Thomas Dekker interview

iainf72

Very good read

http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/tho ... redemption

Kléber

Yes, a really good article that clearly makes the point that a rider can blow it all by doping.

For me, if he wants to come back then he needs to come clean on all his past. Millar named the riders at Cofidis who were leaning on him and also grassed up the Euskatel staff who were selling him EPO. Unpleasant but it means a lot of detail's out there and in the past. Dekker needs to find a way to address these things rather than clam up.

It's also very bad for Lotto management. Other teams won't touch many a rider but the Belgian outfit doesn't want to ask many questions, it's one of the most slapdash teams around.

takethehighroad

This interviews highlights a few cases in the past and it leads to the question : -

Is cycling too tolerant of dopers, or is athletics too harsh?

Watching the European Athletics Championships, the vitriol poured over Dwain Chambers has shocked me a little, it's been how long since he came back to the sport, going on for two years and he still divides opinion.

As the article says, Thomas Dekker will come back, and will come back for a good team, and maybe win some good races, and to a large extent he will be accepted back into the peloton.

Does this make cycling more lenient or is athletics too harsh?

avoidingmyphd

Athletics treats Chambers badly not because he cheated, but because he got caught, giving the lie to the standard line that there is not really any doping in the sport.
Look at Steve Cram's articles in the Guardian over the years to see this standard line.

Richrd2205

TakeTheHighRoad wrote:

This interviews highlights a few cases in the past and it leads to the question : -

Is cycling too tolerant of dopers, or is athletics too harsh?

Watching the European Athletics Championships, the vitriol poured over Dwain Chambers has shocked me a little, it's been how long since he came back to the sport, going on for two years and he still divides opinion.

As the article says, Thomas Dekker will come back, and will come back for a good team, and maybe win some good races, and to a large extent he will be accepted back into the peloton.

Does this make cycling more lenient or is athletics too harsh?

I think it makes cycling more informed than harsh/lenient....
There is vitriol still poured out over Chambers but Christine Ohorugu (sp?) is still an unfairly treated heroine. You do get the same perceptions in cycling, but those ill-informed perceptions are slightly less mainstream & less likely to be spouted by pundits (Phil & Paul excepted of course )

avoidingmyphd

sorry, relevant post this time!

The Dekker interview is interesting for the comment that the arrival of non-cyling team management were part of the reason for him feeling pressure to dope. They didn't pressure him, but they seem to have managed in a way that led to such pressure.

It might be that DS's like Riis, who have doped, are actually better placed to avoid this kind of pressure - because they know what it's like etc. - than "outsiders". Food for thought when people call for a cleansing of all the former dopers still active in team management.

Kléber

avoidingmyphd wrote:

The Dekker interview is interesting for the comment that the arrival of non-cyling team management were part of the reason for him feeling pressure to dope. They didn't pressure him, but they seem to have managed in a way that led to such pressure.

I read the opposite, he was doping and then found questions from new management awkward. If these managers had got to him earlier, a lot of grief could have been saved.

iainf72

Reading between the lines....New trainer....

What happened to Cecchini? I mean, isn't he just rich and wouldn't need to tell anyone to dope?

FJS

Kléber wrote:

avoidingmyphd wrote:

The Dekker interview is interesting for the comment that the arrival of non-cyling team management were part of the reason for him feeling pressure to dope. They didn't pressure him, but they seem to have managed in a way that led to such pressure.

I read the opposite, he was doping and then found questions from new management awkward. If these managers had got to him earlier, a lot of grief could have been saved.

Exactly; it depends whether your read the article believing Dekker when he says he started doping somewhere late in 2007, or whether he really had been on it for much longer.

morstar

I think one of the most interesting observations is the parallel to DM...

The doping began to deliver the same level of performance with less effort rather than to become better.

stagehopper

If anything the doping seems to have reduced Dekker's performance as he used it as an excuse to be less professional in his training/recuperation etc.

Bakunin

stagehopper wrote:

If anything the doping seems to have reduced Dekker's performance as he used it as an excuse to be less professional in his training/recuperation etc.

That was a good read. It is important to be reminded that there are a lot of different reasons why people do it.

As a young guy, Dekker was enjoying his success a little too much and wanted a shortcut. I think his use of the word is invincible is very telling. People get well known, have money, win races -- get treated like rock stars -- it is easy to take the juice.

It was also interesting that Dekker (and even the article on Valverde from a few months ago showed this) felt gravity's pull from all the negative talk about him (ie, blood values, etc).

These guys obviously hear/read/feel the talk, even if they refuse to admit the truth of it.

I'm willing to wager that down the road, we will read a similar story about Valverde.

Cumulonimbus

Interesting how it talks about how bad his results were in 2008.

'Yet despite the drugs 2008 was a poor year results wise. Dekker went from race to race in search of form, unable to find the legs that had helped him in 2007. But it wasn’t his legs that were the problem. He’d lost his head. The regimented life of rising early and training every day had disappeared as he became more reliant on drugs, ego, partying and being the centre of attention.'

His early season results were;

3rd Vuelta a Castilla y Leon
3rd Tour of the Basque Country
5th Amstel Gold
5th Fleche Wallonne
6th Liege Bastogne Liege

Good start to the season so the drugs cant have made him worse straight away. Certainly did better in those events than he did the next year although i cant imagine he was team leader in 2009.

However, these results were followed by the mysterious withdrawal the day after he finished 2nd in the tour of romandie time trial. What happened there? I think the official reason was an injury but there were various rumours/guesses going on. Maybe he just went out and got hammered

FransJacques

The guy's still living a lie. He doesn't want to get the skeletons out of the closet. He thinks he's protecting himself and feathering his nest in the sport by not grassing these guys up. That's how the mafia works.

He thinks he's now grown up and learned a lot at 25 - gimme a break. He needs a strong manager to slap him around and get him to get it all off his chest. The people he protected are the ones who will welcome him back. The rest might think he's not sincere.

Good for the team who saw his values and ran, anyone know who it was?

iainf72

FransJacques wrote:

Good for the team who saw his values and ran, anyone know who it was?

I think it was Garmin

Kléber

Yes, he was linked to them for a moment.

There's a grey area in that some already have massive suspicions but you can't act on them. The rider then ends up on the team that asks no questions or doesn't give a fark about doping.

rick_chasey

Kléber wrote:

Yes, he was linked to them for a moment.

There's a grey area in that some already have massive suspicions but you can't act on them. The rider then ends up on the team that asks no questions or doesn't give a fark about doping.

That'll be the Belgian, Spanish, and Italian teams then...

andyp

Rick Chasey wrote:

That'll be the Belgian, Dutch, Spanish, and Italian teams then...

Agreed.

mroli

Just as bad as the others "I didn't dope" "I didn't dope and it was the lab's fault" "I only doped once" "I doped, but I won all my important races clean". Name others? "I, and I alone are resonsible for my doping".

"I want to return clean and win". Balls. You have no remorse, you cheated and you will do nothing to stop or help others stop.

donrhummy

Good read but does anyone here believe him that, lucky him he can keep his trophies, he didn't dope in either of his two big victories? He doped continually...oh, but not when he won Tirreno or Romandie of course.

donrhummy

BTW, I thought the most important piece of the article was this:

One prominent team even met with Dekker, took one look at his profile and decided to walk away. Run, in fact.

If that's correct, it really shows the blood passport is of use and that certain teams are actually paying attention and others (Lotto) are not.