Omerta

dave_1

was better. I have to admit I have sometimes argued against it...but... this operation puerto thing will just create unemployment, deny young riders a career they deserve

Armstrong was right to chase down Simeoni and Bassons has also made a career out of his anti-doping image...not without ulterior motives in himself it seems.

Are you for Omerta or Spit in Soup soupt bowl? Please state your stance forumers!

micron

Personally, I'd love to see the sport go back to the good old days of the 70s when I first became a fan - I loved the style of racing and the riders. And, yes, I was always fairly aware that doping was going on but it was easy to turn a blind eye.

But in terms of the sport? The climate, whether we like it or not, has changed - there are too many anti doping crusaders, too many high profile cases both in cycling and other sports, to keep turning a blind eye. We might not like it, and it certainly isn't pretty, but that's a lot to do with resistance and denial and a desire to keep going with the old ways when the 'old ways' are no longer acceptable. Perhaps this season should have been canceled - or at least the big showpiece events - while the mess gets sorted out. But if the sport is to survive it'll continue to try and win an unwinnable battle because it simply doesn't have any other choice.

dave_1

micron wrote:

Personally, I'd love to see the sport go back to the good old days of the 70s when I first became a fan - I loved the style of racing and the riders. And, yes, I was always fairly aware that doping was going on but it was easy to turn a blind eye.

But in terms of the sport? The climate, whether we like it or not, has changed - there are too many anti doping crusaders, too many high profile cases both in cycling and other sports, to keep turning a blind eye. We might not like it, and it certainly isn't pretty, but that's a lot to do with resistance and denial and a desire to keep going with the old ways when the 'old ways' are no longer acceptable. Perhaps this season should have been canceled - or at least the big showpiece events - while the mess gets sorted out. But if the sport is to survive it'll continue to try and win an unwinnable battle because it simply doesn't have any other choice.

i think we've learned nothing new from the T mobile confessions, from Musseuw, from the nobody who got sacked by kelme, from Riis. What have we achieved aprt from putting athletes and team support on the dole?

Kléber

Dave_1 wrote:

this operation puerto thing will just create unemployment, deny young riders a career they deserve

So you reckon they deserve to spend 10 years injecting hormones, infusing blood and risking their health?

Not me.

dave_1

Kléber wrote:

Dave_1 wrote:

this operation puerto thing will just create unemployment, deny young riders a career they deserve

So you reckon they deserve to spend 10 years injecting hormones, infusing blood and risking their health?

Not me.

Aren't there other ways to solve that problem than putting everyone on the dole? The doping confessions haven't educated us...most of us know the methods.

Eurostar

I've completely lost interest. I used to think the Tour was the highlight of the year, but the Landis debacle, the Rasmussen farce and the continuing presence of the monstrous Bruyneel have killed it for me. I won't bother watching again until they find a way to get rid of all the cheats. I know people like Fuentes and Bruyneel and Conte will always be one step ahead of the testers, so I think we need to make the penalties so harsh that nobody would dare risk doping. So: even for a first offence you get jail time for sporting fraud, a lifetime ban from having anything to do with the sport, all your palmares are wiped out and you have to repay all the prize money you've ever won. And all your samples are stored for decades and you can be punished retrospectively for doping after you've retired. AND your whole team is suspended for a year, and your manager for 3 years.

And I want Dwain Chambers out too.

LangerDan

Dole queue or death? Hmmmmm, let me see.....

The whole "return to the 70's and 80's" thing reminds me of the aftermath of Ayrton Senna's death. Track owners around the world were instructed by the FIA to sanitise their tracks and remove hazards, some of which were what gave particular tracks their fame. Jacques Villeneuve complained about the loss of the romantic image of F1. Max Moseley's reponse - "All this talk of romance and history is all very well until someone dies." and its just the same for cycling. It is a very bitter pill to swallow when your sporting idols are shown not to be the Olympian ideal you took them for.

Much like Eurostar, I'm getting fed up. Miniature climbers who can suddenly time trial, 6 foot tall rouleurs who can climb like angels, 20 stone rugby players who can sprint quicker than national level athletes, indefatigable 17 year old tennis players...

Testing has only proven so successful - if some individuals are prepared to break the silence, for whatever reason, it has to help. I do believe that the confessions have helped. Not in the "how, but the "who". The upper levels of the sport (UCI, ASO, mangagers, former stars) would like to have us believe that institutionalised doping went away in '98 and its only a few mavericks at it now. As someone here put it so well "I have only two things to say to that - bo!!ocks". At least the '07 round of confesions put that lie to rest.

It may not be a popular view, but I believe that the riders (or most professional sportsmen for that matter) are no more owed a living than anyone else. "Ordinary" folk lose their jobs everyday - should illegal practices be permitted by them and their employers so they won't be sacked?

I think 2008 will show a lot. At this point, if they can't be arsed to tidy things up, the whole lot are welcome to sign-on in the first week of '09

dave_1

I ask what are the benefits of the confessions by Jacksche, Sinkewitz, Riis, Zabel, Aldag? We learned nothing new and lost sponsors. Testing does work to quite an extent I think

dave_1

Eurostar wrote:

I've completely lost interest. I used to think the Tour was the highlight of the year, but the Landis debacle, the Rasmussen farce and the continuing presence of the monstrous Bruyneel have killed it for me. I won't bother watching again until they find a way to get rid of all the cheats. I know people like Fuentes and Bruyneel and Conte will always be one step ahead of the testers, so I think we need to make the penalties so harsh that nobody would dare risk doping. So: even for a first offence you get jail time for sporting fraud, a lifetime ban from having anything to do with the sport, all your palmares are wiped out and you have to repay all the prize money you've ever won. And all your samples are stored for decades and you can be punished retrospectively for doping after you've retired. AND your whole team is suspended for a year, and your manager for 3 years.

And I want Dwain Chambers out too.

Bruyneel hasn't been caught doing anything, so you can't say that. I am no fan of his I assure you...but you should stop short of saying he is one step ahead.

avalon

I'm at a bit of a loss here I must confess.
Do you ,Dave 1 ask the question in order to put your opinions forward.
Or are you genuinely interested in the opinion of others?
Bruyneel would seem to be one step ahead if we discount the fact that he didn't figure on being outed or should I say ousted by ASO..
So why should Eurostar hold his tongue?

brido67

Dave_1 wrote:

was better. I have to admit I have sometimes argued against it...but... this operation puerto thing will just create unemployment, deny young riders a career they deserve

Armstrong was right to chase down Simeoni and Bassons has also made a career out of his anti-doping image...not without ulterior motives in himself it seems.

Are you for Omerta or Spit in Soup soupt bowl? Please state your stance forumers!

Woosh

aurelio_-_banned

micron wrote:

Personally, I'd love to see the sport go back to the good old days of the 70s when I first became a fan - I loved the style of racing and the riders. And, yes, I was always fairly aware that doping was going on but it was easy to turn a blind eye.

The big difference between doping back in the 'golden age' of cycling and today is that 'old school' doping didn't turn also-rans into Tour winners, as modern methods such as Epo and blood doping can. Riders such as Coppi who was widely known to use stimulants would still have won as many, or almost as many, major races with them as without. The use of stimulants in those days was largely a product of the cyclist's life-style: 200 racing days per year, the necessity to take part in the exhausting after-Tour criterium circuit where most of the riders income came from, then the 6 Day season and so on, with the riders often driving themselves hundreds of miles between events. That life-style has gone and modern riders are much more able to target a few specific events, are transported by team bus and all the rest so the use of stimulants simply in order to be able to ride yet another day is a thing of the past.

Unfortunately the long-existing culture of doping in cycling has adopted to the modern era using methods which can make a huge difference to a rider's performance. However, not all riders benefit equally so in the modern era even if all riders were to use the same 'preparation' methods the results of events is likely to be very different to what it would be if they all raced 'clean'.

Just look at the way the ability of riders like Riis and Armstrong was transformed when they got on to a serious 'program'. For example, whilst Armstrong was a talented one-day rider nothing in his pre-cancer days suggested he had what it took to win 7 straight Tours. (And just look what Merckx did in his first Tour!). In fact even when he was world RR Champion and so was very much at the 'top of his game' already (and didn't Boardman himself say at the time that once you have got to that level of the game you are lucky if you scrape an additional 5w per year?) he had trouble finishing the Tour with 3 abandons in his first 4 rides and typically loosing 20- 30 minutes on each Mountain stage of the Tour. He couldn't even time trial that well, with Chris Boardman beating him into 18th place in the 1994 prologue and losing 6 minutes 23 seconds in the 64 km time trial to Bergerac. As to his mountain stage performances, in 1993 he finished 86th at 21.42 on the 10th stage to Serre Chevalier via the Galibier and 97th at 28.47 on the 11th stage finishing at the summit of Isola 2000, after which he abandoned. In 1994 he finished 65th at 7.03 on the 11th stage which was flat apart from climb to finish at Hautecam and was 55th at 20.09 on the 12th stage which went to Luz Ardiden via the Tourmalet. In 1994 Armstrong abandoned on the next mountain stage (stage 15) which went over Mt Ventoux.

This is the real issue with modern-day doping, it make the results of events meaningless, with the finishing order to a very large extent simply showing which riders have a physiology which responds best to modern, 'state of the art' doping methods.

micron

I agree, aurelio, and I think that was the point I was trying to make. You always felt that the rider who won would have done so anyway - up until that Gewiss 1, 2, 3. Even Indurain showed some progression in his career but Riis? And then of course Armstrong who, after losing 6 minutes to Indurain in a TT said he needed to get better by a minute a year, something he never did until his comeback when he was many many minutes faster...Landis was the proof that carthorses could indeed become racehorses with the right 'preparation'.

The sport has to be pragmatic if it isn't going to look like a doped up freak show - but, instead of McQuaid siding with the dopers, it needs firm leadership from the UCI to put cycling at the forefront of the campaign. Instead the sport allows itself to be victimised and becomes Dick Pound's whipping boy.

dave_1

avalon wrote:

I'm at a bit of a loss here I must confess.
Do you ,Dave 1 ask the question in order to put your opinions forward.
Or are you genuinely interested in the opinion of others?
Bruyneel would seem to be one step ahead if we discount the fact that he didn't figure on being outed or should I say ousted by ASO..
So why should Eurostar hold his tongue?

I simply ask what the benefits are of spitting in the soup? Bassons has carved himself out a career in anti-doping because of taking on Armstrong. I don't think Sinkewitz, Jacksche and D'hont should be allowed back into the sport-I hope they don't get sponsors-they have helped damage the sport once, been caught and have compounded the damage they've already done, scaring the hell out of sponsors and leaving possibly clean riders jobless.

What single useful fact have we learned from the confessions that we didn't already know?

DaveyL

Does the name Jesus Manzano mean anything to you?

Operacion Puerto, perhaps?

dave_1

DaveyL wrote:

Does the name Jesus Manzano mean anything to you?

Operacion Puerto, perhaps?

what did we learn from him about doping that we didn't already know? Saiz of liberty was apprehended with stuff...i don't see the Manzano connection there. I think plea bargains and ratting on your mates when you get caught doping is lousy really..

Moomaloid

I'm really bloomin confused here... I must be completely stupid or something, but surely these guys speaking out is good for our sport. Are you guys saying they've harmed the sport by speaking out? Utter stupidity! Yes they are only speaking out because they've been caught, but any insight into their systematic doping systems is good news.

For all of those that say they;d rather it was kept quiet and it doesn't achieve anything, in my book, obviously don't care for the future of the sport.

DaveyL

Dave_1 wrote:

DaveyL wrote:

Does the name Jesus Manzano mean anything to you?

Operacion Puerto, perhaps?

what did we learn from him about doping that we didn't already know? Saiz of liberty was apprehended with stuff...i don't see the Manzano connection there. I think plea bargains and ratting on your mates when you get caught doping is lousy really..

Unless this is a spectacular wind-up, you have seriously lost the plot.

aurelio_-_banned

Dave_1 wrote:

this operation puerto thing will just create unemployment, deny young riders a career they deserve

No, it is the dopers who deny other riders the career they deserve. For example, if Boardman ( a rider vouched to be clean by other riders who bravely exposed the extent of doping in pro cycling, such as Nicolas Aubier ) had been racing against other riders who weren't using Epo, blood doping and so on he would probably have been a contender for the overall in the Tour. He even knew what 'preparation' methods would have benefited him the most. For example, after having tests he discovered that his testosterone level was naturally low and was depleted further by heavy racing, something which adversely affected his ability to recover. However he declined to use artificial testosterone and so always raced at a disadvantage. I also recall how he had a barrage of tests showing his sustainable power output should have put him up there in the mountains only for him to find that one in the Tour "100 riders" simply left him for dead come the first real mountain. Now we know why!

As Bradley Wiggins said the real 'hero's of the modern day Tour are "Guys like Geraint Thomas, 21 years old - for the last two weeks I've watched him drag himself through the Alps and the Pyrenees on nothing but bread and water. For me they are the real heroes of the Tour de France - not the guys on the million Euro contracts who are being done for blood transfusions and things like that."

method

Dave unless you are going for an Ian style devils advocate type of thing, then I'd say that you really have lost the plot.

dave_1

Manzano should have gone to the police, not the media. Fixing professional cycling's doping problems behind the scenes is a legitmate point of view...I don't agree with clean riders losing their jobs for some idiot like sinkewitz

dave_1

method wrote:

Dave unless you are going for an Ian style devils advocate type of thing, then I'd say that you really have lost the plot.

I am serious Method. ..I am putting myself in the riders shoes..if I was doing the 20,000 miles a year on the road, foregoing all career and education opportunities like some full-time amatuers...I would be angry as hell with the plea bargain types , seeing it from their point of view, the riders' point of view I mean...which i feel Iain also does...

method

I understand your point, I'm not sure its acceptable to go along with it all and then only grass up your fellow riders when you get caught. In that sense I agree with you, but from the point of view of the overall good of the sport, it has to change. I've stopped watching it and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Monty Dog

I often feel that the views on cycling are often a bit too parochial and we often do our sport a disservice - IMO doping is rife in all professional sports - there's too much money awash in sport not to make it worthwhile. Sadly, mainstream media has such a vested interest in TV sport that they're not even prepared to admit there's a problem. I also agree with others that watching GT's is becoming a bit or an irrelevance - I still love the classics because of the heritage of the races and that the difference between a doper and a clever rider on a hard course is a lot less - the fact that most of today's GT's riders are singularly inept at winning classics proves the point. I think it's also too easy for the media to focus on cycling as the bad boys, ignoring sports like athletics, where a drugs ban is almost a neccessity for success! As to the size and shape of rugby players - compared to say, 20 years ago - it's like they're inflatible!

G man

I disagree with you Dave_1. Honesty is the way forward.
G man

slojo

First the confession, then redemption and finally salvation.