Wiggo's form

frenchfighter

ddraver wrote:

We ve all read your posts bernie and we all think they're rubbish. You re opinion has no more validity than any other post here, unless you can point to something concrete, which thus far you have failed to do.

Speak for yourself.

BB has been here a lot longer than you and still is for a reason. He can argue a point from an intelligent and fact based perspective, even if that perspective is too strong for some. He has a huge range of articles to quote from and has a good memory.

finchy

FrenchFighter - I actually quite like Bernie (as much as you can like someone you don't know other than on a forum), but when he goes on to say that everyone else has suspended their critical faculties then people have the right to say that he's talking rubbish.

BikingBernie

On the subject of Geert Leinders, he even has a poem dedicated to him

http://captaintbag.tumblr.com/post/2249 ... e-dope-doc

Of course, there are plenty of other experienced hands on board at Sky. For example Sean Yates, who seems to be applying what he learnt when racing with Armstrong to Sky.

I guess Lance [Armstrong] was the pioneer in training to race,” said Yates, who raced with Armstrong.

http://velonews.competitor.com/2012/06/ ... ace_222231

inkyfingers

frenchfighter wrote:

ddraver wrote:

We ve all read your posts bernie and we all think they're rubbish. You re opinion has no more validity than any other post here, unless you can point to something concrete, which thus far you have failed to do.

Speak for yourself.

BB has been here a lot longer than you and still is for a reason. He can argue a point from an intelligent and fact based perspective, even if that perspective is too strong for some. He has a huge range of articles to quote from and has a good memory.

My issue is that when Bernie appears it ceases to be a discussion and starts becoming a lecture. A place like this only works if you have an open mind and are at least tolerant of other peoples opinions, if it just becomes a stream of facts and unbending opinions then you might as well just go and read Wikipedia. The truth in most matters is somewhere in the middle ground.

Tom Butcher

OK stuff like an doctor proven to be involved in doping I agree doesn't look good - I don't know Geert Leinders has been proven to be so by the way I haven't any knowledge of his history. Doping went on at Rabobank - and he was a doctor working with that team - I accept he probably knew it was going on - not sure that makes him a doping doc - or is there stronger evidence against him than that ?

What I don't buy are arguments along the lines of he is holding form all year - therefore he must be doping - wasn't it always the opposite that was taken to be suspicious - riders whose form fluctuated were seen as probably dopers ?

I don't buy that sky riding on the front in the Dauphine means the team have a doping programme - they have a huge budget and have bought in riders like Froome, Rogers and Porte to do just that - Liquigas did similar at the Giro - possibly not quite so dominant there but then the Giro is a 3 week grand tour not a one week warm up for the Tour.

I just find it unlikely that Sky would have a team doping programme - there is so much for them to lose - the implications for British Cycling as a whole would be huge and go way beyond the probably collapse of the pro road team. Maybe I'm being naive on that but there doesn't seem much to suggest they are doping - the whispers don't seem that loud and in a sport with cycling's history it must be virtually impossible to avoid any association with people linked to doping in the past.

alihisgreat

This thread is hilarious -> I love how a combination of good form and potentially inaccurate (although not really suspicious) information given in interviews to the media can turn into an indication of doping... who cares if he only lost 5kg instead of 11kg? or that he's maintaining 90% year round rather than 95-97%? He's probably just trying to scare some opponents.

but i guess that's just the hangover from cycling's dodgy past? I wonder how long it will be before the hangover clears?

finchy

Tom Butcher wrote:

What I don't buy are arguments along the lines of he is holding form all year - therefore he must be doping - wasn't it always the opposite that was taken to be suspicious - riders whose form fluctuated were seen as probably dopers ?

In the old days, when villagers dug up a corpse to see if it was a vampire, the corpse was deemed to be one of the walking dead if it hadn't start to decompose. It was also a vampire if it HAD started to decompose.

This is a bit like following cycling today. Wins throughout the year = doped. Inconsistent = doped.

RichN95.

K

BikingBernie wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

And a lot of the last couple of decades of sports science in cycling has been based around doping programmes. The big peaks and troughs were due to doping programmes, in clean sport it's an outdated idea...

"In a clean sport". Wow, that the biggest declaration of unsubstantiated faith that I have ever seen with regards pro bike racing. More likely doping is still rife, but the gains to be had are now much less and they days of riders like Armstrong and Riis, riding with haemocrit levels of 58-64%, are over.

I didn't say cycling was clean. But there are other sports which are more or less. In those sports 'peaking' is increasingly viewed as a myth and really just a mental thing. Rest and recuperation is the key. If you keep a high base level the work needed to peak is minimal which frees the athlete up to work on specifics.

And yes, I do know a lot of sports scientists.

dougzz

inkyfingers wrote:

frenchfighter wrote:

ddraver wrote:

We ve all read your posts bernie and we all think they're rubbish. You re opinion has no more validity than any other post here, unless you can point to something concrete, which thus far you have failed to do.

Speak for yourself.

BB has been here a lot longer than you and still is for a reason. He can argue a point from an intelligent and fact based perspective, even if that perspective is too strong for some. He has a huge range of articles to quote from and has a good memory.

My issue is that when Bernie appears it ceases to be a discussion and starts becoming a lecture. A place like this only works if you have an open mind and are at least tolerant of other peoples opinions, if it just becomes a stream of facts and unbending opinions then you might as well just go and read Wikipedia. The truth in most matters is somewhere in the middle ground.

On the whole I like BB's posts, don't always agree with them, but mostly find them interesting, debate is the point of this place after all. I don't think it matters how long you've been here, we all talk rubbish at times, we all talk sense at others. BB does seem to generate a lot of personal attacks though, if you don't like what he posts offer a counter or ignore it.

brettjmcc

DeadCalm wrote:

Jonathan Vaughters ‏@Vaughters
@UCI_Overlord not sure why ppl are surprised by sky:a few €800k guys pulling a €900k guy, who then pulls for a €1.3m guy,who helps a €2m guy

Yeah and on top of that he then tweeted to others

Jonathan Vaughters ‏@Vaughters
@magic_spanner I am. Wish I could pay like Sky. I was just answering some stupid speculation over why sky was riding so well.

This is for me the reason, they finally have the team built together after Brailsford learnt/understood what it would take to win. I think he said as much after Sky's 2010 performance - that they had under estimated and it would need replanning

ddraver

frenchfighter wrote:

ddraver wrote:

We ve all read your posts bernie and we all think they're rubbish. You re opinion has no more validity than any other post here, unless you can point to something concrete, which thus far you have failed to do.

Speak for yourself.

BB has been here a lot longer than you and still is for a reason. He can argue a point from an intelligent and fact based perspective, even if that perspective is too strong for some. He has a huge range of articles to quote from and has a good memory.

Longevity is no sign of accuracy Frenchie....

The trouble today is that he has NOT done the bit in bold...yet...Quoting articles is also pointless if the articles are rubbish.

BikingBernie

inkyfingers wrote:

A place like this only works if you have an open mind and are at least tolerant of other peoples opinions, if it just becomes a stream of facts and unbending opinions then you might as well just go and read Wikipedia.

Facts are meaningless. You could use facts to prove anything that's even remotely true!

Homer Simpson.

inkyfingers wrote:

The truth in most matters is somewhere in the middle ground.

What's the middle ground between 'doping' and 'clean' I wonder?

P.s. With regards 'unbending opinion', I didn't think that I had expressed any opinion with regards whether or not Sky have a doping programme. As to my 'opinion' that a lot of what comes out of the Sky camp doesn't really add up, as with the daft claims Wiggins made about the effect of losing weight, surely that is demonstrable fact, not opinion?

BikingBernie

Tom Butcher wrote:

OK stuff like an doctor proven to be involved in doping I agree doesn't look good - I don't know Geert Leinders has been proven to be so by the way I haven't any knowledge of his history. Doping went on at Rabobank - and he was a doctor working with that team - I accept he probably knew it was going on - not sure that makes him a doping doc - or is there stronger evidence against him than that ?

Nice bit of rationalisation there. Some people say much the same about Ferrari..

Tom Butcher wrote:

I just find it unlikely that Sky would have a team doping programme - there is so much for them to lose

On the other hand, just imagine what they would have to gain if Wiggins won the Tour. You could apply what you say to practically every rider and team who has ever doped.

Tom Butcher wrote:

it must be virtually impossible to avoid any association with people linked to doping in the past.

I am sure there are many highly qualified people without an associations with doping who would jump at the chance to work with a team like Sky. Perhaps it depends on what 'skills' and 'experience' you are really looking for.

Anyhow, I see that another poem has been posted

http://captaintbag.tumblr.com/post/2477 ... ping-recap

Tom Butcher

Now I don't think all that is quite right.

Being aware of doing in a team you work for is not equivalent to being a doping doctor in the way Ferrari is. I'm aware of some things that have gone on at my work that I think are wrong - that isn't the equivalent to me having done them myself.

There is more to lose for the likes of Sky than say USPostal because of the tie up with British Cycling. I'm not saying that that makes it impossible for them to be involved in doping - just less likely. I also suspect that organised doping by teams is less likely these days - the more recent cases are not Festina type affairs and I've seen very little to prove that that level of doping still goes on - so the idea that Sky's dominance in the Dauphine is down to team doping is consequently also less likely.

Finally I think Sky found out in their first year that they needed experience of people within the sport. In any case I've yet to see proof (that's proof, not poetry) that this doctor is in fact a doping doctor rather than just someone who happened to work at a team where doping took place.

BikingBernie

Tom Butcher wrote:

Being aware of doing in a team you work for is not equivalent to being a doping doctor in the way Ferrari is. I'm aware of some things that have gone on at my work that I think are wrong - that isn't the equivalent to me having done them myself.

If you do a bit of research (most of the stories are in Dutch) you will see that Geert Leinders was intimately involved in Rabobank's doping programme. True enough his main role seems to have been monitoring the doping so as to stop the riders killing themselves, and he is hardly another Ferrari, but it is hardly credible to claim that he was an innocent bystander.

So much for Sky's policy of employing no-one with a link to doping, and there are others on Sky's team, both staff and team members with similar associations. The 'policy' did it's PR job though, I suppose.

gabriel959

I am glad some people don't see everything with rose tinted glasses like Biking Bernie.

If you can read Spanish...

http://ciclismo2005.blogspot.co.uk/2012 ... ostal.html

mididoctors

gabriel959 wrote:

I am glad some people don't see everything with rose tinted glasses like Biking Bernie.

If you can read Spanish...

http://ciclismo2005.blogspot.co.uk/2012 ... ostal.html

"Please welcome therefore the UkPostal"



If sky boss the tour like they did the Dauphine it will be somewhat incredulous ...but I dont think they will... They are not going to ride tempo across 3 weeks

RichN95.

What Sky did at the Dauphine was the equivalent, in football, of Manchester City winning the Calling Cup by beating Sunderland and Everton.

In such an event, if a football fan proclaimed that this was reminiscent of the greatest ever teams and their improvement over the last three years was down to doping, they would he seen as crazy. If they then used Micah Richards saying he always gives 110% and has an extra yard of speed as evidence of wrong doing because 110% is not possible and speed is not measured in yards, they'd be sectioned.

The idea that this is really the bare minimum that team spending their sort money should be achieving wouldn't seem to occur to some cycling 'fans'. They would point to Toure taking a slimming pill and think that was think that is why they're successful, not the £500m spent on players.

mididoctors

if other teams let sky dictate the tour like that they are going to lose.

I have brain damage...its the only possible explannation

Pross

BikingBernie wrote:

Gazzaputt wrote:

As to raising an eyebrow to Wiggo I think you'll find it well documented the training methods.

All the studies of training methods I have ever read indicate that the most effective programmes are strongly cyclical in nature, with relatively few periods of targeted form. If anyone can point me in the direction of any others showing that this is false, I would love to read them.

I'm surprised at you pointing out the cyclical approach and that anything deviating from that potentially being suspicious given that the thinking on peaking just a few times a year came around at about the same time as EPO. We all know who the ultimate exponent of hitting their peak for a 3 week window was so are you suggesting he was probably clean as this fitted with perceived wisdom of training?

For years before the EPO era riders competed (and won) for the whole season. Anquetil won the Tour, Vuelta and Paris - Nice in '63 and Tour, Giro and G-W in '64 (OK, he's a self-confessed doper but it wouldn't have been with today's method). Merckx '70 Tour, Giro, G-W, P-R and Fleche - '73 Giro, Vuelta, G-W, P-R, L-B-L, Amstel, Paris-Brussels. OK they are at the extreme of cycling ability and I wouldn't class Wiggins anywhere near their league but we seem to be seeing more riders stay at the top level throughout the season again now that many seem to believe the peloton is the cleanest it has been for a long time. Gilbert last season that he was able to stay at his best for a huge part of the season. So who knows, maybe it is just that the cyclical peaking was indelibly linked to the use of EPO and similar. Of course, it could be that EPO use has changed to make detection harder and that this has left riders at a lower level but able to maintain it for longer but I prefer to give the benefit of the doubt (and usually end up disappointed!).

DeadCalm

johnfinch wrote:

FrenchFighter - I actually quite like Bernie (as much as you can like someone you don't know other than on a forum), but when he goes on to say that everyone else has suspended their critical faculties then people have the right to say that he's talking rubbish.

Indeed, the derogatory and insulting tone of his early posts provoked the nature of the responses. In fact, given that he is on the face of it of reasonable intelligence, it is difficult to come to any conclusion other than that was what he sought.

Turfle

People are surprised that Wiggins, Porte, Froome, Rogers finished in the same group as Weening, Zubeldia, Kiriyenka? The same group that Machado managed to hang onto for ages even after being in the break?

Who were the on form, very good climbers that were unable to stay with them?

Why that is more suspicious than the likes of Nibali and Schleck not being able to hang anywhere near Weening, but suddenly being at their very very best 3 weeks later is beyond me.

It's basically, 1) ride good = cheat. 2) fit all arguments to your conclusion. 3) look I was right.

DeadCalm

Pross wrote:

BikingBernie wrote:

Gazzaputt wrote:

As to raising an eyebrow to Wiggo I think you'll find it well documented the training methods.

All the studies of training methods I have ever read indicate that the most effective programmes are strongly cyclical in nature, with relatively few periods of targeted form. If anyone can point me in the direction of any others showing that this is false, I would love to read them.

I'm surprised at you pointing out the cyclical approach and that anything deviating from that potentially being suspicious given that the thinking on peaking just a few times a year came around at about the same time as EPO. We all know who the ultimate exponent of hitting their peak for a 3 week window was so are you suggesting he was probably clean as this fitted with perceived wisdom of training?

For years before the EPO era riders competed (and won) for the whole season. Anquetil won the Tour, Vuelta and Paris - Nice in '63 and Tour, Giro and G-W in '64 (OK, he's a self-confessed doper but it wouldn't have been with today's method). Merckx '70 Tour, Giro, G-W, P-R and Fleche - '73 Giro, Vuelta, G-W, P-R, L-B-L, Amstel, Paris-Brussels. OK they are at the extreme of cycling ability and I wouldn't class Wiggins anywhere near their league but we seem to be seeing more riders stay at the top level throughout the season again now that many seem to believe the peloton is the cleanest it has been for a long time. Gilbert last season that he was able to stay at his best for a huge part of the season. So who knows, maybe it is just that the cyclical peaking was indelibly linked to the use of EPO and similar. Of course, it could be that EPO use has changed to make detection harder and that this has left riders at a lower level but able to maintain it for longer but I prefer to give the benefit of the doubt (and usually end up disappointed!).

Plus, if you actually read the Cyclingnews article together with the one in the Guardian (and don't just leap on a single quote) it is clear that Wiggins is using a cyclical approach to training with a view to peaking at the tour. The 'revolutionary' bit appears to be that he doesn't let himself go during the recovery phases.

symo

Just my 2p.

Brailsford has been given the task of winning the tour with a Clean British rider in 5 years. Somehow I think knowing Sky's canny legal team that they will all have clauses relating to repayment of salary and prizes linked into each rider and support personnels contract. Potentially you could also add in retrospective testing clauses too.

Could be wrong but it would be how I would put a Pro-riders contract together, to limit liability to the parent company.

BikingBernie

Pross wrote:

For years before the EPO era riders competed (and won) for the whole season. Anquetil won the Tour, Vuelta and Paris - Nice in '63 and Tour, Giro and G-W in '64 (OK, he's a self-confessed doper but it wouldn't have been with today's method). Merckx '70 Tour, Giro, G-W, P-R and Fleche - '73 Giro, Vuelta, G-W, P-R, L-B-L, Amstel, Paris-Brussels...

Ah yes, the days of the 'social season', when riders would commonly hang up their bikes after the last race and, unless they were riding a few amphetamine-fuelled 6-day events, hardly touch their bikes until the next year, beginning with those early season stage races along the Med, now no more, to help them begin to 'get the rough off'.

In any case, riders rode all season largely because they had to in order to earn a decent living. The 'peaking' thing came along when riders realised that racing in a half-knackered state all season was not necessarily the way to maximise their performance, and when increased incomes allowed riders to pick and choose their events and still earn a living.

BikingBernie

symo wrote:

Brailsford has been given the task of winning the tour with a Clean British rider in 5 years.

By whom? That bastion of 'morality above profits', Rupert Murdoch perhaps?

Is there some document that lays out this stipulation for all to see?

Why did he need to employ a doping doc to achieve this goal?

BikingBernie

Turfle wrote:

It's basically, 1) ride good = cheat. 2) fit all arguments to your conclusion. 3) look I was right.

No, it's more a case of 'Long, painful experience tells us that the best way to spot a doper is simply to look at who is standing on the podium, and whilst the sport may well be getting cleaner, and winning is no proof in itself of doping, it is always best to keep an open mind, especially when the reasons given by riders for going so well don't seem to hold water, when the team employs dodgy doctors and so forth.

To repeat, yet again, I am not categorically saying that Wiggins / Sky are doping, but there are plenty of things about Sky that mean only the naive would be willing to categorically claim that they are clean, whatever the Sky PR machine might have us believe. To make such a claim is nothing more than a declaration of faith.

jibberjim

BikingBernie wrote:

The 'peaking' thing came along when riders realised that racing in a half-knackered state all season was not necessarily the way to maximise their performance, and when increased incomes allowed riders to pick and choose their events and still earn a living.

Surely the peaking thing came about with Blood doping in the 80's when you needed to remove blood to have it later, ie it was the troughs which were enforced not the peaks. Of course there were always riders who did nothing in the off season, but they can be ignored as that's obviously not going to be possible nowadays.

Turfle

BikingBernie wrote:

Turfle wrote:

It's basically, 1) ride good = cheat. 2) fit all arguments to your conclusion. 3) look I was right.

No, it's more a case of 'Long, painful experience tells us that the best way to spot a doper is simply to look at who is standing on the podium, and whilst the sport may well be getting cleaner, and winning is no proof in itself of doping, it is always best to keep an open mind, especially when the reasons given by riders for going so well don't seem to hold water, when the team employs dodgy doctors and so forth.

To repeat, yet again, I am not categorically saying that Wiggins / Sky are doping, but there are plenty of things about Sky that mean only the naive would be willing to categorically claim that they are clean, whatever the Sky PR machine might have us believe. To make such a claim is nothing more than a declaration of faith.

If Sky get 1, 2, 4 at the Tour de France, when all other riders are on form and trying to win, then by all means use the podium as reason to be suspicious. But 1, 2, 4 at a TT heavy Dauphine, while riding your strongest team vs a collection of out of form contenders, while many other contenders ride an entirely different race is indicative of nothing.

At the Dauphine there were 3 Tour de France GC riders who showed form - Wiggins, Evans, VDB. Wiggins didn't look to be in particularly better form than those two, he just happens to be a superior TT rider. In the mountains they all looked as comfortable as each other.

What Sky have done is target those who can TT, and climb in a similar style to Wiggins. Those are also the riders you'd expect to feature towards the top at week long, TT heavy stage races regardless of who they ride for.

IMO their performance is easily accounted for by form and parcours.

dougzz

BikingBernie wrote:

No, it's more a case of 'Long, painful experience tells us that the best way to spot a doper is simply to look at who is standing on the podium, and whilst the sport may well be getting cleaner, and winning is no proof in itself of doping, it is always best to keep an open mind, especially when the reasons given by riders for going so well don't seem to hold water, when the team employs dodgy doctors and so forth.

The podium bit isn't really true is it. Lots of the EPO period doping was domestiques just trying to hang in there.

With regard to the original issue of Wiggins and Sky I like Rich's Man City analogy, it incorporates the 110% crap so often talked about by sports people.