Wiggins to publish blood test records

Eurostar

Do these test results mean that Wiggins is definitely clean? If you're suspicious of Wiggins (which I'm not) can it be argued that he may have been using something which doesn't affect these figures?

In other words...is this PROOF??

bipedal

Eurostar wrote:

Do these test results mean that Wiggins is definitely clean? If you're suspicious of Wiggins (which I'm not) can it be argued that he may have been using something which doesn't affect these figures?

In other words...is this PROOF??

as good as according to cycling news, they point to three lines of evidence:
[1] all parameters are well within "normal" levels for a human being
[2] haemoglobin and OFF score lines have the same curve (i.e., no blood manipulation)
[3] blood parameters decline over the course of the three week tours (i.e., no topping up with 800mls of packed cells, as Aurelio was keen on saying!)

pb21

What about stuff like hormones?

gabriel959

According to lance’s twitter all his blood results since cycling was invented (ten or so years ago) are in the livestrong website.

Edwin

Just read that cyclingnews article, do Phil and Paul write the picture captions by the way?
"Bradley Wiggins went deep into the pain cave on stage 15 to Verbier"

That's a new one on me.

moray_gub

irvini wrote:

Bradley Wiggins needs to stop worrying about people suspecting him, you can tell he's not a drugs cheat just by his performances.
We don't need to see his blood tests to know that.

He's a genuine bloke and the fact he can't sprint up a seriously steep mountain at double the speed of the peloton puts him in a different and much more impressive class to those that can.

He can go up hills quicker than most of the peleton he has recenlty just proved that.For what its worth i dont belive he is a doper but him being a genuine bloke doesnt preclude him from being one.

frenchfighter

Kléber wrote:

Good for him but this will end up putting pressure on others.

So Alberto, Andy, Lance, what are your numbers?

http://www.livestrong.com/lance-armstro ... g/testing/

Hematocrit dropped off quite a bit since a few years ago...

moray_gub

irvini wrote:

Bradley Wiggins needs to stop worrying about people suspecting him, you can tell he's not a drugs cheat just by his performances.
We don't need to see his blood tests to know that.

He's a genuine bloke and the fact he can't sprint up a seriously steep mountain at double the speed of the peloton puts him in a different and much more impressive class to those that can.

But he can go up hills quicker than most of the peleton he has recenlty just proved that, though i dont see how becuase he is not as quick as others such as Bertie he is somehow more classy ..........how does that work then ? For what its worth i dont believe he is a doper but him being a genuine bloke doesnt preclude him from being one.

jim one

Without starting another Lance debate in 1 of his books I clearly remember him writing his normal 'crit was 46% during the tour yet these tests show his normal 'crit is infact around 40ish.

iainf72

LA's numbers for one tested changed from one posting of the results to the next.

Poor admin

frenchfighter

jim one wrote:

Without starting another Lance debate in 1 of his books I clearly remember him writing his normal 'crit was 46% during the tour yet these tests show his normal 'crit is infact around 40ish.

Armstrong said: "Say, for example, hypothetically, it [haematocrit] is 43, 42, 41 and you then go to altitude for a month and it goes to 46.

"Not everyone in this room is going to say that that means I must have cheated. But a few of you would say it was suspicious."

frenchfighter

jamlala

frenchfighter wrote:

And I bet that tasted pretty damned good! Nothing like it.
Trouble is I don't think he's stopped since!

frenchfighter

Not a match for de Jojo

mididoctors

we need some proper analysis and explannations of how this all works.. .....

take this excerpt from CN

The best indication that Wiggins rode clean is in the fact that his hemoglobin and Off Score values followed the same curve - according to the logic employed in the Off Score, if there was artificial performance enhancement occurring, the end of each curve would point in the opposite direction.

ok i can get the the off score thing but how is the degree of non conformity a true reflection of manipulation...

If I apply this idea superficially to Lances values I see his OFF score and crit/hb value do move in opposite directions on the rest day of the Giro this year..?

is that suspicious?

I don't know? a little knowledge and all that

a lot of data points on lances published results move in contradictory directions compared with tests either side?

and before all the haters start jumping on this we need education

*(and I am a hater)

grantus

jim one wrote:

Without starting another Lance debate in 1 of his books I clearly remember him writing his normal 'crit was 46% during the tour yet these tests show his normal 'crit is infact around 40ish.

Yes but as someone posted earlier - how significant is this? After all - he won his first tour 10 years ago - perhaps a difference like that can be explained due to ageing? I don't know, i'm not a haematologist, don't imagine there are many on here who are.

I don't know but seems like people will jump on the fact it's 10-15% lower now and put 2+2 together and maybe by chance they could come up with 4 but also, maybe come up with 5. It's still guessing and supposition

BikingBernie

Can anyone explain how Wiggin's blood profile shows that he didn't use the banned 'fat burning' drug Aicar?

Kléber

You can't prove a negative Aurelio.

I almost feel sorry for Wiggins, he does something to be transparent and now this invites further skepticism from some. He's long been a critic of doping and rides for a team with the same attitude. This doesn't mean people shouldn't be vigilant but it does give Wiggins some credit in the Bank of Trust.

BikingBernie

Kléber wrote:

You can't prove a negative Aurelio.

I almost feel sorry for Wiggins, he does something to be transparent and now this invites further skepticism from some. He's long been a critic of doping and rides for a team with the same attitude. This doesn't mean people shouldn't be vigilant but it does give Wiggins some credit in the Bank of Trust.

Fair enough, and Wiggin's does deserve credit for doing this, though perhaps making the raw data available might mean more, allowing those with the necessary expertise to do some independent analyses.

My main point was that the graphs Wiggins has released can't really be taken to be absolute proof of anything, in that we have to take the rider's / team's word that the data they are based in is genuine and that there have been no changes made to any of the values. I take it that the data used is taken from the teams own monitoring and not from an independent source?

Yes, this is to take a very sceptical stance, and I really would like to believe that Wiggins is clean, but we have to remember that we can't always rely 100% on data given out by a rider or his team. For example, we know that Armstrong has changed data that he has made public on several occasions, as with the recent changes he made to his haemocrit values, as referred to by Iain, and when he altered his VO2 max figures in response to Lemond's criticism that someone with his reported VO2 max - 81.4 as I recall - could not produce the sort of sustained power outputs he did.

Also, the general point remains that not all illegal PED's will show up in a measure based on one's haemoglobin concentration / concentration of reticulocytes.

That said, if we take the data at face value, it does indicate that Wiggin's is not blood doping and it is blood doping, by virtue of its very effectiveness, that is probably the main problem in the sport. Wiggin's actions also put pressure on others to do likewise.

On a similar note, I wonder why more teams don't seemed to have signed up to the 'Mouvement pour un cyclisme crédible'?

jamlala

Its as if they don't want to clean up the sport........ostrich scenario.

iainf72

BikingBernie wrote:

On a similar note, I wonder why more teams don't seemed to have signed up to the 'Mouvement pour un cyclisme crédible'?

You mean the one Gerolsteiner was a member of?

Movements and purity rings are pointless exercises.

frenchfighter

Wiggins is also preparing his test data from 2003-2008 to be released.

samb01

iainf72 wrote:

You mean the one Gerolsteiner was a member of?

Holczer was a naive fool, but there is little reason to believe he wasn't being sincere.

Movements and purity rings are pointless exercises.

They're not.

DaveyL

BikingBernie wrote:

Can anyone explain how Wiggin's blood profile shows that he didn't use the banned 'fat burning' drug Aicar?

One would have thought many of his samples will be stored for retrospective testing. And apparently a WADA accredited tested for said drug has been available this year, so I'm not sure what Mr Bodry's problem was/is.

stagehopper

BikingBernie wrote:

My main point was that the graphs Wiggins has released can't really be taken to be absolute proof of anything, in that we have to take the rider's / team's word that the data they are based in is genuine and that there have been no changes made to any of the values. I take it that the data used is taken from the teams own monitoring and not from an independent source?

This is the UCI's data from his blood passport which he requested be released.

knedlicky

The criticism I heard of Wiggins’ published data was that it doesn’t explain the (possibly influential) conditions and circumstances when the tests were done, and really doesn’t give any proper info about reticulocytes.
To this I’d add, there are no tests shown between Jan/Feb and Mid-April, which seems a long unexplained gap.

I actually don’t doubt Wiggins was clean, and my main concern is that he decided to prove this by publishing his data, which I think a mistake.

I say this because increasingly, in the event of any crime, the onus is being gradually switched around from the judiciary having to prove someone is guilty to the innocent parties having to prove to the judiciary they are innocent.
I think this wrong and an infringement on civil rights, and therefore I don’t want to see innocuous sportsmen leaning this way in case these basically irrelevant cases (it's only sport!) lead to some major change in the approach in the legal system.

Kléber

This is a good step. I'd like to know his VO2 Max now.

...there is a slippery slope to all of this, one effort to be transparent risks bringing more questions as knedlicky says.

One small effort which shouldn't be forgotten is that in doing this Wiggins is going to be seen as the peloton's "good two shoes" (to some extent Garmin are already) and this might mean some teams will be more willing to shut down any move he tries, just because he is pointing out their failings on the anti-doping front. Just as a shop owner who defies the mafia gets a brick through their window.

In other words, publishing this data has put Wiggins at risk of more questions and increases the chances of getting grief during his day job, it's not as basic as putting the numbers on a website. We'll see how things pan out.

iainf72

Kléber wrote:

This is a good step. I'd like to know his VO2 Max now.

88 I believe

mididoctors

Kléber wrote:

This is a good step. I'd like to know his VO2 Max now.

...there is a slippery slope to all of this, one effort to be transparent risks bringing more questions as knedlicky says.

One small effort which shouldn't be forgotten is that in doing this Wiggins is going to be seen as the peloton's "good two shoes" (to some extent Garmin are already) and this might mean some teams will be more willing to shut down any move he tries, just because he is pointing out their failings on the anti-doping front. Just as a shop owner who defies the mafia gets a brick through their window.

In other words, publishing this data has put Wiggins at risk of more questions and increases the chances of getting grief during his day job, it's not as basic as putting the numbers on a website. We'll see how things pan out.

indeed but it needs to be done..

the more common high gc "goody two shoe" riders become the harder it is too be pressurized not to be or rail in transparency.