UCI defends integrity of cycling movement

sudholz

Thank god someone's standing up to him!

Link here

emadden

That is an incredibly dumb move by the UCI... God knows who is advising them - not only from a PR, but also a legal perspective. A Swiss judgement (if any) against Landis isnt going to do much good anyway.

Before doing this they should have at least waited for the outcome of the US Grand Jury in the Armstrong case.

iainf72

Jesus wept.

Idiots. They'll just come out of it worse off.

andyp

Meanwhile, back in the real world, they've actually done something good today;

http://www.uci.ch/Modules/ENews/ENewsDe ... LangId%3D1

Snorebens

So two accusations:

i) attack on the characters of Fat Pat and Hein - why are the UCI paying for this case?
ii) attack on integrity on cycling - I don't think it would take long to highlight incidents where Fat Pat has done just that!

Should this joke case ever make it to a Swiss (?) court, I'll gladly chip in to a DFens fund

shinyhelmut

Time to reinstate Floyd's Fairness Fund? This time round I might be tempted to contribute...

Tusher

...........was thinking the same thing myself.

RichN95.

There is, of course, the possibility that what Landis said about the UCI actually is a pile of crap. After all, he was just repeating what Armstrong told him.

iainf72

Bit of follow up on the background

Tusher

Brilliant- it's been a long time, Iain

sudholz

chapeau!

eh

Said a little less classy: f*cking quality Iain

To be fair Hein Verbruggen envolved in a dodgy UCI episode, surprise :? :twisted:

iainf72

Floyd isn't exactly concerned

http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/cycling/n ... id=6478523

blazing_saddles

He's will be demonstrating just how bad their timing was, too:
http://twitter.com/#!/GreyManrod/status ... 7176845313

Kléber

This could be a real car crash.

Landis has US free speech on his side and this only gives him more publicity to repeat the allegations. From what I've read he's next to bankruptcy already and doesn't care what the UCI does. He's essentially free and has no image to protect nor bank account to defend.

all show no go

I'm confused! I've just read the words "integrity" and "UCI" in the same sentence. Surely that's some kind of grammatical error?

iainf72

Oooff. Car crash is right

----

One year ago, for the sake of my conscience, I admitted to having lied about having used (performance-enhancing drugs) during my cycling career. There was no doubt in my mind that I’d face retribution by those who stood to lose when faced with the exposure of their fraud.

Having felt the vitriol and invective directed at those who must bear the scarlet “D” for being exposed, I met with USADA and pled with them to subject none of my former colleagues to this opprobrium but rather to offer confidentiality and immunity to those who came clean and who offered a glimpse into the corruption within cycling. In return for turning on many of my former friends and colleagues I was assured that they’d be granted lenience and never have to suffer for my actions or theirs. Indeed in recent discussions I’ve learned that many of them have chosen to clear their conscience and have confirmed to USADA many of the allegations that I’ve made which were written off by the perpetrators of the fraud as “sour milk.”

However in light of the UCI’s attempt to collect defamation damages against me and the resulting necessity to have to defend myself, I now will have no choice but to depose those cyclists and expose them and for that I’m deeply sorry. I had hoped that in spite of whatever any current Federal cases may expose, as few of them as possible would need to speak publicly or testify, but it has become clear that the leaders of cycling will destroy anyone who stands in the way of covering their crimes.

The defamation suit filed today by the cycling leadership is nothing short of witness intimidation and a terrorist tactic designed to take away from me one of Americans’ most highly valued rights. So while the clouded version of freedom of speech offered to Europeans has allowed them to bully others into subservience in the past, it will only serve to strengthen my resolve to expose them as the criminals that they are.

emadden

UCI protecting the integrity of cycling... what a freaking joke... How do they explain this sh*te: http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/2007-to ... -in-france

This is just making me angry now. This sport and McQuaid are rotten at the core.

RichN95.

emadden wrote:

UCI protecting the integrity of cycling... what a freaking joke... How do they explain this sh*te: http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/2007-to ... -in-france

I would expect that there are some legal matters at the root of that decision. Why did the prosecutors need the samples anyway - all the riders had tested positive? Why couldn't they proceed on that basis?

eh

To be fair to Pat, I think this has way more to do with uber dodgy Hein Verbruggen.

I can't see what grounds they are going after Landis on, afterall the majority of the best riders of the last 20 years have been busted for dope at some point and most of the others have got connections to Ferrari, Fuentes etc. At least to watch 'sports' like WWF you don't need a PhD in pharma products :shock:

emadden

RichN95 wrote:

emadden wrote:

UCI protecting the integrity of cycling... what a freaking joke... How do they explain this sh*te: http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/2007-to ... -in-france

I would expect that there are some legal matters at the root of that decision. Why did the prosecutors need the samples anyway - all the riders had tested positive? Why couldn't they proceed on that basis?

Yes I agree there are legal impediments ... to a certain extent... but it smacks of the UCI trying to "take care of matters themselves"...

iainf72

Nice summary from Inner Ring

http://inrng.com/?p=2940

RichN95.

iainf72 wrote:

Nice summary from Inner Ring

http://inrng.com/?p=2940

As usual, a good appraisal from IR, but that google trick is beneath him.

This whole thing will go no further than it's current state. The UCI have made their point. Neither party would be advised to take the next step.

RichN95.

emadden wrote:

Yes I agree there are legal impediments ... to a certain extent... but it smacks of the UCI trying to "take care of matters themselves"...

On the other hand, there's a prosecutor who's had four years and a fair amount of public money to make a fairly straight forward case and failed. Time for a scapegoat, eh?

It comes down to which is more likely: the UCI protecting dopers who have already been busted, or a DA covering his arse? I dare say the UCi will have handled it badly (as usual), but I doubt the bulk of the blame lies with them.

blazing_saddles

Obviously, this is a hot topic in "The Clinic". As someone there highlighted, WADA's TDF report might well contain some pretty heavy ammo for Floyd's case.
The really interesting stuff is on page 19 and deal's with riders most likely to be on the hot sauce and targeted testing.............or rather lack of:

http://www.wada-ama.org/Documents/World ... 010_EN.pdf

iainf72

I see Floyd is launching "Operation Honeys Beaver" or something in response to this where he'll just burn everyone.

LangerDan

iainf72 wrote:

I see Floyd is launching "Operation Honeys Beaver" or something in response to this where he'll just burn everyone.

I'm far too afraid to type that into Google.