Sky and David Walsh

blazing_saddles

iainf72 wrote:

No tA Doctor wrote:

iainf72 wrote:

The biggest problem with this is that in the grand scheme of things, Sky and Walsh have the same employers.

I might be alone in not thinking this is a problem.

Your edit changed the context somewhat.

What I meant was, considering the circumstances (same employer) would Walsh let it lie if it wasn't him? I didn't read the article so perhaps he addressed it or had a caveat, but he's not open about it doesn't it make him an enormous hypocrite?
I'd expect him to apply the same standard to himself as he would to others.

Were that the only universal forum rule, the world would be a much saner place.

iainf72

No tA Doctor wrote:

Sorry, wasn't aware of an edit - I scrolled back looking for your original post and couldn't find it, so copied the quote from someone else quoting you. Apologies.

Frankly you've just confused the hell out of me.

This bit:
"would Walsh let it lie if it wasn't him? "

Would he let what lie? That Sky have given a journalist access all areas? Or that Sky have given a journalist connected by "same employers" access all areas?

Forget journalism - Anything. So if the UCI, or an athlete had a financial connection to someone that could be perceived as a conflict of interest, would he call it out? I believe he would.

Especially as the new fluffy Sky where they're open and let journos have a poke around is allowing access to someone from News Corp.

No_Ta_Doctor

iainf72 wrote:

No tA Doctor wrote:

Sorry, wasn't aware of an edit - I scrolled back looking for your original post and couldn't find it, so copied the quote from someone else quoting you. Apologies.

Frankly you've just confused the hell out of me.

This bit:
"would Walsh let it lie if it wasn't him? "

Would he let what lie? That Sky have given a journalist access all areas? Or that Sky have given a journalist connected by "same employers" access all areas?

Forget journalism - Anything. So if the UCI, or an athlete had a financial connection to someone that could be perceived as a conflict of interest, would he call it out? I believe he would.

Especially as the new fluffy Sky where they're open and let journos have a poke around is allowing access to someone from News Corp.

OK, I'm with you now.

I think he would ask questions if it wasn't him, and I think he should answer the questions he would have asked seeing as it is him.

I think pointing out potential conflicts of interest is valuable wherever it occurs, though I'm not keen to jump from that to "it's a fishy business" without some further context (e.g. in this case, journalistic reputation etc.). I may be more forgiving than Walsh himself is here. It's a typical tactic in journalism to let an open question hang in the air until it becomes a rhetorical statement. It's fair that Walsh himself is held accountable, but that's a very long way from pre-judging him.

rob churchill

iainf72 wrote:

No tA Doctor wrote:

iainf72 wrote:

The biggest problem with this is that in the grand scheme of things, Sky and Walsh have the same employers.

I might be alone in not thinking this is a problem.

Your edit changed the context somewhat.

What I meant was, considering the circumstances (same employer) would Walsh let it lie if it wasn't him? I didn't read the article so perhaps he addressed it or had a caveat, but he's not open about it doesn't it make him an enormous hypocrite?

I'd expect him to apply the same standard to himself as he would to others.

Ok, so how many journalists have called foul about this supposed conflict? None? Then I think we can reasonably infer that Walsh would also 'let it lie if it wasn't him'.

Macaloon

rob churchill wrote:

Ok, so how many journalists have called foul about this supposed conflict? None? Then I think we can reasonably infer that Walsh would also 'let it lie if it wasn't him'.

No journalists, one Kimmage.
Ninja edit to note that I'm reading between the lines. Don't know if there's a direct PK quote on this.

iainf72

rob churchill wrote:

Ok, so how many journalists have called foul about this supposed conflict? None? Then I think we can reasonably infer that Walsh would also 'let it lie if it wasn't him'.

I don't believe he would.

I don't think Walsh is just writing fluff pieces for what it's worth. I think Brailsford has realised the way they were dealing with things (not discussing, removing access to riders etc) was a mistake and they're trying to rectify it. I think letting Kimmage near your team is a recipe for disaster though, but there are many competent journos out there not just DW

No_Ta_Doctor

iainf72 wrote:

rob churchill wrote:

Ok, so how many journalists have called foul about this supposed conflict? None? Then I think we can reasonably infer that Walsh would also 'let it lie if it wasn't him'.

I don't believe he would.

I don't think Walsh is just writing fluff pieces for what it's worth. I think Brailsford has realised the way they were dealing with things (not discussing, removing access to riders etc) was a mistake and they're trying to rectify it. I think letting Kimmage near your team is a recipe for disaster though, but there are many competent journos out there not just DW

They need a broadsheet journalist for maximum coverage (is there a tabloid that actually has a cycling journo?).

Fotheringham can't do it as he's written Brad's book.
Gallagher at the Telegraph? He's not really tuned in to cycling really, I'd be disappointed if it were him.
Who have the Independent got?

They aren't actually spoilt for choice, and Walsh has the perfect CV otherwise.

iainf72

No tA Doctor wrote:

Gallagher at the Telegraph? He's not really tuned in to cycling really, I'd be disappointed if it were him.

Bren tweeted about the Sky transparency and how they've always been brilliant, despite Brailsford saying they hadn't. Which says it all really.

rob churchill

Also, when Kimmage said he'd been offered unrestricted access and then they immediately started restricting the access, my initial response was that I'd like to hear Brailsford's version, and specifically whether anyone had ever said access would be unlimited.

Richmond Racer

Continuing the question of broadsheet journos...

But before I get on to that, I just want to point out something. The journos are generally freelance. So take someone like Richard Moore - he gets commissions to write blogs for Sky Sports, but he also writes for Scotland on Sunday (I think its called), a couple of other papers, CycleSport, Procyling etc. The only guy as far as I know who is employed by a national paper - and has been for years - as their cycling journo is Will Fotheringham.

(this is why this business about Kimmage crying about being sacked by Sunday Times (along with at least 99 other journo staff at that time) is a red herring - he wasn't a full term emplyee as such, he would have been freelance)

OK, back to the journos who regularly contribute cycling pieces to British papers:


Telegraph: Gallagher. A joke. No credibility whatsoever.

Independent - Alastair Fotheringham. He's Will's brother, so concerns that Will might not be neutral, may be levelled at him by the fraternal connection

Times - Owen Slot, but he really covers multi-sports and has only a general level of knowldege of cycling.

Which leaves us Jeremy Whittle who writes in the Times. Whittle went on record recently in a BBC radio programme as saying that he will never trust anything a rider tells him ever again. The host was a bit taken aback and pushed him on this, but Whittle repeated that he had been lied to so many times over the years that he will never trust again, and nothing any rider or team did would make him believe or trust again. Not really the kind of stand you'd want -you dont really want to embark on an exercise like this with someone you know from the outset isnt going to believe anything he's told, and at the end of it is going to say, 'no, didnt see anything but still cant believe because I wont believe in cycling ever again.'

Macaloon

Matt Seaton?

It occurred to me that there are likely to be 'investigative journalists' all over Team Sky/British Cycling (looking for any scrap of scandal. It could be a career story for someone. And given the lack of fraternal love felt for NI amongst media brethren no shortage of publishers. Not seen much, if any, scandal so far.

at Bren ^^^

Richmond Racer

Seaton is US based.

(he's also completely under the Kimmage spell but that's another issue)

ratsbeyfus

I wouldn't want Brenden Gallagher anywhere near SKY. Anyone who can photoshop his tagline photo that much has a distant concept of 'truth'. Matt Seaton would be great but I think he's trying to be a proper journo in the states. How about Inrng as well as Walsh?

iainf72

Anyone else remember 2008 when the team was being formed and a few of us we're saying "If it's supposed to be a clean team, WTF are they hiring x & y" for?

Good times.

Richmond Racer

iainf72 wrote:

Anyone else remember 2008 when the team was being formed and a few of us we're saying "If it's supposed to be a clean team, WTF are they hiring x & y" for?

Good times.

They should have has us as the recruiters, eh, Iain

Richmond Racer

ratsbeyfus wrote:

I wouldn't want Brenden Gallagher anywhere near SKY. Anyone who can photoshop his tagline photo that much has a distant concept of 'truth'. Matt Seaton would be great but I think he's trying to be a proper journo in the states. How about Inrng as well as Walsh?

INRNG's a blogger. A good one, but still a blogger. He/she has a day job (which could be as a writer, of course) Also their anonymity is clearly very important to them. And besides, INRNG's site is not mainstream - known to a lot of procycling community but means nothing outside.

ratsbeyfus

Richmond Racer wrote:

ratsbeyfus wrote:

I wouldn't want Brenden Gallagher anywhere near SKY. Anyone who can photoshop his tagline photo that much has a distant concept of 'truth'. Matt Seaton would be great but I think he's trying to be a proper journo in the states. How about Inrng as well as Walsh?

INRNG's a blogger. A good one, but still a blogger. He/she has a day job (which could be as a writer, of course) Also their anonymity is clearly very important to them. And besides, INRNG's site is not mainstream - known to a lot of procycling community but means nothing outside.

Simple, INRNG does it in disguise:



INRNG and Walsh - what a team! The former might keep the twatteratti off SKYs back, the latter would keep rational-everyday-folk happy.

blazing_saddles

Richmond Racer wrote:

iainf72 wrote:

Anyone else remember 2008 when the team was being formed and a few of us we're saying "If it's supposed to be a clean team, WTF are they hiring x & y" for?

Good times.

They should have has us as the recruiters, eh, Iain

They'd still be trying to form the team. :oops:

Richmond Racer

In all seriousness, Walsh is a highly credible journalist with a proven 13-year track record in investigative cycling journalism. He was on Armstrong's tail from the very first Tour win. He didnt trust what he was seeing, he wrote articles immediately saying as much. He followed up leads, he dug and dug.

I think we can reasonably trust that he will conduct a proper job as an investigative journalist.

If he doesnt like what he sees, and finds himself blocked on the editorial front, he'll find a way of getting published.

The idea of suggesting that a second person should be in there - what, a watcher over the watcher? - is just getting into Silly Land.

How about we stop huffing and puffing about the fact that he's going to be published in the Sunday Times, and lets see what he comes up with and what he writes.

mroli

Matt Seaton's "The Escape Artist" is very good.

stagehopper

On embedding and Kimmage, given his famous stint with Garmin/Slipstream ended up with nothing more than an extended love letter to the post-Landis Allen Lim, why does anyone think a) it has any worth wahtsoever as a journalistic technique b) as far as Kimmage is concerned, "nobody does it better"

r0bh

mroli wrote:

Matt Seaton's "The Escape Artist" is very good.

It is, and anyone who can read it without getting a bit of dust in their eye must have a heart of granite

Macaloon

r0bh wrote:

mroli wrote:

Matt Seaton's "The Escape Artist" is very good.

It is, and anyone who can read it without getting a bit of dust in their eye must have a heart of granite

Absolutely. No doubt that there's a real human being called Matt Seaton. It's tiring trying to puzzle it out with others.

micron

Has everyone read 'inside the Tour de France', 'the acolytes tale'? Walsh had a great deal of time for a brash young Texan. I always wondered what changed his mind (he addressed that issue recently) but he was impressed by Armstrong once upon a time, saw him as a breath of fresh air. I guess the point is, Walsh is an optimist - and god knows the sport needs more of that. I hope he can 'trust but verify'. I'm sure he can maintain professional distance & keep his integrity - even though, like iainf, the stench of Murdoch meets Murdoch offends my nostrils. Walsh has more than proved his chops.

Gallagher, unfortunately, has been granted same kind of access. When asked if he could request that sky release blood/power data he became hugely defensive - glad to see I'm with the majority opinion on his journalistic skills

Just as long as cyclismas don't get anywhere near it - that the overlord now has a parody account - a parody of a parody - is too meta to bear. The overlord now aspires to be the very think he claims to despise. The fact that cyclismas will be hosting a Kimmage podcast is a big misstep by him - the 'twaliban' may love it but, in playing to the cheap seats won't do anything to enhance his reputation.

No_Ta_Doctor

Does Gallagher have the same kind of access or some kind of access? I'm not a grammar nazi, I'm just not sure whether you've got a typo or a missing "the". If he did have the full backstage pass it would be good, just as long as it wasn't only him. My favourite broadsheet journo is William Fotheringham by a country mile, I'd love it if he also got the access-all-areas treatment, but again, not the best placed to make use of it if it were only him.

I'm glad to see you put some distance into UCI Overlord and cyclismas, they're pretty much the epitome of what I hate about the "twaliban". They're responsible for driving and fuelling much of the cynical nudge-wink rumour-mongering that pervades the twitter cycling community. I don't know if they're "bone idle", but the rest of Wiggins' description of them seems to fit.

Kimmage just makes me sad now. Any personal injustice that was done to him, by Armstrong or others, seems to send him into a spiral of self-pitying bile, and while he may be deserving of some pity it doesn't make for good, disinterested, objective journalism or comment. Too many people are too happy to feed it for him, which makes for some spectacular soundbites and tweets as he apparently self-destructs before our eyes, but while they might think they're helping him they're actually encouraging him to destroy the last vestiges of his career. It's horrible to watch.

micron

Oh I'm not part of any particular twitter 'gang' - I agree & disagree with a wide range of people

I've spoken to Overlord a few times - we even did a velocast together a while ago - he's a perfectly decent bloke. But the popularity that cyclismas increasingly enjoys has gone to his head, I think - the recent tweets about his relocation to Girona have been, um, interesting.

We all know absolute objectivity is a myth - the best we can ever hope for is a decent balance. I'd like to see walsh's optimism balanced by kimmage's pessimism - the apparently innocent opening question followed up by the sucker punch. Somewhere between them is the perfect journo - after all, they are really only flip sides of the same coin, both obsessive and passionate about the sport. Remember, there was once a time - in the not too distant past - when Walsh was perceived as anything BUT objective : wink:

Richmond Racer

Walsh was very taken with Armstrong in the early 90s. He interviewed Armstrong in 93. He stopped covering cycling after that and returned to cover it for the 99 Tour, during which he saw a number of things that sent the warning bells off in his head, he filed candid articles for his paper from the Tour, saying that he couldnt trust what he was seeing, and from that point onwards he didnt let go.

Given that history, I hardly think that harking back to how he felt about Armstrong in the early 90s when to Walsh there were no real warning signs, is a credible basis for trying to cast doubt on his desire and ability to ask the right questions and do a proper job as an investigator. Its seems nothing more than grasping at straws by those who wish to discredit his investigative exercise with Sky as a worthwhile exercise right up front. They have been doing so within seconds of Walsh sending his tweets re his work on Sky on Sat 2nd Feb.

No_Ta_Doctor

micron wrote:

I've spoken to Overlord a few times - we even did a velocast together a while ago - he's a perfectly decent bloke.

I'm not really interested in what he's like in person, on twitter he's an arrogant fool.

Both him and cyclismas, and others, are industrial grade shit-stirrers that are a cancer on the sport. Their sport is trouble making, and when people tweet idle conjecture, half baked theories and blatant rumour - without evidence in support - it feeds them and helps them power up the huge shit-storms that periodically blow through twitter (and from there to the real world). Brailsford has to come out publicly in the mainstream press to deny buying ASO a sysmex? How the f@cking hell can that ever have to happen? Plastergate: WTF?

This may help explain why some of us are a little hung-up, a little anal-retentive, when it comes to little things like "evidence". We get like that.

It's also part of the reason that even Vaughters is reluctant to be completely open and transparent about e.g. blood data and power values. It isn't possible to release data like that when even the slightest possible variation in interpretation of it will lead to a rider being painted as having walked straight out of trainspotting.

They shout "openness" but they actively prevent it. And so does anyone that promotes evidence free conjecture.

micron wrote:

Remember, there was once a time - in the not too distant past - when Walsh was perceived as anything BUT objective : wink:

Not by me. I also had a lot of time for Kimmage in the past.

Richmond Racer

To No tA Doc's post above, I'd also cite the coining of Sky as UKPOSTAL - during the Dauphine, I believe? This was not done as a joke, it was done specifically to try to link Sky to USPS and the latters dark doping practices - ditto Wiggins to Armstrong. It meant that as the term was taken up with glee by the rest of the Twaliban and its merry followers and then spread around the place, every time a Sky performance was commented on the use of UKPOSTAL to refer to Sky would mean that Armstrong and doping would be linked in (some) peoples minds in connection with Sky.

A malicious little piece of handiwork.

micron

RR the point I was trying to make was the very obverse: Walsh's great strength is that he has the ability to change his mind based on the evidence he accumulates - so woe betide Sky if they do anything to piss him off I freely admit to being disappointed with his first article - no drugs in swimming Tim Kerrison? - but Walsh plays a long game. I'm really interested to see what he concludes - whichever way it falls out, some will inevitably be disappointed - lets hope its me rather than you

Not: if you want to oppose a revolutionary council, look no further than cyclismas - I called OL on one of his little stunts the other day.

As for Walsh, neither you or I would call him obsessional - that wasn't my point. Simply that he & kimmage, in the dark old days before USADA were often derided as such. Reading LA Confidentiel was, for me, like the Hamilton book, finally seeing in one place all the information that had been scraped together and shared and then roundly debunked, even on this august forum, presented by someone who surely had to be listened to. He wasn't back then - he was derided as obsessional, a liar, bitter etc etc etc. LA Confidentiel was never officially published in English - extraordinary to think of that now. But that's the problem with terms like 'evidence' and 'innuendo' - look at the vaughters/andreu SMS conversation now enshrined in the USADA reasoned decision as evidence - when that first emerged it was immediately explained away by the fanboys as innuendo, speculation, at best a joke at worst lies. You're right - there is nothing as concrete around Sky, just some whispers from the odd ex-pro, an as yet unresolved UKAD investigation into Linda McCartney and rumours of CERA & carbon monoxide poisoning used as a PED. As you have more than ably demonstrated, all these can be rationalised away quite easily. But the accusation always levelled at LA Confidentiel was that there was no 'smoking gun'.

Ultimately, it depends on what you're willing to believe. You guys fall on 1 side, I the other - for the moment.