Latin American rowers from many countries train (or used to) at Tiquicaca Lake, in Bolivia. The highest lake in the world. Apparently intense training in a thin atmosphere made them more powerful when racing in richer atmospheres.<p>Source: Olympic rower who is a friend.
If it confers an advantage, even a small one, and it's allowed, everyone will be compelled to do it in order to remain competitive.<p>That's the crazy thing about high level sports. Either it's banned or everyone does it. There is no in between.
I got a light case of CO poisoning from using a grill outdoors in a space that I guess wasn't really well ventilated. Threw up in the middle of the night (wasn't the food, everyone else was fine and so was I the very next day). I didn't feel any faster after that and it was kind of a miserable experience.<p>I don't think I would mess around with that stuff.
> That’s what happened in January 2023 when two riders on Uno-X Mobility had to be taken to hospital after a go-karting session for team bonding left them with carbon monoxide poisoning.<p>Surely it was the go-karting and the team-bonding...
This sounds very stupidly dangerous. I’m amazed this is legal, and that people would do it in the first place.<p>I get wanting to win at all costs but this is nuts.
Couple of things:<p>I’m not sure this is dangerous, per se, as long as the dosage is measured. As you learn in school, CO is only poisonous because it replaces oxygen in your blood. There’s no negative long term effects as long as the dose never reduces the oxygen mix of air beyond what a human can survive on.<p>This is being used to simulate altitude training, so I don’t see how you can ban it. It’ll just mean all teams go back to altitude training instead. We don’t consider altitude training doping because that would be an insane position to take. Would you ban riders from mountainous regions from cycling?<p>That second point also means it’s not being dangerously configured because we know the oxygen % levels at different altitudes.<p>An interesting article, nonetheless.
I wonder what'll happen if/when it leads to a fatality:<p>> Other details like optimal dosage are still very much in question as well. [...] Aside from the risk of death, acute carbon monoxide poisoning can cause lasting health problems, including delayed neurological damage. [..."]But if you inhale carbon monoxide, the half-life is 300 minutes. If you get toxic levels, you’re really screwed” because the gas can’t leave your body for hours. [...] And in especially acute cases, victims would need access to a hospital equipped with a special hyperbaric chamber for treatment.
Seems like they are breathing plenty of carbon monoxide during the race too:
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