Elite Sport's Race to the Bottom, and Anti-Doping's Scramble for Higher Ground

In this Spotlight edition, Gareth Davies and Ross Tucker dive ever deeper into the abyss of sport's Talent Identification and Development inefficiencies. With a nod to our most recent podcast on Gout Gout's meteoric rise and anticipated trajectory to sprint dominance, we discuss how elite sport 'farms' talent in a 'race to the bottom' that characterises the ruthless pursuit of champions. We discuss the costs this creates, both financial and human, using talent pathway practices in cycling, football, rugby and tennis to illustrate why lost young athletes and inefficiencies are features of the system, rather than 'bugs'. We also discuss the latest developments in the world of anti-doping, where WADA have announced changes to contamination cases and accidental doping, and where the UCI have moved to ban carbon monoxide use for performance enhancement, but not measurement.SHOW NOTES:Join DiscourseIf you fancy a bit of the coaching, sports science and sports news conversations with our amazing members, consider a small donation to become a Patron of the site, and get access to our Discourse community, where you can join like-minded fans and sports enthusiasts to keep the conversation going.The article discussing the retirement of junior cyclists and the ruthless efficiency with which they are replacedA research article exploring how U23 performances predict elite cycling performance, perhaps not surprisingly, as discussed in the showMy 2019 article on the curse of the precocious athleteThe Gout Gout podcast referenced in our Talent discussionsThe very interesting Discourse topic in which Gareth and others talk about the changes in professional cycling (Discourse members only)A news article on WADA's announcement about intended changes to the Anti-Doping Code, including the discussed changes to contaminated product and accidental doping rulesThe UCI "bans" carbon monoxide use for performance enhancement, but not for measurement. Quite how is anyone's guess. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There are no comments yet.

Please log in to write the first comment.