fit.
Not to push the point too much, but in other instances ie: Randy Barnes and FloJo the lists do make a clear reference to the fact that T&FN does not consider these the real records despite iaaf ratification and then proceeds to list what the best other mark is. I'm a fan of consistency.
gh wrote:mump is also apparently unaware of the fact that T&FN stats don't include marks from the Chinese National Games of '93 and '97 (the two with obvious "irregularities").
(see our all-time lists elsewhere on the site, with the Chinese marks given the heave-ho)
Hadn't noticed that till I read it here. Bravo--a bold but entirely logical decision that makes any further "discussion" of the matter entirely beside the point.
I would feel a lot more comfortable with deleting whole sets of marks from lists if you could posit a concrete reason for doing so, other than they were "irregular". I don't disagree on the irregular nature of most of the marks, but I don't believe anyone has ever been able to legitimately charge the Chinese with any illegal activities or use of contraband. More along the lines of a stinky meter: Smells bad, worse, worse, worse...okay, THAT one just smells way too bad, so out it goes. With former Eastern Bloc-PED using/admitting athletes practically falling out of trees nowadays, there are a whole lot of other marks that could more reasonably be stricken from the unofficial books, donchathink?
Unfortunately It is not socially rewarding/acceptable in a lot of countries for a girl to be big and strong and to be a thrower. And then, just imagine all of the technical knowledge lost when all those hundreds of GDR coaches were sacked after unification. It aint all about steroids.