Tyler sinks the Lance

avoidingmyphd

clever comments from Ashenden on cyclingnews:

either:
it's impossible for a lab to tamper with a sample (=Verbruggen's' position), in which case the Swiss allegations must be unfounded, but the 1999 EPO positives in retests are trustworthy
or
it's possible for a lab to tamper with a sample, in which case the 1999 retests can be dismissed but the Swiss allegations become plausible and worth looking into.

Either way, you can't dismiss BOTH out of hand.

dougzz

Excellent point by Ashenden

The trouble with all the sporting organisations is the lack of accountability. I'm sure that they all end up in Switzerland partly to be near each other, I guess the IOC would be the lead on that, the cosy standard of living for the executives, and no doubt because of the privacy granted by the Swiss government. You think how can Pat stay in his role, does he have no shame, but then you think about Blatter at FIFA and some of the crap spouted by Platini for UEFA and Pat seem half reasonable.

Matchstick Man

RichN95 wrote:

Leipheimer and Barry were never on a Tour team with Armstrong, so probably not part of the inner circle.

I'm pretty sure Levi and Lance rode the TdF together at Astana in 2009 (DNF due to crash) and Radioshack in 2010 (13th). I guess you mean they never rode together whilst in the same USPS roster?
Pretty sure Barry never rode a GT with Lance

RichN95.

Matchstick Man wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

Leipheimer and Barry were never on a Tour team with Armstrong, so probably not part of the inner circle.

I guess you mean they never rode together whilst in the same USPS roster?

Yeah, I was only referring to the USPS years (+2005), which seems to be where the investigation is focused.

iainf72

Good chat with Tyler's lawyer

http://velonews.competitor.com/2011/05/ ... ent_175728

Le Commentateur

58585 wrote:

Still no sign of Bruyneel?

Perhaps his and his family's move to London was so he can obtain one of those superinjunction things (so popular nowadays for those with money and something to hide :twisted:).

jerry3571

I wonder if there is any correlation to LA winning the Tour de France after the massively problematic Festina affair. After Cycling's nightmare year 1998, cycling needed a way to right the sinking ship and Lance came along at the right time to create a positive feeling in the Cycling world. The authorities decided to close thier eyes to USPS's prolific doping programme in order to regain some credibilty in the sporting world and so the story of Lance, the guy who came back from the dead to win the toughest bike race, seemed enough to cover over the disasterous year before. As years have gone buy it seems money went to the Anti doping authorites as an open gift but for all we know there may well have been strings attached as USPS and Discovery managed to collect the biggest prizes in cycling without any positive tests.

If it wasn't anything like I say above then there may have been some other deal made with the Authorites to "not see" what Lance/Bruyneel were up to. It could well have simply been in the form of the proverbial brown envelope but an unhealthy relationship seems to be apparent.

-Jerry

Monty Dog

Jerry, your hypothesis is fairly accurate and one presented by David Walsh and Pierre Ballistere in the book "From Lance to Landis" amongst many others. The UCI, Verbruggen and to a degree ASO at that time were focussed on the lucrative US market that LA allowed them to access and were prepared to ignore their indiscretions. What they probably hadn't accounted for was the conniving way they sought to exploit and protect their position, including forcing team riders onto their "programme". Likewise, the building of the brand "Armstrong" and subsequently "Livestrong" bolstered by significant sponsorship from the likes of Oakley, Nike and Trek made sure they could defend their brand 'values' through an aggressive campaign of PR and litigation against dissenters. The SCA arbitration and the Greg Lemond vs Trek cases are testament to how hard they were prepared to corrupt, perjure and destroy reputations in order to maintain their myth. Sadly, whilst the $$$ roll-in, there are still many prepared to prostrate themselves to this alter of corruption and maintain this false-idolatry.

calvjones

L'equipe now reporting a 'borderline' EPO at 2002 Dauphine. (Race Radio on Twitter)

58585

At the risk of asking a stupid question - is the UCI run as a business (for profit)?
Did the top men in the UCI cash-in directly as a result of increased interest in the US?
I've noticed this which is quite interesting http://inrng.com/?p=2794

MrTapir

calvjones wrote:

L'equipe now reporting a 'borderline' EPO at 2002 Dauphine. (Race Radio on Twitter)

Also race radio is saying that there are loads of borderline positives for EPO and the threshold is "absurdly high"....

smithy21

Can someone explain a "borderline EPO" to me please. Did they have a test then or has it been re-tested subsequently or are we simply on about haematocrit levels?

Gazzetta67

If Armstrong`s defence team think that their man has no case to answer then why dont they sue Floyd Landis,Tyler Hamilton,Paul Kimmage,David Walsh,Greg Lemond etc etc. ???? . Coming out with the they have zero credibility line makes them look pathetic
I just hope cycling can recover if this all comes out in the wash if there was a big inner circle between the UCI,ASO, Armstrong,Bruyneel et al as it`s claimed.

MrTapir

smithy21 wrote:

Can someone explain a "borderline EPO" to me please. Did they have a test then or has it been re-tested subsequently or are we simply on about haematocrit levels?

Here's the article that @raceradio links to, http://velonews.competitor.com/2008/06/road/danish-researchers-raise-questions-about-epo-test_78921

it says its really hard to distinguish between naturally produced EPO and recombinant EPO and so it seems the threshold above which you are deemed to have too much and thus be doped, is too high so lots of riders are getting away with it.

The articles from 2008 so i dont know if the test has been improved since then. I would hope it has

Kléber

Gazzetta67 wrote:

If Armstrong`s defence team think that their man has no case to answer then why dont they sue Floyd Landis,Tyler Hamilton,Paul Kimmage,David Walsh,Greg Lemond etc etc. ???? . Coming out with the they have zero credibility line makes them look pathetic

That would involve testing the facts in court rather than trying to smear someone's reputation. Much easier to sling some mud and to play the man instead of the ball.

As for the EPO test, it is not yes/no but the use of the threshold involves the degree of probability. No doubt riders escaped punishment because of this grey area. See Danish rider Bo Hamburger who was first caught and then cleared after arguing his 79% test result wasn't absolute proof.

jerry3571

I think the Hematocrit levels are not primarily for sporting fraud more to stop Cylcists from killing themselves. The deaths to EPO could not be carried on and the sport would have had to be re-thought if deaths were to carry on and the test has seemed to have slowed the deaths to a minimal level now.
I have heard that if a Pro cylcist (who wouldn't result in a positive drugs test) were to turn up a Hospital they would be kept in for strict observation as thier body chemistry would be so off the scale.

-Jerry

morzov

Despite all that has been said the case has yet to be proved against Lance Armstrong as an individual.

However, there is a point which I'm not sure has been raised before. If his teammates have admitted doping during some of his TdeF victories (and presumably they are not lying on that front) then doesn't that invalidate the result because of the assistance they provided.

In particular weren't there some team time trials in which Hamilton and Landis were involved?

ratherbeintobago

I think the Hematocrit levels are not primarily for sporting fraud more to stop cyclists from killing themselves.

I don't think there was any doubt that's why the 50% limit was brought in. As has been said before, while it may have reduced some of the more extreme Hct results & deaths, it did effectively legalise rEPO use as long as Hct stayed <50% (normal range being 35-45%) - at the time there was no effective rEPO test.

Andy

Monty Dog

^ if you read Matt Rendell's Death of Marco Pantani, particularly following a serious crash where the coctors couldn't understand what was happening with his blood-count. It was only when they understood that Marco was an abuser of EPO were they able to treat him accordingly. The problem with EPO is that is screws-up the body's natural ability to replenish red blood cells - consequently users become dependant.
With evidence now suggesting that LA was working with Ferrari (records of bank transfers) until last year pretty well confirms the fact that his performance could only be achieved through artificial means, regardless of what lies4lance.com says.

jerry3571

ratherbeintobago wrote:

I think the Hematocrit levels are not primarily for sporting fraud more to stop cyclists from killing themselves.

I don't think there was any doubt that's why the 50% limit was brought in. As has been said before, while it may have reduced some of the more extreme Hct results & deaths, it did effectively legalise rEPO use as long as Hct stayed <50% (normal range being 35-45%) - at the time there was no effective rEPO test.

Andy

The amount of riders who died through EPO and cross country skiiers was a big problem at one point in the late 90's and the protection of riders came above everything hence the introduction of wearing of Helmets. Deaths came and still come above sporting fraud in anyones game. It's a little crazy to think not.

-Jerry

iainf72

http://bicycling.com/blogs/boulderrepor ... 6/failure/

A few good pieces being turned out at the moment

frenchfighter

AP

Attorney Elliot Peters arrives at Manhattan Federal Court in New York. Cyclist Lance Armstrong is adding John Keker and Peters to his legal team. The attorneys represented Major League Baseball players as they won a key appeals court case two years ago in which a panel of federal judges ruled that agents had no right to seize baseball's anonymous drug-testing results from 2003.

BarryBonds

Good job this is all in the public domain then

iainf72

$900 per hour I believe.

For an innocent man fighting people with no credibility, he's going to have a big lawyer bill. Perhaps he can expense it?

BarryBonds

all deductable and in anycase they may be defending him to preserve the charity raising value on behalf of livestrong. in which case Armstrong not only beat cancer hes goping to make it pay

MrTapir

^^^Its Suggs!

BikingBernie

iainf72 wrote:

$900 per hour I believe.

For an innocent man fighting people with no credibility, he's going to have a big lawyer bill. Perhaps he can expense it?

Perhaps the Livestrong 'charity' could fund it. After all, protecting Armstrong's image (on which the organisation relies) and protecing Armstrong are pretty much interchangeable. Last time I bothered to look Livestrong.org did seem to spend a very large part of their income on lawyers' fees: in excess of 6 million Dollars for the year, which if I recall correctly was their largest single itemised expense. Odd that a charity should need to spend so much on lawyers.

Monty Dog

Bernie, I'd read somewhere that Livestong's legal bill is bigger than their 'cancer awareness' contribution so guess they'll just have to get busy selling wristbands!

SunWuKong

http://bit.ly/myvBKA So they did meet with the Swiss Lab Director

lostboysaint

BikingBernie wrote:

iainf72 wrote:

$900 per hour I believe.

For an innocent man fighting people with no credibility, he's going to have a big lawyer bill. Perhaps he can expense it?

Perhaps the Livestrong 'charity' could fund it. After all, protecting Armstrong's image (on which the organisation relies) and protecing Armstrong are pretty much interchangeable. Last time I bothered to look Livestrong.org did seem to spend a very large part of their income on lawyers' fees: in excess of 6 million Dollars for the year, which if I recall correctly was their largest single itemised expense. Odd that a charity should need to spend so much on lawyers.

I suggest you look at the single largest item for the Wembley Stadium re-development. More than the cost of the whole design team put together.

Unfortunately it probably has to spend a lot on lawyers because everything it does interacts with people and those people happen to be part of the most litigious culture in the world.

The real question is that if the world comes crashing down around him then the same lawyers that drafted all his contracts with "if I'm ever found guilty then I'll hand the money back" clauses will be suiing him for that money and he hasn't won't have a cent to pay them with.