As for the topic change of this thread and back to it’s point. Athlete’s who dope have shorter careers.
Here’s my reasoning and opinion. (I don’t think you can find empirically either way)
1. All athletes or most of them start clean.
2. The reason to dope(cheat) comes at the point when they can no longer win or have to win to find satisfaction in participation in the sport. This doesn’t happen until the HS level or collegiate level. However, you’ll find it tough to find a systemic doping regime in collegiate track and field these days, unless the football program and S&C;staff what to supply it to them.
3. If you have to dope to win and can no longer win while doping then why compete any longer.
4. This seems to happen at a neatly convenient time. Age 27-33 for most athletes across the board and not just track athletes. Why??? The effect of anabolic PED’s on connective tissues (muscle,tendon, ligament, fascae, and bone) actually causes some very bad unbalanced physiological consequences with increased force outputs and rate of force development that occur with there consumption. Tendon and Ligaments deteriorate with long term use, while bone and muscle get stronger and harder.
5. After the injuries occur to the tendon and ligament tissues (in some case muscles), the athlete loses performance even with PED usage because the tendons and ligaments no longer replicate like they had even at pre-PED usage levels thus all performance is dictated by the performance of muscle and bone.
6. If you can’t compete to the level of satisfaction that makes you want to compete well then you get out. How can someone who dopes, do it for a long period of time in which it does not produce results for that individual.
7. The examples are out there to justify this reasoning. In American “Sports” were PED’s are used at a very high percentage it seems there is a 5-7 year window maybe 8 years at most were an athlete begins to use PED’s before performance drops significantly. In Baseball, Clemens, Canseco, McGwire, Bonds, Sosa, Tejeda, Pettite etc… The longest term of use known and high level of performance was McGwire with Andro and that was about 11 years on an unproven substance although many believe he took something else between 1995-2001, his career was plaqued with injuries. The older athletes needed prescribed playing schedules while continuing to were down to nagging injuries and the younger players fell off the planet. In football, were PED usage is likely the highest in sport, players like Merriman come to mind, but Bill Romanowski seems to be counter intuitive to what I believe. The guys who survive injuries in the NFL by taking corticosteroids not just anabolic steriods. Take corticosteroids before a WADA administered organizations competition and see what happens to you.