Walsh: the passports aren't working.

Ramanujan

Looking at the VAM from this years TDF, Walsh reckons that most of the top pros are juiced:
From cyclingnews:

David Walsh, one of the sport's leading anti-doping fighters and chief sports writer for the Sunday Times has hit out at the UCI and the biological passport programme, saying that cycling's governing body is still some way short from catching the leading cheats.

Walsh, author of, From Lance to Landis and LA Confidentiel told Cyclingnews, "The passport seemed like a good idea but I don't believe that the system can catch the sophisticated cheater. The evidence we have so far is that the guys towards the winning end of the classification in big races are still significantly ahead of the UCI's checks."

Asked for evidence to back up these claims, Walsh pointed to Antoine Vayer, a former coach from the Festina team, who now analyses data from the Grand Tour's major climbs and rider's power outputs.

"I look at the times and Vayer's take on it. He looked at this year's race: the speed, the speed on the climbs and he said ‘sorry, this sport has not seriously changed'. I'm sure it has changed to a degree but if it hasn't changed at the very top then it hasn't changed in the way we wanted it to."

The biological passport, which is a record of every rider's blood profile, is paid for by the sport's professional teams at a cost € 5.3 million in 2008. The UCI spent over a year collecting data by testing riders in order to build up long-term profiles.

The data is analysed by independent experts. It has already led to several doping cases being opened, with former Giro d'Italia winner Danilo Di Luca the highest profile case.

The Italian's career now looks to be in tatters, but according to Walsh, cycling's purification lies with the sport's governance and not just the actions and behaviour of the riders.

Attacking a lack of consistency by the UCI, Walsh pinpointed the body's president, Pat McQuaid, who had previously ruled out retesting of last year's drug test from the Giro.

"In the wake of the revelations that riders had used CERA in last year's Tour de France the UCI were invited to go back and look the test results from the Giro."

Ricardo Ricco finished second overall to Alberto Contador at the Giro d'Italia last year and then two months later tested positive for CERA at the Tour de France. The UCI president Pat McQuaid refused to perform retroactive testing on the Giro samples last year, but just last week changed his mind and is trying to obtain the samples to have the tests done.

"The UCI president refused retrospective testing. He said it was a bad idea. How can he have one view and then a few months later completely change? There's obviously some pressure and it's politically wise to retest those samples now. It shows that at that top level it's a game of politics and not a game of integrity." Walsh added.

With Alexandre Vinokourov set to make his return to racing after serving a two year ban for blood doping, Walsh refused to comment on whether the rider's comeback was a blow for cycling. "I reserve my disgust for the people who should be policing the sport. The Vinokourov's are just the pawns who do things, come back and don't change their mindsets."

Walsh, who is currently investigating the drug culture within rugby union after three Bath players refused drug tests, believes that proper policing would act as a key deterrent.

"We've seen all of this before, but the UCI should be the ones saying to the riders ‘you're not going to get away with it. We're on your case. If we get evidence that you've used a drug we couldn't test for last year we will go back and retest those samples.' "

This year, the Tour de Franc has so far passed with just one positive doping test (Mikel Astarloza, EPO), but Walsh pointed to winner Alberto Contador as an example of a how the sport had missed a chance to portray a cleaner image.

Contador has never tested positive; however he was initially implicated in the Operacion Puerto scandal that hit the sport in 2006. He was suspected of being the rider whose blood bags were labeled 'AC', but was later cleared.

"We want a winner we can believe in. Everyone wants that. If we had Alberto Contador's involvement in Puerto properly thrashed out and found out precisely who AC was and what he was doing I'd be a lot happier."

"I've always been unhappy when thing's aren't dealt with and his alleged involvement has never been dealt with. When he's asked a question at the Tour about his VO2 Max and doesn't answer, I just think, why? Why would you refuse to answer a question like that? It's something that a lot of cycling fans would like to know."

finchy

Does anyone know if the 15 riders being re-tested for CERA from last year's Tour have been chosen due to biological passport results? Because if they are, then I would say that this is evidence of the value of the biological passport.

And what's this - a journalist for a middle class paper like the Times investigating rugby for drugs? :shock: That's the most surprising thing I've ever heard in my life.

disgruntledgoat

johnfinch wrote:

Does anyone know if the 15 riders being re-tested for CERA from last year's Tour have been chosen due to biological passport results? Because if they are, then I would say that this is evidence of the value of the biological passport.

And what's this - a journalist for a middle class paper like the Times investigating rugby for drugs? :shock: That's the most surprising thing I've ever heard in my life.

Unless it's rugby league, in which case it all makes sense.

andyrac

disgruntledgoat wrote:

johnfinch wrote:

Does anyone know if the 15 riders being re-tested for CERA from last year's Tour have been chosen due to biological passport results? Because if they are, then I would say that this is evidence of the value of the biological passport.

And what's this - a journalist for a middle class paper like the Times investigating rugby for drugs? :shock: That's the most surprising thing I've ever heard in my life.

Unless it's rugby league, in which case it all makes sense.

How about investigating Football - especially Spanish football, another player dies at the weekend with a cardiac arrest, there was a Sevilla player last year, there have been others. Or is it just a coincidence?

finchy

AndyRAC wrote:

How about investigating Football - especially Spanish football, another player dies at the weekend with a cardiac arrest, there was a Sevilla player last year, there have been others. Or is it just a coincidence?

Yes, football should also be investigated. Won't happen though, at least not in the mainstream media.

top_bhoy

AndyRAC wrote:

How about investigating Football - especially Spanish football, another player dies at the weekend with a cardiac arrest, there was a Sevilla player last year, there have been others. Or is it just a coincidence?

People die of heart attacks all the time - for a variety of reasons so why identify a football player who has no way to defend himself from your drug insinuations. A pretty low thing to do - unless you can prove that the footballer was involved in drug use. If so, please provide and enlighten the rest of us on this individuals life history.

Paulie W

Top_Bhoy wrote:

AndyRAC wrote:

How about investigating Football - especially Spanish football, another player dies at the weekend with a cardiac arrest, there was a Sevilla player last year, there have been others. Or is it just a coincidence?

People die of heart attacks all the time - for a variety of reasons so why identify a football player who has no way to defend himself from your drug insinuations. A pretty low thing to do - unless you can prove that the footballer was involved in drug use. If so, please provide and enlighten the rest of us on this individuals life history.

+1. Completely out of order to make such an implication!

andyp

Why? An apparently healthy, fit professional athlete dies suddenly without any hint of previously having underlying health problems. One has to wonder why and, given the state of doping in Spanish sport, where Fuentes himself admitted that he'd worked with both Real Madrid and Barcelona and doped athletes get protection from the government, then it's natural to make the link.

Of course it's a shock and terribly sad for the family of Daniel Jarque, but it was the same for Antonio Peurta a couple of years ago.

Paulie W

andyp wrote:

Why? An apparently healthy, fit professional athlete dies suddenly without any hint of previously having underlying health problems. One has to wonder why and, given the state of doping in Spanish sport, where Fuentes himself admitted that he'd worked with both Real Madrid and Barcelona and doped athletes get protection from the government, then it's natural to make the link.

Of course it's a shock and terribly sad for the family of Daniel Jarque, but it was the same for Antonio Peurta a couple of years ago.

Why? Because the poster who made the link was doing so from a position of ignorance in this specific case. Few would doubt that performance enhancing drugs are being used in football, perhaps there is a particularly strong suggestion that there is doping in Spanish football but those things do NOT lead to the natural conclusion that this particular footballer was a doper. If you cant see how inappropriate it is to speculate on the possibility that his death was drug-related then I cant help you. I can however point out that a surpisingly large number of fit young men and women with no apparent underlying health problems die on an annual basis.

andyrac

I do apologise if I've offended people - I

'm sorry to say that when I heard the news that was what instantly came into my mind. It shouldn't , but fit young sportsmen suddenly dieing whilst not new is quite shocking.

Spiny_Norman

We need to tread carefully when suggesting that deaths like Jarque's might have anything to do with PEDs, especially so soon after they occur, but a recent cluster of similar events, especially in Spain, suggests that the questions are worth asking, at least.

It's interesting to get Walsh's take on the current situation, which broadly tallies with my own lay opinion, although I'm dubious about the usefulness of VO2 Max as an indicator of guilt. I'm glad that he's turning his attention to RU, though, which has obvious problems with both recreational and PEDs.

As this is broadening into a general discussion of doping in sport and reporting on it, an example from the BBC News website today: a headline "Jamaicans cleared over drug tests", which explains that the Jamaican anti-doping panel have decided that they took something, but they can't tell whether the substances were banned. :? It was positioned just above a feature titled "What makes Jamaican athletics so strong?" :roll:

Paulie W

AndyRAC wrote:

I do apologise if I've offended people - I

'm sorry to say that when I heard the news that was what instantly came into my mind. It shouldn't , but fit young sportsmen suddenly dieing whilst not new is quite shocking.

It is shocking but caridomyopathy - which seems to be the cause of many such deaths - is horrifyingly not that uncommon.

avoidingmyphd

I love a doping argument, but I don't have any time for this one, which lemond also uses, and boils down to deducing doping from speed and elevation data. VAM's are extremely rough. They are really good for comparing performances, say on the same day or on the same hill a few years apart. But that is all they are good for.

you can't say "this is so fast it must be doped" without some baseline for what undoped humans are capable of. and we don't have that baseline, and in practice we never will, whatever lemond and walsh think.

I agree (and Dennis will be along shortly to disagree!) that they don't help themselves by refusing to discuss this stuff openly, as if they have stuff to hide though.

takethehighroad

There is a good piece in this months' FourFourTwo magazine about the problem of drugs in football, and they seem to think someone big will be busted for drug use (be it recreational or PED) by the end of the season

blorg

Paulie W wrote:

AndyRAC wrote:

I do apologise if I've offended people - I

'm sorry to say that when I heard the news that was what instantly came into my mind. It shouldn't , but fit young sportsmen suddenly dieing whilst not new is quite shocking.

It is shocking but caridomyopathy - which seems to be the cause of many such deaths - is horrifyingly not that uncommon.

As Paulie says sudden cardiac failure is a well known phenomenon among young athletes and is not generally linked to doping, although doping with blood boosters can indeed cause heart failure.

http://www.google.com/search?q=Sudden+D ... e+Athletes

Jez mon

Tbh, it's sad that the questions are being asked. However the same things are asked whenever a young cyclist dies, so why not other sports. However if this young man did die due to drugs then there needs to be an investigation.

Tbh I'm not too sure about the validity of using vam as an indicator of doping, however, I feel that the blood passport doesn't provide the complete answer that some claim it does. Nevertheless I should think that it does provide some help in indicating who should be targeted

Woodchip

The main issue I see with using VAM is that pro sportsmen/women are a lot more professional now. They train harder and longer than before and eat the right foods.
I think the fact there is more science in sport (or that could be a good company name) means that people are able to get more from their body.

As for the footballer, Jez hits the nail on the head that hard it looks like a penny now. If, for example, one of the pro tour collapsed on Ventoux and died people would assume he was drugged up to the eyeballs. Why do other sports avoid this critique? Look at the number of deaths in Rugby lately, from heart attacks. Could this be a mere coincidence? I doubt it, and the back room staff should be questioned to find out what's going on.

Personally, I reckon there is more drugs in football and rugby than cycling at the mo. The only way to solve it is to test the players at full time, and regularly during the off-season. As for cycling, all riders in the top 40 should be tested after every race, and a random 20 from the rest. If found guilty you get a lifetime ban from the PT (ideally I'd say shot in the calf but that may not be legal in all countries).

finchy

Woodchip wrote:

As for cycling, all riders in the top 40 should be tested after every race, and a random 20 from the rest.

Would that not be too expensive?

CyclingBantam

blorg wrote:

Paulie W wrote:

AndyRAC wrote:

I do apologise if I've offended people - I

'm sorry to say that when I heard the news that was what instantly came into my mind. It shouldn't , but fit young sportsmen suddenly dieing whilst not new is quite shocking.

It is shocking but caridomyopathy - which seems to be the cause of many such deaths - is horrifyingly not that uncommon.

As Paulie says sudden cardiac failure is a well known phenomenon among young athletes and is not generally linked to doping, although doping with blood boosters can indeed cause heart failure.

http://www.google.com/search?q=Sudden+D ... e+Athletes

I think it was a very valid point to ask by Andy RAC. Firstly can we get beyond this view that because someone has died we can't comment on their circumstances for fear of being disrespectful. I don't think Andy was directly suggesting he was doped more, it was unusual. I think it is far more disrespectful to ignore/cover up something that can kill young sportsmen.

There have been a number of footballers die in recent years of heart problems. These may very well all be coincidences however have we not learnt anything from our past about potential causes of heart attacks in fit healthy young men. I think football along with other sports needs to get real and look in to what is going on. Currently they are not interested because there is too much money made and needed. Doping stories would only damage this. What football and many other sports are doing is offensive, questioning them isn't.

Note - I am a big football fan!

Woodchip

johnfinch wrote:

Woodchip wrote:

As for cycling, all riders in the top 40 should be tested after every race, and a random 20 from the rest.

Would that not be too expensive?

Maybe not tested, but sampled, then a selection of those tested. That way if anyone is found quilty then there is plenty of evidence to retro test. Plus if you know you're going to be sampled, but unsure if you'll be tested you might think twice about doping.

Jez mon

Woodchip wrote:

johnfinch wrote:

Woodchip wrote:

As for cycling, all riders in the top 40 should be tested after every race, and a random 20 from the rest.

Would that not be too expensive?

Maybe not tested, but sampled, then a selection of those tested. That way if anyone is found quilty then there is plenty of evidence to retro test. Plus if you know you're going to be sampled, but unsure if you'll be tested you might think twice about doping.

Depends on what you are doping with. Basso and Ullrich would both have been tested many times over their respective careers. DiLuca would have known he was going to be tested at the Giro. I really don't think that cyclists dope thinking that they will not get tested, but that they will sail through anti doping, because they believe the tests don't work. A few more cyclists test positive, and the pros may revise that opinion.

aarw

and still expensive. doctors, storing blood, etc...

blorg

BenBlyth wrote:

I think it was a very valid point to ask by Andy RAC. Firstly can we get beyond this view that because someone has died we can't comment on their circumstances for fear of being disrespectful. I don't think Andy was directly suggesting he was doped more, it was unusual. ...

There have been a number of footballers die in recent years of heart problems. These may very well all be coincidences however have we not learnt anything from our past about potential causes of heart attacks in fit healthy young men.

I have no problem with questions being asked, I am just pointing out that this is a well known medical phenomenon among young athletes. It commonly happens to non-professionals indeed including kids involved in sport.

My point is simply that, no, it is NOT that unusual that a perfectly healthy athlete drops dead of a heart condition. Drugs may have been involved, maybe not, I am just pointing this out as many here seem to think it very irregular for apparently healthy sportspeople to drop dead from heart failure, and sadly it is not that irregular, the sports actually bring on the fatality (it is a genetically inherited condition.)

According to CRY, 12 young people die every week in the UK from it.

More here:

http://www.c-r-y.org.uk/
http://www.sads.org/
http://www.sads.org.uk/

moray_gub

Top_Bhoy wrote:

AndyRAC wrote:

How about investigating Football - especially Spanish football, another player dies at the weekend with a cardiac arrest, there was a Sevilla player last year, there have been others. Or is it just a coincidence?

People die of heart attacks all the time - for a variety of reasons so why identify a football player who has no way to defend himself from your drug insinuations. A pretty low thing to do - unless you can prove that the footballer was involved in drug use. If so, please provide and enlighten the rest of us on this individuals life history.

Yea was thinking that myself ,Phil O Donnel of Motherwell died on the pitch last year with heart failure ,Jamie Dolan a teamate of Phil's dies with heart failure early this year so your drug angles could easily be applied to them as well.

donrhummy

While I agree that the passport probably isn't working it's NOT because of Walsh's reason. He's essentially saying, "They still seem to be going fast, so the passport's not working!" That's stupid and an example of poor journalism.

The thing that made me think the passport doesn't work is Bernhard Kohl. He was never flagged under the passport system and he was able to actually USE it to "prove" he was drug free and get new job offers from other teams. I think it a very odd coincidence that the first ever sanctions from the passport system happened right after Kohl said that the passport didn't work and could be used to HELP dopers. Of course, the UCI will never work with Kohl and some scientists to figure out how he was able to fool the passport and fix the issues (or come up with something else if needed). Instead, they'll insist he's wrong despite the fact that it never picked up his doping!

teagar

Woodchip wrote:

johnfinch wrote:

Woodchip wrote:

As for cycling, all riders in the top 40 should be tested after every race, and a random 20 from the rest.

Would that not be too expensive?

Maybe not tested, but sampled, then a selection of those tested. That way if anyone is found quilty then there is plenty of evidence to retro test. Plus if you know you're going to be sampled, but unsure if you'll be tested you might think twice about doping.

Doping usually seems to occur under the premise that what they're using cannot be tested for. Hence everyone's surprise that Di Luca got caught for using CERA, which was widely known to have caught others out the in tests the season before.

Roscobob

Moray Gub wrote:

Top_Bhoy wrote:

AndyRAC wrote:

How about investigating Football - especially Spanish football, another player dies at the weekend with a cardiac arrest, there was a Sevilla player last year, there have been others. Or is it just a coincidence?

People die of heart attacks all the time - for a variety of reasons so why identify a football player who has no way to defend himself from your drug insinuations. A pretty low thing to do - unless you can prove that the footballer was involved in drug use. If so, please provide and enlighten the rest of us on this individuals life history.

Yea was thinking that myself ,Phil O Donnel of Motherwell died on the pitch last year with heart failure ,Jamie Dolan a teamate of Phil's dies with heart failure early this year so your drug angles could easily be applied to them as well.

POD died of an undiognosed heart condition. Not sure about Dolan.

These things do happen in sport. Marc Vivian Foe died in a game a few years back due to heart failure.

The thing is these guys work so hard to get their body in the best possible condition and sometimes their heart's just can't keep up.

stagehopper

donrhummy wrote:

The thing that made me think the passport doesn't work is Bernhard Kohl. He was never flagged under the passport system and he was able to actually USE it to "prove" he was drug free and get new job offers from other teams. I think it a very odd coincidence that the first ever sanctions from the passport system happened right after Kohl said that the passport didn't work and could be used to HELP dopers. Of course, the UCI will never work with Kohl and some scientists to figure out how he was able to fool the passport and fix the issues (or come up with something else if needed). Instead, they'll insist he's wrong despite the fact that it never picked up his doping!

But that's not in any way an accurate representation of Kohl's case.

He was caught well before the passport was in full operation + could be used to prosecute, and it's been hinted that many of those caught for CERA at last year's Tour were targetted precisely because of their early dodgy passport profiles.

It took 15 months from the start of the collection of data to generate strong enough baseline profiles to allow legal cases to be put forward that blood manipulation had taken place even though no "PED" had been detected. This involved gathering profiles from all the peleton, establishing long term profiles for each cyclist, and then getting the array of experts to agree on what represented doping and what didn't such that it would stand up in a court of law.

For Kohl to claim the passport didn't work as it didn't catch him belies his total lack of understanding of the phase the UCI/WADA had reached in developing the passport system as a future method of doping censure.

As for the offers he received, some teams seem to have put more effort into studying potential profiles than others ...

top_bhoy

BenBlyth wrote:

I think it was a very valid point to ask by Andy RAC. Firstly can we get beyond this view that because someone has died we can't comment on their circumstances for fear of being disrespectful. I don't think Andy was directly suggesting he was doped more, it was unusual. I think it is far more disrespectful to ignore/cover up something that can kill young sportsmen.

To a point, I do think it is a valid point Andy RAC made - limited only though to the questioning of drug use and testing in Spanish football. To introduce dead individual footballers into the drug equation without any evidence, did, in my opinion, overstep the mark and was unneccessary. It obscures the debate by focusing on individuals instead of looking at the practices of the Spanish FA (and other sporting governing bodies) ie drug test policy, drug labs used, disciplinary procedures, etc...

Andy RAC, I wasn't offended.....no harm done to me 8)

Woodchip

The spaniards do seem to think doping is cool though (as well as racism, but that's a different matter).

rolf_f

Roscobob wrote:

The thing is these guys work so hard to get their body in the best possible condition and sometimes their heart's just can't keep up.

It isn't even necessarily that - it can happen irrespective of whether you are an athlete. I think it is just that athletes are probably the majority of young, high profile people that, when they die, you don't assume rock and roll lifestyle.

As it happens, I have a form of tachycardia - fortunately it does little more than give me the occasional dizzy spell. However, it still took years and luck to diagnose. There are forms of tachycardia where, the first time you get a dizzy spell, that's it - you are dead. People then complain about 'how it was allowed to happen' to a young and fit person but even in my case, when I was still around to explain what I was feeling, it was still difficult to diagnose.