virren was on drugs


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It became commonly believed that Lasse' Viren did something called "blood doping" whereby he would donate a pint of his own blood 6 months or more before important world class races (like the Olympics) and frozen. Then within a week or so before the race would have his blood transfused back into his system. That gave him additional hemoglobin and gave his circulatory system more oxygen carrying capability. Since it was his own blood, there was no real way of detecting it by any testing.

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Read this article from WebMD for further information regarding blood doping.

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/blood-doping

Given that Viren was relatively mediocre running in international races in between Olympics, it was widely assumed he "blood doped" prior to both the 1972 and 1976 Olympics to improve his performance.

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You can doubt it if you wish, but the practice of blood doping has been illegal in Olympic competition since the mid 1980's. If it doesn't work why is it now illegal? That being said I guess you could argue that since retransfusion of one's on blood wasn't against the rules at the time Prefontaine and Viren ran then it wasn't against the letter of the law, although it was certainly against the spirit of the Olympics (in both 1972 and 1976 games). Here is another article regarding blood doping and the acquisations against Lasse Viren.

http://www.faqs.org/sports-science/Ba-Ca/Blood-Doping.html

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