Comeback from doping... possible?

fraamman wrote:
I am suggesting that people are capable of greater effort, but that it is
a
conscious decision to conclude that effort prematurely due to the pain
such exertion causes.

You might be right about this with respect to most non-pro-level
racers --especially the canonical masters fatties-- but I think you are way
off base wrt to professionals. To a large extent, they're mentally
conditioned to remove the "exertion pain" limitation from the equation and
they ride much more like machines. I also don't see any reason that would be
different for dopers and non-dopers. The dopers are just faster machines. Of
course this is just my opinion, and just like your opinion, neither one can
be proven.

Carl Sundquist wrote
marco wrote:
Carl Sundquist wrote:
For the past 9 months I've been hitting 238-239 on almost every hard
ride I have done.

Are you considering surgery, like that valve ablation procedure?
(Assuming that you have the kind of arrhythmia it's designed to fix...)

Yeah, I am. It started affecting me on the bike in August of '07 in a
relatively minor way. Ran a slew of tests that Fall, but it seemed to go
away after resting in the off season. Was scheduled to have an ablation in
March of last year, but between not having much recurrence, some of the
risks of radio frequency (burning) ablation, and not keen on a 6 month
regimen of Coumadin/Warfarin, I chose to postpone the procedure. Things
were going well but in August, it all fell apart again. Even easy recovery
effort rides were triggering fibrillation events. It gradually got better
(I was hoping for a similar pattern as the year before), but not good. I
heard about a clinical trial that used a cryogenic procedure rather than
the RF method that is much safer and gets you off Coumadin in half the
time. Unfortunately, I was too late for the first round of the trials and
was too far down on the list for the second round. It's gotten not quite
to a quality of life issue (if you don't count the bike that is), but it's
come to the point where I should address it sooner rather than later.


I know that rbr is the LAST place you'll go for advice, but...

Have you given up all caffeine and ...gasp!!... alcohol? (Side story: I
remember when you won the crit for 35+ masters nationals in Tallahassee and
when the announcer asked "what's next?" you responded that you were going to
go get a beer...) Anyway, I have a teammate who is dealing with the same
heart issue and he's had some success by giving up caffeine and alcohol.
Personally, my head would explode if faced with that option.

On Jun 9, 3:37*pm, wrote:
I am not talking about power, I am talking about pain-
specifically the pain required to achieve - that the doper is one who
has cracked and seeks to achieve without the painful price.

We'll have to find an example of "the doper" and see what he says
about pain.

Read Kohl's latest, may "the doper" might not be so hard to find. Like
maybe most of "the riders" are also examples of "the doper".

(I think it still hurts, but your results are better.)

You're still hung on the morality issue. Remember, like the Mitchell
report stated, the problem starts at the top, with owners, organizers,
all who control the power structure.
--D-y

On Jun 9, 4:48*pm, Donald Munro wrote:
raamman wrote:
you seem to misunderstand my point- try reading it again and see if that
helps. I am not talking about power, I am talking about pain- specifically
the pain required to achieve - that the doper is one who has cracked and
seeks to achieve without the painful price. I am suggesting that people
are capable of greater effort, but that it is a conscious decision to
conclude that effort prematurely due to the pain such exertion causes. I
suggest heart rate monitoring as a common means one can test this idea

Ah, so you're suggesting they're all using crystal meth and PCP since
EPO would have no effect on perceived pain ?

no, I am suggesting you are a clown who needs to interject nonsense
into the discussion.

On Jun 9, 6:43*pm, "marco" wrote:
fraamman wrote:
I am suggesting that people are capable of greater effort, but that it is
a
conscious decision to conclude that effort prematurely due to the pain
such exertion causes.

You might be right about this with respect to most non-pro-level
racers --especially the canonical masters fatties-- but I think you are way
off base wrt to professionals. To a large extent, they're mentally
conditioned to remove the "exertion pain" limitation from the equation and
they ride much more like machines. I also don't see any reason that would be
different for dopers and non-dopers. The dopers are just faster machines. Of
course this is just my opinion, and just like your opinion, neither one can
be proven.

merkx tried to disuade axel from going pro because because it was too
painful a sport. hinault reciently spoke of the pain. I think a lot of
pros are familiar with the pain, as are most here too. I'm thinking a
racer is trying to keep up and thinks "I can't handle this anymore"
then goes afterwards for a way to make it easier. I would say at that
point the rider has mentally cracked and given up- I don't see how a
rider can go past that breaking point after finding a easier way to go
past without the suffering. I'm not certain, it might have been ricco
who described how nice it was to glide along with the pack and look
around and see all the suffering faces- if he describes gliding along
while others are suffering he is not feeling pain to any extent. but
pain is why I don't get on my bike and make an effort to get my hrm to
show me a max that is one beat higher than what I am used to- it's
hard, it hurts and I don't want to cross that line even though I might
get a better time and that pushing myself to that extent shouldn't
harm me- that's my breaking point even though I think I could go a few
beats higher, much less just one. I think the same deal basically
applies to just about anyone.
there is pain management- the automaton pro cyclist- probabally has a
higher tolerance or mental focus to deal with it- but that doesn't
mean it doesn't hurt. merckx and the hour, he said it was the most
painful thing he had ever done, and I don't doubt him that one bit.

On Jun 9, 3:43*pm, "marco" wrote:


fraamman wrote:

snip



Dumbass -

Nice work!

thanks,

Kurgan. presented by Gringioni.

In article
,
wrote:

On Jun 9, 6:43Â*pm, "marco" wrote:
fraamman wrote:
I am suggesting that people are capable of greater effort, but that it is
a
conscious decision to conclude that effort prematurely due to the pain
such exertion causes.

You might be right about this with respect to most non-pro-level
racers --especially the canonical masters fatties-- but I think you are way
off base wrt to professionals. To a large extent, they're mentally
conditioned to remove the "exertion pain" limitation from the equation and
they ride much more like machines. I also don't see any reason that would be
different for dopers and non-dopers. The dopers are just faster machines. Of
course this is just my opinion, and just like your opinion, neither one can
be proven.

merkx tried to disuade axel from going pro because because it was too
painful a sport. hinault reciently spoke of the pain. I think a lot of
pros are familiar with the pain, as are most here too. I'm thinking a
racer is trying to keep up and thinks "I can't handle this anymore"
then goes afterwards for a way to make it easier. I would say at that
point the rider has mentally cracked and given up- I don't see how a
rider can go past that breaking point after finding a easier way to go
past without the suffering.

Performance enhancing drugs to not ease the pain.

--
Michael Press

fraamman wrote:
merkx tried to disuade axel from going pro because because it was too
painful a sport. hinault reciently spoke of the pain.

Perhaps they're more refering to the chronic pain and fatigue of 3 week
stage races. We'd have to ask them. That's different than riding a little
bit harder up a col because you can handle more acute "pain".

I think a lot of pros are familiar with the pain, as are most here too.

What the amateur whines about as pain, the pro perceives as a bioligical
barometer of effort. It may be uncomfortable, but it's not pain in the sense
of pulling off your fingernails one by one. Ask your local pro about his/her
perception of the pain of climbing a long climb or riding a 40 km tt, and
particularly whether or not it is what limits him/her. I think they spend
enough time at those levels that the pain perception is different than it is
for the rest of us. That's what I've been told anyway. Also, though it's not
exactly comparable, I know when my fitness is good, the perceived limiter is
not pain in the same way it is when I'm not fit. When fit, the sensation is
just a byproduct of the effort; when not fit, it's a limiter.

I'm thinking a
racer is trying to keep up and thinks "I can't handle this anymore"
then goes afterwards for a way to make it easier. I would say at that
point the rider has mentally cracked and given up- I don't see how a
rider can go past that breaking point after finding a easier way to go
past without the suffering. I'm not certain, it might have been ricco
who described how nice it was to glide along with the pack and look
around and see all the suffering faces- if he describes gliding along
while others are suffering he is not feeling pain to any extent.

Your conjectures a (1) the dopers don't have the mental fortitude to push
themselves as hard as the non-dopers; and (2) for high-level racers,
independent of doping, they're all limited by their perception of pain. Is
that correct? All else equal, how many delta-watts do you think the
non-doper's versus the doper's mental fortitude is worth? And in general, if
you had a way to measure the ability to handle the pain, how much do you
think it's worth in watts, time, or whatever? For example, take the
physiology of (rbr's new crush) Taylor Phinney and add the mind of some
other pro pursuiter who "can't handle as much pain" ...how different would
his 4k time be?

pain is why I don't get on my bike and make an effort to get my hrm to
show me a max that is one beat higher than what I am used to- it's
hard, it hurts and I don't want to cross that line even though I might
get a better time and that pushing myself to that extent shouldn't
harm me- that's my breaking point even though I think I could go a few
beats higher, much less just one. I think the same deal basically
applies to just about anyone.
there is pain management- the automaton pro cyclist- probabally has a
higher tolerance or mental focus to deal with it- but that doesn't
mean it doesn't hurt.

Sure, but I think you're suggesting that some additional psychological
training would let most of the pro peloton ride a bit harder. In other
words, you're suggesting the ultimate limiter is still mental no matter how
well trained the physiology is. Is that about right?

merckx and the hour, he said it was the most
painful thing he had ever done, and I don't doubt him that one bit.

I don't doubt that either, but it's not the same thing as saying his pain
threshold is what limited his hour distance. I think he did what he could do
and it hurt a lot.

On Jun 9, 12:17*pm, "Kurgan. presented by Gringioni."
wrote:
On Jun 9, 6:33*am, --D-y wrote:



We don't have a Truth Machine. Until we do (I hope never), doping is
an unsolvable problem.

Dumbass -

It's not possible. People's memories range from perfect (a small
minority)

No, no one has perfect memory.

to completely delusional.

Delusions are false beliefs. You could have a great memory and be
totally delusional, or vice versa.

There's a portion of the brain
that alters memories as a coping mechanism. Some brains use it only
for coping w/ truly traumatic events while other brains run all
memories through it.

Eh, not quite. A better explanation is that human memory is not
perfect because it just doesn't need to be, so it didn't evolve to
be. Trauma certainly need not be involved, and there is actually
scant evidence to support memory repression. If anything, trauma is
typically remembered too well in some cases.

And, to sum it all up, which you are right that there will almost
certainly never be a perfect Truth Machine, the future of lie
detection is coming, and it will be way better than that F. Lee Bailey
nonsense. Brain imaging technology directed to the portions of the
brain dedicated to subterfuge will be very hard to defeat.

-rj, presented by the Beckman Center.

wrote:
On Jun 8, 10:51 pm, Carl Sundquist wrote:
marco wrote:
Carl Sundquist wrote:
For the past 9 months I've been hitting 238-239 on almost every hard
ride I have done.
Are you considering surgery, like that valve ablation procedure?
(Assuming that you have the kind of arrhythmia it's designed to fix...)
Yeah, I am. It started affecting me on the bike in August of '07 in a
relatively minor way. Ran a slew of tests that Fall, but it seemed to go
away after resting in the off season. Was scheduled to have an ablation
in March of last year, but between not having much recurrence, some of
the risks of radio frequency (burning) ablation, and not keen on a 6
month regimen of Coumadin/Warfarin, I chose to postpone the procedure.
Things were going well but in August, it all fell apart again. Even easy
recovery effort rides were triggering fibrillation events. It gradually
got better (I was hoping for a similar pattern as the year before), but
not good. I heard about a clinical trial that used a cryogenic procedure
rather than the RF method that is much safer and gets you off Coumadin
in half the time. Unfortunately, I was too late for the first round of
the trials and was too far down on the list for the second round. It's
gotten not quite to a quality of life issue (if you don't count the bike
that is), but it's come to the point where I should address it sooner
rather than later.

is that all 4 chambers in correct order or is that an aberation in the
sequence, a hic-cup tricking an ecg into a faster count ?

It is (for me) just in the right atrium.