Dick Pound doubts cycling new clean image
Comments
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BenderRodriguez wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:
Sure, it's 'out there' but has it been approved by WADA and are the labs equipped to test for it? Just look how long it took for the test for Epo to be approved after it was first developed.
Bottom line is, the dopers always seem to be one step ahead of the testers.
And WADA need to take some of the heat for that. Instead of which there's this ongoing willy-waving (to nick Rich's phrase) in which WADA and some of the national ADs indulge just as much as certain sports governing bodies.0 -
BenderRodriguez wrote:YorkshireRaw wrote:As for Bender's assertion that 'a doped rider will always beat a clean one' - so many elements (holes) in that view I don't know where to start. I do know that I could take all the gear under the sun and I wouldn't beat any pro riders.
Of course, but I would have thought that it was clear that we are talking about riders at the top level here. So, to be more specific, take 30 riders all of whom have the ability to finish in the top 10 of the Tour, dope any one using the current state of the art methods, and that rider will almost certainly be able to beat the other 29.
This point has been covered many, many times from many different angles, from the inability of riders like Lemond to compete against lesser riders once Epo came on the scene, to the fact that at the top level the difference between first and 30th is no more than a couple of percent, and yet doping can give a rider another 5% or more.
I dont think the Doper will always beat a none doper theory is always correct. I believe, in the past at least, a lot of the big dopers did there training, up to a point, but got/get lazy. They believe that by taking all there "Preparations" they are sorted and have done all they can.
The none dopers get everything they can out of there training and preparation because they know it is all they have. They train to the nth degree and leave nothing to chance, unlike the dopers who think PEDs will make up the difference.
Also the dopers have the nagging pressure regarding the timing and quantity of the doses and the risk of being caught.
Give 20 potential top 10 riders exactly the same training, preparation, team, recovery and nutrition. Then the one who dopes will, probably, win.0 -
mike6 wrote:I believe, in the past at least, a lot of the big dopers did there training, up to a point, but got/get lazy. They believe that by taking all there "Preparations" they are sorted and have done all they can.
The testimony of plenty of ex-dopers suggests that the exact opposite of this is the case. The dedicated doper tends to be the sort of rider who will do anything to win, and to them one of the biggest benefits of doping is the way it allows them to train for longer, train harder and recover more quickly then the rider attempting to do it clean, so giving a real 'double whammy' benefit."an original thinker… the intellectual heir of Galileo and Einstein… suspicious of orthodoxy - any orthodoxy… He relishes all forms of ontological argument": jane90.0 -
BenderRodriguez wrote:mike6 wrote:I believe, in the past at least, a lot of the big dopers did there training, up to a point, but got/get lazy. They believe that by taking all there "Preparations" they are sorted and have done all they can.
The testimony of plenty of ex-dopers suggests that the exact opposite of this is the case. The dedicated doper tends to be the sort of rider who will do anything to win, and to them one of the biggest benefits of doping is the way it allows them to train for longer, train harder and recover more quickly then the rider attempting to do it clean, so giving a real 'double whammy' benefit.
I think you are right, up to a point, but a lot of guys only got to be "contenders" because they doped. Without doping they would have been also rans. It was the dope that got them to the top.0 -
Flawed thinking, b/c you don't know if the scope of what riders are doing is the same as the scope of the tests. I'd wager that the scope of doping is wider than the test coverage.RichN95 wrote:
It's not the 90s anymore. The tests these days are reasonably good, ...In the Tour, Froome was tested 20 times.BenderRodriguez wrote:
Of course, but I would have thought that it was clear that we are talking about riders at the top level here. So, to be more specific, take 30 riders all of whom have the ability to finish in the top 10 of the Tour, dope any one using the current state of the art methods, and that rider will almost certainly be able to beat the other 29.
This point has been covered many, many times from many different angles, from the inability of riders like Lemond to compete against lesser riders once Epo came on the scene, to the fact that at the top level the difference between first and 30th is no more than a couple of percent, and yet doping can give a rider another 5% or more.When a cyclist has a disagreement with a car; it's not who's right, it's who's left.0 -
You've done some selective quoting there, deleting my actual point. I'll repeat it.FransJacques wrote:Flawed thinking, b/c you don't know if the scope of what riders are doing is the same as the scope of the tests. I'd wager that the scope of doping is wider than the test coverage.
The tests are such now that while they can be beaten, the gains available are not like they were when there was an EPO free for all. Major blood manipulation is now off the table. There seems to be an idea that any drug is going to give big advantages - but they don't. Some are really no better than a placebo. EPO was special. New drugs - their impact is minor
So clean riders can beat riders who are doping but maybe only giving themselves an extra five watts in the third week.Twitter: @RichN950 -
BenderRodriguez wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:
Sure, it's 'out there' but has it been approved by WADA and are the labs equipped to test for it? Just look how long it took for the test for Epo to be approved after it was first developed.
Bottom line is, the dopers always seem to be one step ahead of the testers.
Is the fact that there is a specific test for AICAR not slightly moot these days? The biological passport means you no longer need to catch the athlete holding the smoking gun, you just need to witness the effect the drug has had on the athlete's normal biological markers.
Either way, it appears that WADA are aware of, and proactively dealing with, the AICAR problem.
http://www.wada-ama.org/Documents/Science_Medicine/Funded_Research_Projects/Completed_Projects/2011/11C07MT%20Dr.%20Thevis.pdf0 -
The bio passport doesn't seem to be catching them and the cheats are still winning.
Lifetime bans is the way forward. Banned athletes are free to earn a living, just not in the sport they are banned from. Teams should also be banned and directors banned from the sport for enabling the problem to continue.0 -
gpreeves wrote:Is the fact that there is a specific test for AICAR not slightly moot these days? The biological passport means you no longer need to catch the athlete holding the smoking gun, you just need to witness the effect the drug has had on the athlete's normal biological markers.
I think AICAR is a weight loss drug and wouldn't affect the biological parameters.0 -
Rodrego Hernandez wrote:The bio passport doesn't seem to be catching them and the cheats are still winning.
Lifetime bans is the way forward. Banned athletes are free to earn a living, just not in the sport they are banned from. Teams should also be banned and directors banned from the sport for enabling the problem to continue.
Based on?0 -
Pross wrote:Rodrego Hernandez wrote:The bio passport doesn't seem to be catching them and the cheats are still winning.
Lifetime bans is the way forward. Banned athletes are free to earn a living, just not in the sport they are banned from. Teams should also be banned and directors banned from the sport for enabling the problem to continue.
Based on?
Apologies for jumping in here, but. Possibly based on the fact that a two year ban, the current punishment, is not a deterrent to guys doping. The number of positives over the last few years proves that. If the ban was at least 4 years then the chances of making it back to a Pro Tour team would be very small.
Also, If titles and winning from proven doped periods, by a positive rider, had to be forfeit, regardless of time lapsed, then we might see some light at the end of the tunnel.
We either want a clean sport, and take the measures to make it so, or we let it return to the past. Half measures clearly dont work.0 -
mike6 wrote:Pross wrote:Rodrego Hernandez wrote:The bio passport doesn't seem to be catching them and the cheats are still winning.
Lifetime bans is the way forward. Banned athletes are free to earn a living, just not in the sport they are banned from. Teams should also be banned and directors banned from the sport for enabling the problem to continue.
Based on?
Apologies for jumping in here, but. Possibly based on the fact that a two year ban, the current punishment, is not a deterrent to guys doping. The number of positives over the last few years proves that. If the ban was at least 4 years then the chances of making it back to a Pro Tour team would be very small.
Also, If titles and winning from proven doped periods, by a positive rider, had to be forfeit, regardless of time lapsed, then we might see some light at the end of the tunnel.
We either want a clean sport, and take the measures to make it so, or we let it return to the past. Half measures clearly dont work.
No - the claim being made is that the bio passport isnt catching cheats. Its one of a set of anti-doping tools alongside IC and OOC testing - and I'd suggest that Anthony Colom, Riccardo Serrano, Leif Hoste, Thomas Dekker, Tadej Valjavec and Pellizotti, to name 6 riders, might testify that it helped to catch them. I appreciate, though, that of those I named Hoste is the only relatively recent catch. But you also need to consider its effect as a deterrent. Thats always going to be hellishly difficult to quantify but anecdotal evidence strongly supports that it has had some effectiveness as a deterrent.
Personally I'd extend the passport to Conti teams as well as making more rigorous testing mandatory at all UCI-licenced races irrespective of ranking - or withdraw the organisers' licences. We keep on going in about the Pro-Tour, but the Conti scene particularly in Asia and South America, can seem like the wild west.0 -
mike6 wrote:Pross wrote:Rodrego Hernandez wrote:The bio passport doesn't seem to be catching them and the cheats are still winning.
Lifetime bans is the way forward. Banned athletes are free to earn a living, just not in the sport they are banned from. Teams should also be banned and directors banned from the sport for enabling the problem to continue.
Based on?
Apologies for jumping in here, but. Possibly based on the fact that a two year ban, the current punishment, is not a deterrent to guys doping. The number of positives over the last few years proves that. If the ban was at least 4 years then the chances of making it back to a Pro Tour team would be very small.
Also, If titles and winning from proven doped periods, by a positive rider, had to be forfeit, regardless of time lapsed, then we might see some light at the end of the tunnel.
We either want a clean sport, and take the measures to make it so, or we let it return to the past. Half measures clearly dont work.
I was referring to the bit in bold. As RR has pointed out there are several riders who have been caught thanks to the bio passport when they may not have been but also the comment that 'the cheats are still winning' - yes, people are still doping and some are getting caught but how many race winners (especially at higher level events) in the last 2 or 3 years have been proven to have cheated? I would say the cheats are winning less and less unless it is the Tour of Turkey!
As for life bans, ideologically I agree but I really don't see it ever happening. 4 years will be a big step in the right direction and some way of inflicting stringent financial penalties like a team having to pay back all money won in events where one of the team doped (whether they won the money or not) might focus the minds although prize money never seems to be the big incentive in cycling. It was interesting to hear athletes talking on Radio 5 last week and the consensus there was that 4 years should be a minimum although quite a few support life bans. The problem with a life ban is where to stop it - should Alain Baxter have received a life ban? Ohurugu?0 -
Cycling as a signatory sport to the Wada Code, cant start whacking longer terms on 1st offences than are laid out in the Code.
Thing is that the code provides the maximum terms for suspension. So for a first offence the max term is currently 2 years - and as I posted yday the 2015 Code revision would take that to 4 years - again, as a maximum. AFAIK there's no minimum terms - only maximum. It still leaves the decision making in terms of the scale and scope of the penalty, up to the AD agencies.
Bit of a curious case that's just been reported. A female US trackie tested positive by UCI for clen in competition in Mexico in Feb. UCI referred case to USADA. The rider put up a contamination defence. USADA decided to accept it and merely nullified her results from the competition where she came up positive. If she tests positive again in the future it'll be treated as a first offence.
http://www.usada.org/default.asp?uid=43210 -
There's just not enough money to do that. There are 19 WT teams and 19 Pro Conti teams (which accounts for nearly 1000 riders) and about 150 Continental teams - many of them in countries with some pretty ropey economies. The five star testing programme - urine, blood, all substances tested, OOC and bio passport - costs a lot of money. At continental level there's only enough money for a one star programme most of the time - urine in competition only, testing for basic substances (usually not EPO).Richmond Racer wrote:
Personally I'd extend the passport to Conti teams as well as making more rigorous testing mandatory at all UCI-licenced races irrespective of ranking - or withdraw the organisers' licences. We keep on going in about the Pro-Tour, but the Conti scene particularly in Asia and South America, can seem like the wild west.Twitter: @RichN950 -
RichN95 wrote:
There's just not enough money to do that. There are 19 WT teams and 19 Pro Conti teams (which accounts for nearly 1000 riders) and about 150 Continental teams - many of them in countries with some pretty ropey economies. The five star testing programme - urine, blood, all substances tested, OOC and bio passport - costs a lot of money. At continental level there's only enough money for a one star programme most of the time - urine in competition only, testing for basic substances (usually not EPO).Richmond Racer wrote:
Personally I'd extend the passport to Conti teams as well as making more rigorous testing mandatory at all UCI-licenced races irrespective of ranking - or withdraw the organisers' licences. We keep on going in about the Pro-Tour, but the Conti scene particularly in Asia and South America, can seem like the wild west.
I know, Rich. But given the choice of less teams, less races (maybe a lot less), but more controls in place...some races have become a byword for a joke...0 -
A question for all the advocates of a 4 year / lifetime ban - how do you feel this fits with the concept of strict liability?
One of my favourite quotes, from Marco Pinotti."You can’t say what he said. I don’t know what he told the investigators – he must have said something if they reduced his ban – but compare Di Luca and Tom Zirbel. Zirbel was banned for two years by USADA having tested positive for DHEA. He didn’t know how it got into his body and he definitely didn’t take it intentionally. Nonetheless, he admitted that what enters an athlete’s body was his responsibility and he wasn’t able to prove that it was contamination, perhaps because he didn’t have the money and the lawyers. Anyway, he couldn’t prove it and he got banned for two years. There was another case - Zirbel heard about it - of an athlete who did manage to prove that he’d taken a contaminated supplement and the company got sued – but the athlete still only got a three-month reduction to his ban. Then along comes Di Luca, who’s already been charged twice - once for consulting a doctor who’s banned from cycling for life and now for this. Di Luca tests positive, admits he did it and then he provides the investigators with information, which he can do because he’s an expert in the field, and they give him a nine-month reduction. Then what? He throws his hands up in the air and says, “I didn’t name any names. I didn’t spit in the soup. I just explained my doping methods.” So as an expert in the field, he’s told the investigators how you go about doping. At this point Zirbel says, “Ah, it’s a shame that I’m not an expert in doping. I should have pretended to be one then I’d be able to start racing again next year. Because I’m an idiot, though, and I let this substance get into my system without knowing how, I’ve got two years and I’m stuck with it.”0 -
You would have different bans for different drugs. A four year ban would be for you might called Class A doping - EPO, blood doping - stuff that can't get there by accident.TheBigBean wrote:A question for all the advocates of a 4 year / lifetime ban - how do you feel this fits with the concept of strict liability?Twitter: @RichN950 -
That could all but kill 3 continental tours (okay, the Oceania tour is already dead).Richmond Racer wrote:I know, Rich. But given the choice of less teams, less races (maybe a lot less), but more controls in place...some races have become a byword for a joke...
Antigua and the NZCC last year
http://www.antiguaobserver.com/cycling- ... pionships/
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/prohibi ... ew-zealand
As for Asia, well the gossip mongers are louder there. I would expect clean riders to be languishing round these parts too, far more than I would expect in the pro tour, but that's just a biased personal opinion, much like most of the doping gossip by the Lee Rodgers in these corners.
About the clenbuterol Mexico story, weren't 100+ U17 footballers positive for clen in Mexico a couple of years ago? Would think it's one of the places where clenbuterol contamination is a likely explanation.0 -
RichN95 wrote:
You would have different bans for different drugs. A four year ban would be for you might called Class A doping - EPO, blood doping - stuff that can't get there by accident.TheBigBean wrote:A question for all the advocates of a 4 year / lifetime ban - how do you feel this fits with the concept of strict liability?
<can of worms>
How long would Contador have been banned for then?
</can of worms>0 -
wombly knees wrote:
That could all but kill 3 continental tours (okay, the Oceania tour is already dead).Richmond Racer wrote:I know, Rich. But given the choice of less teams, less races (maybe a lot less), but more controls in place...some races have become a byword for a joke...
Antigua and the NZCC last year
http://www.antiguaobserver.com/cycling- ... pionships/
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/prohibi ... ew-zealand
As for Asia, well the gossip mongers are louder there. I would expect clean riders to be languishing round these parts too, far more than I would expect in the pro tour, but that's just a biased personal opinion, much like most of the doping gossip by the Lee Rodgers in these corners.
About the clenbuterol Mexico story, weren't 100+ U17 footballers positive for clen in Mexico a couple of years ago? Would think it's one of the places where clenbuterol contamination is a likely explanation.
WK, I'm not just talking about the Gob of the East, Lee Rodgers...
Look at one example: Tour of Qinghai Lake, just recently. Unless the likes of Matt Brammeier was gossip mongering? Or being a sore loser?
Nor am I claiming its all riders - that would be a bloody stupid thing to claim.
But neither am I getting into 'there must be more dirty riders in the ProTour than riding at Conti level' debate. But the fact remains that there's a big issue with the lack of testing at Conti races and at Conti level generally.0 -
Yeah, remember that too. Qinghai lake is a unique race, pretty much in all CTs. Practically the whole race is raced over 3000m and Kazakhs and Iranians race at that altitude at home (Presidential Tour of Azerbaidjan/Tour of Iran or whatever that;s called these days another example). It's the peak of their seasons, unlike CSS or other Euro teams.It's not like Brammeier's not seen doped performances elsewhere, or others with Vini Fantini.
The number of EPO busts in CTs is a testament to the most brazen cheating, but equally the possibly cleaner talented ones too who never get out of the lower leagues. Falls in well for a split personality, that last sentence.0 -
Is AICAR the supplement (won't call it a drug for now) that people say a certain British tour winner "might" have taken to lose weight?TheBigBean wrote:gpreeves wrote:Is the fact that there is a specific test for AICAR not slightly moot these days? The biological passport means you no longer need to catch the athlete holding the smoking gun, you just need to witness the effect the drug has had on the athlete's normal biological markers.
I think AICAR is a weight loss drug and wouldn't affect the biological parameters.When a cyclist has a disagreement with a car; it's not who's right, it's who's left.0 -
In my system, anything that could possibly have been taken accident (no need to prove it was, just that it could have been) would have a maximum of two years. (I would have been OK with him getting a year under current rules)TheBigBean wrote:RichN95 wrote:
You would have different bans for different drugs. A four year ban would be for you might called Class A doping - EPO, blood doping - stuff that can't get there by accident.TheBigBean wrote:A question for all the advocates of a 4 year / lifetime ban - how do you feel this fits with the concept of strict liability?
<can of worms>
How long would Contador have been banned for then?
</can of worms>Twitter: @RichN950 -
RichN95 wrote:
In my system, anything that could possibly have been taken accident (no need to prove it was, just that it could have been) would have a maximum of two years. (I would have been OK with him getting a year under current rules)TheBigBean wrote:RichN95 wrote:
You would have different bans for different drugs. A four year ban would be for you might called Class A doping - EPO, blood doping - stuff that can't get there by accident.TheBigBean wrote:A question for all the advocates of a 4 year / lifetime ban - how do you feel this fits with the concept of strict liability?
<can of worms>
How long would Contador have been banned for then?
</can of worms>
There will always be an excuse. Jaja didn't intentionally take EPO etc. There will also be a lot more missed tests. This is the reason strict liability is used.
The proof I think you require is the same as would be required for a criminal prosecution, and given the choice between a criminal prosecution and a 4 year ban, I'd choose the prosecution, but they are not mutually exclusive.0 -
Neil Stephens and his 'I thought they were vitamins'...
He'd got away with that one including most recently the Vance review into OGE0 -
At the moment a range of bans is available - anything up to two years. Two years isn't the only ban available - just the maximum. Schleck got a year, the ex-Postals got six months. I would just propose making the range available larger.TheBigBean wrote:
There will always be an excuse. Jaja didn't intentionally take EPO etc. There will also be a lot more missed tests. This is the reason strict liability is used.
The proof I think you require is the same as would be required for a criminal prosecution, and given the choice between a criminal prosecution and a 4 year ban, I'd choose the prosecution, but they are not mutually exclusive.
And while Jalabert may claim innocence of rEPO, the fact remains that it only gets in the body by the deliberate action of someone - it can't get their by contaminated supplements or food. It needs to be injected for a positive test (you could drink a vial of it and not test positive)Twitter: @RichN950
