EPTLet the authorities deal with it and don't spoil the competition by randomly accusing people without any basis for the accusation.
[Olympics] Rio de Janeiro 2016 - Page 24
| Forum Index > Sports |
|
LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
Let the authorities deal with it and don't spoil the competition by randomly accusing people without any basis for the accusation. | ||
|
Mafe
Germany5966 Posts
| ||
|
VHbb
689 Posts
On August 11 2016 05:55 Mafe wrote: TBF sevens rugby looks quite random at some points. But then I guess this is also the case for other olympic sports, such as road cycling or basicall most judge-based sports. Rugby seven is not judge-based though  (ok there is a referee but you score points with tries and conversions as in rugby 15). For sure it's more volatile (is this a word? I'm not sure but I'm going with it) than rugby 15 since time it's much shorter and it's much more easy to score tries (less players / same field)But if you look at the results of the rugby seven series (outside of the Olympics) the winners are very consistent | ||
|
sung_moon
United States10110 Posts
| ||
|
Mafe
Germany5966 Posts
On August 11 2016 05:58 VHbb wrote: Rugby seven is not judge-based though (ok there is a referee but you score points with tries and conversions as in rugby 15). For sure it's more volatile (is this a word? I'm not sure but I'm going with it) than rugby 15 since time it's much shorter and it's much more easy to score tries (less players / same field)But if you look at the results of the rugby seven series (outside of the Olympics) the winners are very consistent Yeah I know. I was trying to say that I'm not much of a fan of the fact that a big event as the olympic games is decided mainly on who performs the best/is lucky on the day of the competition. But also that this isnt a good argument against rugby, as there are numerous other examples where this is also the case, and which have been olympic sports for much longer. | ||
|
VHbb
689 Posts
On August 11 2016 06:03 sung_moon wrote: What's more widely accepted/prestigious, 7's or 15's? Rules the same, and only difference is players/mentality? I think rugby 15 is more popular overall, but there are some regions where 7s is the most played / more popular or successful (for instance Fiji is nowhere near the level they are in rugby 7s with rugby 15) Rules are *almost* the same: the basic ones are identical (cannot pass the ball forward, try and conversions are the same, outline, tackles, etc.) but there are a few differences coming from the fact that there are less players (I'm not 100% sure of all of them!) | ||
|
LaNague
Germany9118 Posts
| ||
Shellshock
United States97276 Posts
| ||
|
sharkie
Austria18519 Posts
| ||
|
VHbb
689 Posts
On August 11 2016 06:45 Shellshock wrote: They said Fiji had won like 39 games in a row in 7s in recent time and were the 1 seed for this tournament so is it really that huge of a disappointment? Feel like the disappointment should be with how NZL did in the other matches I think the disappointment is (for NZ) that NZ got eliminated before the semifinals, and that they performed a bit poorly in all their matches (not only vs Fiji, as you say). If you look at the results of the 7s world series of 14/15 and 15/16 they were 1st: Fiji 2nd: SA 3rd: NZ So they are very close to Fiji Loosing vs Fiji is not a huge disappointment, but I think NZ is always expected to perform at the top in rugby (7s, 15s, everything) so I bet the kiwis are quite disappointed  (I mean, Japan is in the semis and NZ isn't - congrats to Japan! - but that tells a lot) | ||
Nakajin
Canada8989 Posts
| ||
|
FiWiFaKi
Canada9859 Posts
A 4kg WR on C&J in the 77kg. Damn, beautiful. | ||
|
sertas
Sweden888 Posts
On August 11 2016 05:26 Zealously wrote: See, the thing with Phelps is that if you assume he is doping, the most reasonable conclusion is that he has been doping since the very beginning of his career - pretty much since age 14. He broke his first world record when he was 15, more than 16 years ago. You can reasonably assume that he has been tested somewhere in the vicinity of half a thousand times since then. "No way this dude is clean" seems somewhat a strong statement with that in mind. Besides, the most extraordinary thing about his career to me is his meteoric rise, not the fact that he has maintained his top level for so long. He is one of the most (actually, probably the most, period) rigorously tested athletes in the sport, and has been for at least eight years. With Lance Armstrong in mind I know that doesn't necessarily mean that much, but it strikes me as unlikely that he would be doping at such a young age, and there hasn't really been any point in his career where his performances "spiked" beyond the initial catapult-esque ascent to #1. I know it's "in" to think everyone is doping, and sure - there are grounds for the assumption, but the guy has all the physical and environmental prerequisites for being the best swimmer ever. And given that other swimmers match him (or nearly so) in most races, it begs the question if you think no one is clean. its also very reasonable that he has been doping since he was a teenager like for example arnold and most pro´s | ||
|
L_Master
United States8017 Posts
On August 10 2016 13:34 GoTuNk! wrote: What about year round "random testing"? Few things are as shady as "random" testing in weightlifting. I would rather eliminate random testing and have competition testing only or just remove testing completely, simply because the current system is just not fair. I do understand where you're coming from, but I can't really see either of those situations as being better. At the same time, eliminating testing is synonymous with allowing doping. My problem with doing that is twofold. The first is trickle down, if you must dope to be a top pro, most collegians are going to need to dope too, and with the money in athletics that means lots of HSers trying to dope as well. Don't like where that leads. Elite athletes have support systems and can dope in relatively safety. Ignorant MS/HS kids? Not so much. Then MUCH bigger than that if you allow doping then you turn athletic competition into a science competition about who can develop the best drugs, or increasingly, the best novel genetic modifications. The results would be fantastically impressive, but would also take away the key aspect of what makes athletics, swimming, cycling, weightlifting, etc. compelling. Doping in team sports I would have less of an issue with. If you have competition testing only, it's not far from allowing doping. If you know when the tests are, they are incredibly easy to avoid. It's a basic IQ test. It might slightly limit what you can do, but it would still allow for much greater PED use than the present situation, and athlete's could basically forego many competitions before key meets to ensure wonderful, extended blocks in which they could dope full on before cycling off a smidge before the competition. Actually though, you mention random testing not being fair. Maybe you can elaborate more, because after thinking a bit I'm not sure I see a lack of fairness. If you're clean, you'll never test positive; so even if you get tested more than anybody else it's still plenty fair because their is no negative impact to you (besides mild inconvience of having to provide samples). If you do test positive, I guess it's not "fair" in the sense that one drug cheat might get tested more than another and be more likely to produce a positive test. In my book though, it's still reasonable because one of the cheats got popped, which is MUCH more fair to the athletes we care about, the ones competing honestly, to have to deal with just one doped athlete rather than two. | ||
|
L_Master
United States8017 Posts
On August 11 2016 05:50 LegalLord wrote: Honestly, I think of this "did X dope?" discussion to be as stupid as the "did Y match fix" discussions that go on in the Starcraft forums. Let the authorities deal with it and don't spoil the competition by randomly accusing people without any basis for the accusation. Being a top athlete is a pretty good basis for accusing someone. The benefits of doping are MASSIVE. On the order of 5-10% in endurance sports (i.e. 6-6.2 w/kg for cycling now vs 6.8+ w/kg in 'unrestricted' era). It's absolutely possible that one athlete can be better, even significantly better than the others. However, at the elite level you tend to approach the current limits of human performance. So if you're talking about a Phelps, an Armstrong, a Farah, a Bolt, etc. being clean then you're saying that as a clean athlete they are still crushing all the athletes doping, which has been routinely found to be a high percentage, in excess of 25% getting caught, which could easily mean 50-100% actually doping. Anonymous surveys suggest similar or high percentages. In order to believe that someone like that is clean, you have to believe that they are literally 5-10% better than any other human in the world at their sport, because their even overcoming the doping advantage to win clean. Can you rule it out? No. I'll admit I find it highly unlikely, however. | ||
|
LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
Yes, people do have motivation to dope and I'm sure a lot of them do it. But it's a blanket accusation that's baseless when you single out any one individual. Saying that someone dopes because they do good is like saying someone match fixed because they do bad. | ||
|
L_Master
United States8017 Posts
On August 11 2016 12:46 LegalLord wrote: The problem with your entire point is that everything you describe is basically treating athletes as crooks by default. While testing before competitions is perfectly reasonable as a procedural precaution, random tests basically treat athletes like crooks. It's partly a "if you did nothing wrong you have nothing to hide" argument and partly failing to acknowledge the reality that there are plenty of both false positives and false negatives within drug testing. Yes, people do have motivation to dope and I'm sure a lot of them do it. But it's a blanket accusation that's baseless when you single out any one individual. Saying that someone dopes because they do good is like saying someone match fixed because they do bad. I didn't say this. I said that doing well in a sport where most everyone is likely doping is suspicious in the sense it requires believing that athlete is massively better than any other athlete in his sport. That could be the case with any of these top names, so it's certainly NOT an accusation of doping. It's just a data point that makes you wonder. There aren't many false positives in athletics, certainly not 'plenty' in what I would think of that word. Remember, there are A and B samples. Not only is an A re-checked (with different, more specific methods) in the event of a positive, you also entirely retest the B as well. I'd guarantee you the false+ rate is less than 1/1000, and would not be surprised at all to discover it was less, maybe even significantly less, than 1 in 100,000. If you suspect procedural error, or testing error the results can be appealed, and eventually even challenged in CAS. I may not be understanding or grasping your argument, but I do not see how random testing supposes an athlete is cheating. It merely assumes the possibility an athlete is cheating. This is a reasonable assumption from which to work. If I'm missing your point, please feel free to correct me. | ||
|
sharkie
Austria18519 Posts
| ||
|
suresh325
2 Posts
| ||
|
suresh325
2 Posts
| ||
| ||
