Detecting Cheating in Freediving - Constant Weight:

[Kars]

Detecting Cheating in Freediving - Constant Weight:
Improving trust in regulations and performances.


Dear Freediver.

With the growing of our beloved sport Freediving I feel there has come a need for more trust in the verification of performances.

To keep our sport clean and fair, we have to expend our understanding and maybe some of our regulations concerning cheaters.
Understanding it is impossible to make rules to prevent all cheating, the goal I feel should be to make cheating difficult and expensive enough to keep most from even attempting.

In order to help AIDA in grow to a new level judging professionalism worthy of our earned trust, we can help by making a list of cheats and prevention rules.

To make this an efficient an useful thread I think we should:

- take one discipline at the time.
- list the easy -known- cheats first.
- distillate all solutions into, practical, affordable, easy prevention rules.

I think the format for a post effectively could be the condensed:

(Number*)Cheat - Solution(s)

I invite all freedivers, Jury members, trainers and magicians to help create a thorough list and expend our understanding of all the cheats in order to keep our beloved sport clean and fair.


Let's continue with the depth discipline; CONSTANT WEIGHT.

Thank you all for your help Deeperblue members!

Kars

(* Please make the number following the previous cheat posts, make sure it's cheat not yet listed)

 

[efattah]

There are two mains cheats which have been actually used in real life by some athletes:

1. Hiding weights in the gloves, hood, or suit, and then dropping them when out of view of any cameras
2. Pulling on the rope during the ascent

Herbert is famous for try #2 as a joke and getting away with it. #1 was tried by someone known by Seb Naslund I think, when told to try to cheat, and got away with it.

I also believe that enriched oxygen can be used for deep dives, as long as the fraction is less than 35%. However 27-35% would still give a huge advantage.

The usual doping candidates still apply (EPO, beta blockers, etc..)

 

[chrismar]

Seeing as the usual suspects all have a significant risk of a cardiac event, doping isn't a huge risk (except for the athlete!). You'll be able to tell the athletes that dope; they're the corpses.

 

[efattah]

Another issue would be a small concealed O2 cylinder under the suit, which would allow the athlete to breath some O2 during the ascent, for example when coming up from 130m+, the athlete could inhale some O2 at 50m, still below the safety, and above the bottom camera.

I personally believe that wetsuits should not be allowed in the depth events. Maybe you could allow a hood or gloves if the water is colder than 12C.

 

[nekton]

In principle pulling on the rope should be relatively easy to control: surface judge holding on to the descent line.
Unfortunately, this can be tricky in rough condition, or if the bottom weight is extremely heavy so the judge cannot feel the difference when the diver is pulling. The only other solution that comes to mind is 100% video/scuba diver coverage of the whole dive, but that would be exceedingly difficult to arrange, and would raise the costs too much for all but the best sponsored divers.

Extra weights and hidden cylinders should not be too difficult to check for, as long as the judges are well aware of this. I don't think banning wetsuits in depth disciplines is a realistic option.

Seeing as the usual suspects all have a significant risk of a cardiac event, doping isn't a huge risk (except for the athlete!). You'll be able to tell the athletes that dope; they're the corpses.

Is there any solid evidence behind this? I know there may be risks, but do you have any facts to back this up? I don't know anyone who has tried it. I am not aware on any research on the dangers of EPO (and other similar substances) combined with freediving either.

These speculative risks are not enough to convince me that doping is not being used and will not be used in the depth disciplines. And even if we accept that EPO is too dangerous to be used by anyone, that still leaves us with beta blockers among other things.

Much better doping control is necessary if we want the sport to really be taken seriously in the long run (whether we want that or not is another question). How should this be done? Fattah and others have already given great suggestions, and we should also look closely at how it is done in the olympic sports.

 

[efattah]

I know (3rd hand) of a spearfisherman who started using beta blockers, and his working depth doubled. He continued using them indefinitely without ever dying....

 

[chrismar]

I know (3rd hand) of a spearfisherman who started using beta blockers, and his working depth doubled. He continued using them indefinitely without ever dying....

Interesting. Did he have a cardiac condition? Of course if you do, beta blockers will control your problem. If you don't, I would expect the heart to not respond to the increased blood pressure by increasing stroke volume. Blocking the β1 receptors in the heart prevents it from adjusting to external factors, thus increasing the chances of a deep blackout. After all, they were originally used primarily to reduce hypertension by decreasing cardiac output. While I'm sure some people would love to find out if this would be fatal, I'm not one of them.

As for other substances, you'll find plenty of literature on the fatal effects of EPO and blood doping in extremis. When you factor in the massive increase in blood pressure at depth and the inability to get to a victim should they suffer a cardiac event, is it any surprise there's no hands-on study to be found? Other than blood doping in it's various guises, I can't think of any other substance that's likely to give a positive improvement off the top of my head.

Obviously the enriched air idea could be of use, but surely that could easily be dealt with in an outdoor situation with a diver on the line? It would be a very unobservant judge to miss the tank of nitrox with the tube pointing at the athlete.

 

[nekton]

As for other substances, you'll find plenty of literature on the fatal effects of EPO and blood doping in extremis. When you factor in the massive increase in blood pressure at depth and the inability to get to a victim should they suffer a cardiac event, is it any surprise there's no hands-on study to be found? Other than blood doping in it's various guises, I can't think of any other substance that's likely to give a positive improvement off the top of my head.

Hey chrismar, thanks for your answer.
Again, I have no doubt that EPO and blood doping are dangerous in the depth disciplines, as well as other sports. But as an example of the risks some people are willing to take in order to "be the best", have a look at


Bamberger M. Yaeger D. Over the edge. Sports Illustrated. 1997;14:62–70.

This article reports a poll of 198 sprinters, swimmers, powerlifters and other assorted athletes, most of them U.S. Olympians or aspiring Olympians. They are given two scenarios:

Scenario 1 - You are offered a banned, performance-enhancing substance, with two guarantees: (1) you will not be caught and (2) you will win. Would you take the substance? 195 said yes; 3 said no.

Scenario 2 - You are offered a banned, performance-enhancing substance, with two guarantees: (1) you will not be caught and (2) you will win every competition you enter for the next five years, and then you will die from the side effects of the substance. Would you take the substance? More than 50% the athletes said yes.



I am with you in that I would not be one to try how fatal EPO (among others) is, but with more and more people practicing the sport, some people unfortunately will be willing to do this.

Not trying to be a pain in the ass here I just want to justify why I believe doping IS a very real danger in any freediving discipline, and we shouldn't assume it won't be done just because it is too risky.


Very interesting point about beta blockers, Eric... Doubling your depth sounds incredible! I also remember hearing of someone trying statics while using beta blockers with huge results (this was just out of interest and not in competition, the freediver was not trying to cheat. And this too was 3rd hand, so don't take it as fact...).

 

[trux]

Scenario 1 - You are offered a banned, performance-enhancing substance, with two guarantees: (1) you will not be caught and (2) you will win. Would you take the substance? 195 said yes; 3 said no.

OMG! I cannot believe that. Does no sport spirit and sense for fair-play exist anymore? How's possible that only 1.5% of "aspiring" athletes are honest (or pretend to be)? I would never expect so horrifying number. When nothing else, and despite the survey being anonymous, I'd expect more of them would at least try pretending to be honest. If it is true, then it is really sad.

 

[nekton]

It is really sad, and I find it hard to believe as well.

However, it does seem to be a fairly well respected and well known poll. I was recently listening to a talk given by someone who did their PhD on doping in sports, and he quoted this article in his presentation.

But I really find the numbers in both scenarios hard to believe, and very very sad.

 

[chrismar]

It's true; I've seen the survey. In fact I believe it's a regular thing, every few years or so. Currently there's not enough money or prestige in the sport, with a couple of exceptions, to make cheating a big thing. I do understand though where you're coming from.

One of my main worries with doping in depth is the effect that a death will have on our sport. If people do start doping, it is inevitable that a person will have a serious accident that ends fatally. Where will that leave the rest of us safety-wise, especially if we don't know or can't prove they were doping? What happens to progression and getting new members into a sport that already has an ill-gotten reputation for risk?

 

[Kars]

Good points people, keep it going!

Also a death in a competition -especially a champion's- would have consequences for insurance, organisers, costs, laws, sponsorship, etc.

Kars

 

[DivingDane]

some of the classics like aaltitude tents to increase production of red blood cells, very common for cyclists. will be of great advantage and short of following the competitior around for weeks before and event is also Extremly difficult to proove, now is it illigal or is it just training? the addition of fresh blood high in red bloods cells the day before an event is also very achievable and i would think one of the more likely ways of cheating doping in any disciplin.

DD

 

[DivingDane]

itn would be entirely possible to have a suit custom made with a small air chamber between the inner and outer layer of neoprene, small tube built into the inside of the hood which could be used during the deeper stages of a dive. short of every judge personally inspecting every competitors wetsuit inside and outside it would never be noticed and it would be entirely possible to add say 1L or more of air through out a suit without any noticable change in shape.

DD

 

[trux]

Hypoxic tents were not forbidden in Olympic sports, the last time I researched EPO and oxygen doping, and I guess it did not change. Although ban was considered, the proposal was not accepted. I think the main reason was that it would be really difficult to control. And then, you would also need to forbid training camps at altitude.

And I know that hypoxic tents are used in freediving too. Not sure if it is widely used, but for example Mandy-Rae Cruickshank (now Krack), openly admitted she was sleeping in a hypoxic tent during her preparation to a world record. See for example this DB article: Mandy-Rae sets her tag at 91 metres by Sara-Lise Haith on DeeperBlue.com

Also Blaine, the magician, who was trained by Krack, used hypoxic tent too. I wonder if Martin Stepanek used a hypoxic tent too, being trained by the same people in past. I would certainly prefer that not. Although it is not officially forbidden, from medical or security point of view I consider almost as dangerous as EPO doping, and also from ethic point of view it is discutable whether it is quite clean. Well, it is permitted, and that's what pays.

Edit: so unfortunately my suspicion about Martin seems to be right. At least it is what Paul Kotik wrote, and since he was in the same team, it is certainly true: It's Time: Showdown at Nice by Paul Kotik on DeeperBlue.com

 

[Jorg]

Trux, there are many freedivers who use hypoxic tents and for sure the cheaper variant of altitude training: the special breathing machines that control the percentage of o2. You do this for a short period of time, like 30-60 minutes. And apperantely to the latest studies it is way more efficient that a night in altitude tent and way better then a week in high altitude as they used to do.

I don't see any problem in these developments. I even like this kind of training innovation.

Why do you think it's a problem? only medical and security reasons? Or more?

 

[trux]

Yes, perhaps you are right. Finally WADA permits the use of hypoxic tens, and studies even claim there is no health risk when properly used. I found some more info in this document: http://article.pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/RPAS/rpv?hm=HInit&afpf=h07-013.pdf&journal=apnm&volume=32