Topic: "Clean" 200/245

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

At least in the USA, height is very important. It is correlated with both income and status. Even short women want tall men for mates as a result, and this has been going on for a long time. It is true better nutrition is playing a large role and many experts dismiss natural selection as being capable of achieving the massive changes that have taken place in the last 2 centuries or so. Many believe that the potential for these heights was always there but was repressed by poor nutrition. Either way, people are getting taller though the "experts" are predicting that we are nearing the short term upper limit.

http://www.slate.com/?id=2063439

[Dirk Wilcke]

At least in the USA, height is very important. It is correlated with both income and status. Even short women want tall men for mates as a result, and this has been going on for a long time.

*Goes off to buy high heels*

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

*Goes off to buy high heels*

LOL. I have thought of buying elevator shoes many times to get another couple inches. I am comfortable with my height, but with every inch adding an average of $6,000 to your yearly income....

[Paul LaDuke]

Dirk,

Great input.  I enjoy reading your European perspective.

American athletes certainly are not of higher moral fiber than any other country's athletes.  It is just that weightlifters lack a lot of the external pressure from mainstream society that other countries have.  Weightlifting is just not a big sport here so there is very little prize money.  Since there is no money to be made in the sport, the great athletes go where the money is - powerlifting, football, track and field, to name a few.  If you do a quick study of the US Track and Field, powerlifting/strongman contestants, and our football players you will undoubtedly know that Americans cheat with restoratives as much as any other country.  I truly believe that our elite level weightlifters train clean because of the effectiveness of the USADA's testing protocol as Chris very adequately stated before.  We have busted several of our elite athletes in the past years, but I believe almost all of them were smoking weed, not steroids.

I certainly hope that Steiner is clean and if the German ADA is doing the job as effectively as the USADA, he should be as you have pointed out.  He is enjoyable to watch perform on the platform.

[Dave Almeida]

So I guess what I'm saying is that I am still not sure what I learned about drug use through looking at world record progressions. I am pretty sure it gives no immediately reasonable information on whether 200kg is possible without drugs or not.

  Of course it doesn't confirm that 200kg isn't achievable naturally. However, it does show us that 200kg has only been lifted during the period of confirmed drug use in weightlifting. This says a lot to me about the likelihood of it ever being done naturally in the past (that includes the very recent past of steiner doing it a week or so ago).


  Chris, I have a question about Shane Hamman. How often do people accuse him of taking drugs during his powerlifting career? I have never read anyone doing so on an olympic lifting forum. However he was one of the top squatters in all of powerlifting and drug use in the USA wrt powerlifting is a known epidemic, even in most tested federations. A tested powerlifting federation simply means you can't show up to the meet juiced. They don't test year round unless they changed this within the last 2 years. I'm not saying he cheated. I am just surprised there is no speculation of it when powerlifting is a sport known for its heavy drug use.

 I think no one wants to consider the fact that an American hero in weightlifting was a steroid user (even if it was before his years in olympic weightlifting). Paul Doherty, one of the coaches of Hassle Free, arguably the top youth weightlifting program in the country just got popped for testosterone use at the American Open. I saw two posts about it on goheavy and then complete outrage that the greeks and bulgarians got busted. Yea there is a difference but I still think that there is something to this, I don't know what, but something. I feel it is similar to the korean posting that he doesn't think south korea juices (although he said he was not sure), and the germans defending steiner. None have tested positive but it doesn't necessarily mean they are clean in today's world of strength sport. It will be a while before we can be ever sure that someone is clean in ANY strength sport, not just weightlifting. People forget this.

Kim Kwang Hoon cleaned 210 @ 77 and barely missed the jerk. Taehyun Kim did a 460 total i believe. There is no doubt korea has a chance to be a superpower in weightlifting soon enough. No lifter from south korea has ever been busted. Does this reflect their superior skill in weightlifting or the testing system itself. I'll let you decide.

[Dirk Wilcke]

I think no one wants to consider the fact that an American hero in weightlifting was a steroid user (even if it was before his years in olympic weightlifting). Paul Doherty, one of the coaches of Hassle Free, arguably the top youth weightlifting program in the country just got popped for testosterone use at the American Open. I saw two posts about it on goheavy and then complete outrage that the greeks and bulgarians got busted. Yea there is a difference but I still think that there is something to this, I don't know what, but something. I feel it is similar to the korean posting that he doesn't think south korea juices (although he said he was not sure), and the germans defending steiner. None have tested positive but it doesn't necessarily mean they are clean in today's world of strength sport. It will be a while before we can be ever sure that someone is clean in ANY strength sport, not just weightlifting. People forget this.

Kim Kwang Hoon cleaned 210 @ 77 and barely missed the jerk. Taehyun Kim did a 460 total i believe. There is no doubt korea has a chance to be a superpower in weightlifting soon enough. No lifter from south korea has ever been busted. Does this reflect their superior skill in weightlifting or the testing system itself. I'll let you decide.

The point with Steiner (and, for example, Dabaya) is that most other German (and French) lifters are not really competitive internationally. With countries like Bulgaria (China, Russia etc.) there is the assumption that cheating is systemic, because they consistently place well at international competition as a team, but also have already had a significant number of busts or a dubious history with respect to these issues. Now if individual lifters outperform their national peers, the country as such is rather mediocre however, then it can not really be assumed that cheating is systemic (although maybe the environment in that country is just not as conductive to weightlifting success, e.g. less money, less interest, less lifters). And to accuse individual lifters of cheating in a system that in all likelihood does not endorse cheating, does not appear very reasonable to me absent additional information. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised if Steiner wasn't clean. I just don't really have any reasons to actively suspect him not being clean, besides the fact that some people assume that the numbers he posts are unlikely to be achievable by a clean athlete.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Dave, nothing to do with Shane but I have been suspicious of all powerlifters entering our sport. However, I believe Shane's steady progress under the intense drug testing that he was under just doesn't jibe with the idea that he was a user. If he could improve steadily and eventually snatch and clean and jerk the numbers that he did while clean, it doesn't make sense to question his ability to squat those numbers powerlifting style in my view. As I said, its impossible to know who all has cheated and who didn't. So, we are left with our own personal judgments. Unfortunately, we can't simply let the competitions make the decisions because they are completely tainted. This taint clouds our entire sport, guilty and innocent alike. And, mostly the athletes are usually the victims on both sides from my perspective. But, in my view the supers are most vulnerable to error about this judgment (clean or not) for the reasons I cited. Still, in my opinion the pattern is apparent if you use one nation/several nations as a reference and compare progress over time to the "elite" nations' performance fluctuations, while also factoring in the doping positives from those nations of course.

[Dave Almeida]

Top athletes on drugs will always beat top athletes off drugs. Are you saying Steiner is that much of a better athlete than Chigishev that he can beat him without ever touching drugs? An example: Sprinter wins the gold medal with 9.70 in the 100, 2nd place is 9.71. Winner gets popped but 2nd place never gets busted and comes from a team that doesn't typically produce top sprinters. I'd argue there is no way he is clean. Some would argue he is absolutely clean even though his time would be otherworldly for a clean runner. It is the same thing in weightlifting in my eyes.

People like to look around and say wow there are so many genetic freaks out there. I disagree. There are so many people on drugs out there that would be very very good athletes even without the drugs that the naive get confused. Certainly there are some freaks in the world, but not enough as to where every sport seems to have endless numbers of them at the top levels. Maybe Steiner is a true freak. I kind of wish he is, it would be awesome. He seems like a very lovable character. Unfortunately, it is more likely in today's world that he is simply another athlete that uses steroids.

Chris I agree with your point about being suspicious of all powerlifters entering the sport.

There will be a real crossroads in sport as a whole within the next century as science continues to take over.