2 Dopers come 1st / 2nd in a race in Spain

dsoutar

Gavin Cook wrote:

The fact they have served their bans means nothing at all if they don't admit they are guilty.

Yeah - reminds me of the opening sequence from Porridge where one can hear the judge's voice:

"who accepts arrest as an occupational hazard, and presumably accepts imprisonment in the same casual manner"

Substitute ban for arrest and imprisonment and you have the doper's mentality

jerry3571

Clenbuterol in the system is a straight forward ban so he was guilty. Steakboy hasn't admitted his guilt also. Dear god, this is unreal.

ddraver

dougzz wrote:

ddraver wrote:

In fairness to Thom (and nothing depresses he more), it does appear he is in a massive majority....

What, a massive majority have a man crush on Bert?

A massive majority would rather watch doped cycling than clean cycling

blazing_saddles

jerry3571 wrote:

Clenbuterol in the system is a straight forward ban so he was guilty. Steakboy hasn't admitted his guilt also. Dear god, this is unreal.

Well, this thread is certainly unreal, that's for sure. Unrealistic.

ddraver wrote:

dougzz wrote:

ddraver wrote:

In fairness to Thom (and nothing depresses he more), it does appear he is in a massive majority....

What, a massive majority have a man crush on Bert?

A massive majority would rather watch doped cycling than clean cycling

Utter nonsense. We all aspire to clean cycling, but place different values on different priorities.
You are now slagging off all posters who don't share quite your puritanical stance.

I suspect that the massive majority think that the probability that Contador doped is high
and that the possibility that he is still doping remains.

However, we accept the current rules, as they stand and accept that what was once a clean
race at the time, may, in time, turn out to be dirty. The bio passport being the only tool in the testers armoury,
that isn't completely retroactive.

I place my emphasis on improved and more rigorous testing, within a more efficient (faster outcome) system,
rather than the redemptive words of a past cheat.

Gavin Cook wrote:

The fact they have served their bans means nothing at all if they don't admit they are guilty.

If, after a 2 year ban, the only way back to racing were to make a confession, everybody would.
A confession isn't a guarantee of clean, now, but would be utterly worthless if imposed.

ddraver

I'm not being puritanical about anything, I'm looking at the opinions posted on here, twitter and around the world about the race. Most of them can be summed up as "clean boring tour" and "exciting Vuelta won by 2 dopers" who have made it clear they are doing nothing different from before as they never did anything wrong. How you feel on whether they did anything wrong or not...?

The majority of cycling fans are not british and the majority that I ve spoken to or read opinions of (French, Dutch, German mostly but it seems Italians and Spanish are similar) just assume that all riders dope anyway so just let the racing be exciting. THe most common refrain i ve heard being the "they ride for 200kms a day over 4 mountain passes for 3 weeks - of course they dope!"

If most fans had to re-watch the tour or the Vuelta 2012, they'd choose the Vuelta - they prefer watching the dodgy exciting racing not the realities of a clean cycling. They re not wrong, they just have a different opinion (Wiggins hinted at this in his guardian article).

I have to admit, I have nt worked out quite how this sits with me at the moment. Certainly it does nt give me hope for clean cycling in the future, but do I care? Not sure...Maybe I'm naive to think any road cycling has ever been clean.

Turfle

I'm all for riders getting 2nd and 3rd chances, and while I'd love for them all to confess to their sins, I know it's unrealistic. Finding joy in watching them race is proving hard though. Maybe it's because their performances are being used as a stick to beat the "boring Tour" with.

dsoutar

Blazing Saddles wrote:

[If, after a 2 year ban, the only way back to racing were to make a confession, everybody would.
A confession isn't a guarantee of clean, now, but would be utterly worthless if imposed.

I agree - so there would have to be a far more sophisticated manner of dealing with it such as ensuring the person concerned provided names, dates, places, substances etc with as much evidence (especially where it could be corroborated) as possible.

These activities are not occuring in a vacuum; there are always others (team mates, team officials, UCI officials, third-parties, etc) involved.

Perhaps have an x year ban but commuted to y years if the above is forthcoming. (I'll leave it to others to propose x and y). If x is long enough to threaten a career but y is short enough to permit a realistic return to the sport then perhaps it might go some way to continuing the clean up of the sport in general.

Just banning individuals doesn't really perform that task at all.

slim_boy_fat

Interesting retweet from Vaughters.

RT @ammattipyoraily: Vuelta 2012: Alberto Contador 5.88 W/kg. Vuelta 2000 - 2012: 1. Roberto Heras 2004 6.32 W/kg.... This should be HUGE news.

tommasi

Well this is the source he's using.

http://www.fillarifoorumi.fi/forum/showthread.php?38129-Ammattilaispy%F6r%E4ilij%F6iden-nousutietoja-%28aika-km-h-VAM-W-W-kg-etc-%29&p=1906952#post1906952

Which on the face of it probably isn't the best evidence to suggest power outputs are decreasing. Wiggins with a higher w/kg at this years Tour than Armstrong in 2000 and 2002. Contador with his third highest ever at this years Vuelta. Landis 06 way down the list, etc

mfin

dsoutar wrote:

Blazing Saddles wrote:

[If, after a 2 year ban, the only way back to racing were to make a confession, everybody would.
A confession isn't a guarantee of clean, now, but would be utterly worthless if imposed.

I agree - so there would have to be a far more sophisticated manner of dealing with it such as ensuring the person concerned provided names, dates, places, substances etc with as much evidence (especially where it could be corroborated) as possible.

These activities are not occuring in a vacuum; there are always others (team mates, team officials, UCI officials, third-parties, etc) involved.

Perhaps have an x year ban but commuted to y years if the above is forthcoming. (I'll leave it to others to propose x and y). If x is long enough to threaten a career but y is short enough to permit a realistic return to the sport then perhaps it might go some way to continuing the clean up of the sport in general.

Just banning individuals doesn't really perform that task at all.

I propose a 10 year ban for X then, commuted back to the 2 years if you provide further evidence to your doping than that which was found out without your help, where you got the drugs, blood doping help etc, and names... and even then, 2 years is always 2 actual years, that can be 'y'.

We'd lose a few riders a year. Good.

No_Ta_Doctor

tommasi wrote:

Well this is the source he's using.

http://www.fillarifoorumi.fi/forum/showthread.php?38129-Ammattilaispy%F6r%E4ilij%F6iden-nousutietoja-%28aika-km-h-VAM-W-W-kg-etc-%29&p=1906952#post1906952

Which on the face of it probably isn't the best evidence to suggest power outputs are decreasing. Wiggins with a higher w/kg at this years Tour than Armstrong in 2000 and 2002. Contador with his third highest ever at this years Vuelta. Landis 06 way down the list, etc

Sigh.

There is absolutely no point whatsoever in comparing an average over a whole tour. It tells us nothing whatsoever.

ddraver

Made a blog post about my thoughts...

http://davekio.wordpress.com/2012/09/16 ... r-cycling/

...If you re bored

iainf72

RichN95 wrote:

Nicolas Portal gives them some inside knowledge though - an actual portal if you will. He still knows all those guys. It's the same with the fuss about Leinders. I image Sky had a word with Flecha and Hayman before hiring him.
.

Isn't the rumour Sky have 'Rick Chasey'd' him? (let him go)

RichN95.

iainf72 wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

Nicolas Portal gives them some inside knowledge though - an actual portal if you will. He still knows all those guys. It's the same with the fuss about Leinders. I image Sky had a word with Flecha and Hayman before hiring him.
.

Isn't the rumour Sky have 'Rick Chasey'd' him? (let him go)

Well he was only on a short term contract anyway so I doubt it was renewed, unless Sky wanted to be incredibly stubbon.

rick_chasey

iainf72 wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

Nicolas Portal gives them some inside knowledge though - an actual portal if you will. He still knows all those guys. It's the same with the fuss about Leinders. I image Sky had a word with Flecha and Hayman before hiring him.
.

Isn't the rumour Sky have 'Rick Chasey'd' him? (let him go)

:?: :?:

inkyfingers

Rumour has it that Rick got the flick having placed Kweku Adoboli into his job at UBS.

Vino'sGhost

ddraver wrote:

I'm not being puritanical about anything, I'm looking at the opinions posted on here, twitter and around the world about the race. Most of them can be summed up as "clean boring tour" and "exciting Vuelta won by 2 dopers" who have made it clear they are doing nothing different from before as they never did anything wrong. How you feel on whether they did anything wrong or not...?

The majority of cycling fans are not british and the majority that I ve spoken to or read opinions of (French, Dutch, German mostly but it seems Italians and Spanish are similar) just assume that all riders dope anyway so just let the racing be exciting. THe most common refrain i ve heard being the "they ride for 200kms a day over 4 mountain passes for 3 weeks - of course they dope!"

If most fans had to re-watch the tour or the Vuelta 2012, they'd choose the Vuelta - they prefer watching the dodgy exciting racing not the realities of a clean cycling. They re not wrong, they just have a different opinion (Wiggins hinted at this in his guardian article).



I have to admit, I have nt worked out quite how this sits with me at the moment. Certainly it does nt give me hope for clean cycling in the future, but do I care? Not sure...Maybe I'm naive to think any road cycling has ever been clean.

Good post

rick_chasey

inkyfingers wrote:

Rumour has it that Rick got the flick having placed Kweku Adoboli into his job at UBS.

If only.

Daz555

Error

Daz555

ddraver wrote:

The majority of cycling fans are not british and the majority that I ve spoken to or read opinions of (French, Dutch, German mostly but it seems Italians and Spanish are similar) just assume that all riders dope anyway so just let the racing be exciting. THe most common refrain i ve heard being the "they ride for 200kms a day over 4 mountain passes for 3 weeks - of course they dope!"

So the British are the ones in the right here.

The British have always abhorred corruption (just look at the reaction in Britain to political scandals which would not even have made page 27 of the local rag in places like Italy).

Go GB.

rick_chasey

Daz555 wrote:

ddraver wrote:

The majority of cycling fans are not british and the majority that I ve spoken to or read opinions of (French, Dutch, German mostly but it seems Italians and Spanish are similar) just assume that all riders dope anyway so just let the racing be exciting. THe most common refrain i ve heard being the "they ride for 200kms a day over 4 mountain passes for 3 weeks - of course they dope!"

So the British are the ones in the right here.

The British have always abhorred corruption (just look at the reaction in Britain to political scandals which would not even have made page 27 of the local rag in places like Italy).

Go GB.

thomthom

ddraver wrote:

If most fans had to re-watch the tour or the Vuelta 2012, they'd choose the Vuelta - they prefer watching the dodgy exciting racing not the realities of a clean cycling.

You mean the race in July that had the most postive tests in what.. 3 years?

ddraver

1?

And you don't need to be a dick, I'm actually agreeing with you - I'm just not happy about it....

thomthom

Not being a dick at all. Your post just suggested that Tour De France was clean racing and Vuelta wasn't - (or at least was dodgy) which is pretty much just a claim without any evidence. I don't think neither of the Tours were dodgy. It was two different ways of winning the overall. Conservative riding throughout 3 weeks(which was only possible because of the lack of quality opposition) or aggressive riding with attacks followed by softpeddaling, then attacking, softpaddling etc.

If the Vuelta was 'dodgy', so was Tour De France.

Daz555

ddraver wrote:

A massive majority would rather watch doped cycling than clean cycling

Really? I mean, really?

TheBigBean

I still think doped cycling is far more dull.

ddraver

Daz555 wrote:

ddraver wrote:

A massive majority would rather watch doped cycling than clean cycling

Really? I mean, really?

Hang on you agree with it above, then disagree with the bit at the bottom?

Suggest you need to read the whole thing again bud...

ddraver

ThomThom wrote:

Not being a dick at all. Your post just suggested that Tour De France was clean racing and Vuelta wasn't - (or at least was dodgy) which is pretty much just a claim without any evidence. I don't think neither of the Tours were dodgy. It was two different ways of winning the overall. Conservative riding throughout 3 weeks(which was only possible because of the lack of quality opposition) or aggressive riding with attacks followed by softpeddaling, then attacking, softpaddling etc.

If the Vuelta was 'dodgy', so was Tour De France.

2 guys back from doping bans who have made a big song and dance about never having done anything wrong and not doing anything different from before vs 2 guys with no association to doping at all.

Ok so maybe Wiggo and Froome have been buying Symex Machines for Pat but....

There's some evidence...

Again, I'm not saying anyone is wrong, just that you and they have a different view from the on expressed by many on here...

Richmond Racer

there was no gift of any bleeding machine by Sky to Fat Pat. That Twatter arse UCI Overlord admitted he made it up...

evil:

ddraver

Was nt a serious suggestion - I did nt know about the UCI overlord thing tbh...