Lizzie

DeVlaeminck

I have read elsewhere it was a suspected heart attack but I don't know who the family member was or how reliable that information is - another forum from someone i don't know.

salsiccia1

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Salsiccia1 wrote:

Is it common-place for a governing body to pay for the legal defence of a rider in doping trouble? Genuine question.

Depends on the athlete, the national fed and the sport. If it's one of their top athletes, it's not uncommon (and recent examples that spring immediately to mind are when the athlete tested positive...)

Slightly different angle then - do we think BC would have done this if it were Nicole Cooke in her pomp? Again, genuine question.

germcevoy

It sucks how an incident like this can taint your view of a rider even though they may not be guilty of anything.

If she's clean then she's close to incompetent. Not a great trait for a world champ. Some of the excuses seem to be lifted straight out of the same book of excuses that the dog ate my homework came from. Again she might be innocent but I struggle with it.

Then the statement she released was quite poor.

Not an easy sport to love.

Richmond Racer 2

Salsiccia1 wrote:

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Salsiccia1 wrote:

Is it common-place for a governing body to pay for the legal defence of a rider in doping trouble? Genuine question.

Depends on the athlete, the national fed and the sport. If it's one of their top athletes, it's not uncommon (and recent examples that spring immediately to mind are when the athlete tested positive...)

Slightly different angle then - do we think BC would have done this if it were Nicole Cooke in her pomp? Again, genuine question.

In all honesty, Sausauge, I don't know. Cooke & her father would probably have told them to fook off, and they didn't need their help.

RichN95.

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

In all honesty, Sausauge, I don't know. Cooke & her father would probably have told them to fook off, and they didn't need their help.

I wouldn't have been surprised of Armitstead had done the same. 'I don't need a lawyer I can defend myself. I know what's best for me''.

Omar Little

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

TailWindHome wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

I can't believe the hotel wasn't properly briefed that testers could turn up and they were to tell them which rooms the riders were in. This should have been clearly communicated to all staff so they could not blame the 'new shift' for not knowing.

I work in a hotel
Blaming the Front Desk is SOP.

Yeah, it smacks of a poor excuse to me.

Genuine question: presumably you'd say the same re Froome's excuse for his missed test?

It becomes a poor excuse over time. If the first missed test was appealed after it happened rather than after the 3rd strike then it is a different case. Of course perhaps it was raised at the time and that is why this appeal was successful.

timoid.

I really don't know about this. It does not look good. I presume she will frequently tested in the coming months and still has two strikes against her name. Still she is not guilty for now.

In answer to the question above, I would be MORE suspicious if Froome missed 3 tests. He and Sky and are obsessive in their preparation and control of every aspect of his life. It would be astonishing if he managed to miss three tests in 18 months.

gweeds

1 can be excused/explained. 3 not so much.

above_the_cows

Omar Little wrote:

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

TailWindHome wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

I can't believe the hotel wasn't properly briefed that testers could turn up and they were to tell them which rooms the riders were in. This should have been clearly communicated to all staff so they could not blame the 'new shift' for not knowing.

I work in a hotel
Blaming the Front Desk is SOP.

Yeah, it smacks of a poor excuse to me.

Genuine question: presumably you'd say the same re Froome's excuse for his missed test?

It becomes a poor excuse over time. If the first missed test was appealed after it happened rather than after the 3rd strike then it is a different case. Of course perhaps it was raised at the time and that is why this appeal was successful.

What Omar said. I don't know I just find it bizarre in both cases that a hotel would not let tester's know where riders were, they wouldn't call the room or that rider's and their teams/management failed to tell the hotel that testers might turn up. Still it all shows how many possible places along the 'chain' and in how many ways the 'system' can 'fail'.

kelliano

UKAD Statement:

http://www.ukad.org.uk/news/article/uka ... rmitstead/

UK Anti-Doping Chief Executive Nicole Sapstead said: "We respect the outcome of the CAS hearing against Elizabeth Armitstead.

“When UKAD asserts a Whereabouts Failure against an athlete, the athlete has the opportunity to challenge the apparent Whereabouts Failure through an external Administrative Review, before it is confirmed. Only when three Whereabouts Failures are confirmed is the case then put through an independent review to determine whether the athlete has a case to answer for a violation of Article 2.4 of the World Anti-Doping Code.

“Ms Armitstead chose not to challenge the first and second Whereabouts Failures at the time they were asserted against her. At the CAS hearing, Ms Armitstead raised a defence in relation to the first Whereabouts Failure, which was accepted by the Panel. We are awaiting the Reasoned Decision from the CAS Panel as to why the first Whereabouts Failure was not upheld.

“The collection of Whereabouts information plays a key role in delivering a robust anti-doping programme. Knowing where an athlete is, and what their movements are, is a vital component of our intelligence-led testing programme and ensures that effective and unannounced out-of-competition testing can be conducted at any time, in any place, 365 days a year.

"Athletes providing Whereabouts have a fundamental responsibility to make themselves available and accessible for testing anywhere and at any time. This includes providing sufficient information to be located for testing. By ignoring or failing to meet their obligations, athletes risk a possible two year ban. If an athlete accrues a combination of three missed tests and/or filing failures in 12 months, they will be committing a violation of the Whereabouts requirements under Article 2.4.

“UK Anti-Doping recognises that athletes can make mistakes and that plans can change at short notice. We therefore provide a huge amount of support to athletes throughout their time on the Whereabouts programme to ensure the information they provide is accurate and submitted in a timely manner. This includes providing athletes with a dedicated member of staff to provide ongoing guidance and training on their Whereabouts responsibilities. We also offer athletes a variety of Whereabouts tools, including a dedicated website and a free mobile app, so they can easily update their Whereabouts wherever they are in the world. Athletes can even text or email changes to us in an emergency. On top of this, UKAD provides additional, escalating support to athletes who incur Whereabouts Failures which is tailored to their specific needs.

“It is important to note that we will not publicly disclose provisional suspensions, or disclose details of cases, until an anti-doping rule violation has deemed to have been committed, at which point information will be published on our website. This is to ensure that the rights and privacy of everyone involved are respected and to ensure the case is not unnecessarily prejudiced.”

yorkshireraw

Above The Cows wrote:

Omar Little wrote:

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

TailWindHome wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

I can't believe the hotel wasn't properly briefed that testers could turn up and they were to tell them which rooms the riders were in. This should have been clearly communicated to all staff so they could not blame the 'new shift' for not knowing.

I work in a hotel
Blaming the Front Desk is SOP.

Yeah, it smacks of a poor excuse to me.

Genuine question: presumably you'd say the same re Froome's excuse for his missed test?

It becomes a poor excuse over time. If the first missed test was appealed after it happened rather than after the 3rd strike then it is a different case. Of course perhaps it was raised at the time and that is why this appeal was successful.

What Omar said. I don't know I just find it bizarre in both cases that a hotel would not let tester's know where riders were, they wouldn't call the room or that rider's and their teams/management failed to tell the hotel that testers might turn up. Still it all shows how many possible places along the 'chain' and in how many ways the 'system' can 'fail'.

Froome was on a private holiday in an upscale hotel. Lizzie was in a hotel with the team the night before a race. Froome had filled in his whereabouts correctly (hence why the testers were able to turn up to an out of the way hotel). Neither shows intention of trying to mis-lead the testers, but in Lizzie's case it is less understandable why staff weren't more willing to contact the room (if that is how it happened).

TonyCooke

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Salsiccia1 wrote:

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Salsiccia1 wrote:

Is it common-place for a governing body to pay for the legal defence of a rider in doping trouble? Genuine question.

Depends on the athlete, the national fed and the sport. If it's one of their top athletes, it's not uncommon (and recent examples that spring immediately to mind are when the athlete tested positive...)

Slightly different angle then - do we think BC would have done this if it were Nicole Cooke in her pomp? Again, genuine question.

In all honesty, Sausauge, I don't know. Cooke & her father would probably have told them to fook off, and they didn't need their help.

It is easy to know how you deal with it - you just don't get into this mess in the first place. The rider gets to chose when they make themselves available for testing and records it on the ADAMS system. So you select times when you can have your phone on "OUTDOOR" so you will definitely hear it and you are available. If you need to make last minute changes the system is now such that you can make them up to one minute fore the hour actually starts. Quite whether such a facility is a potent weapon in the arsenal of the war against dopers, I will allow you deduce. I have my views and I am confident they align with those of Nicole.

Then as to whether BC would have offered a "hand" to support Nicole, if they did not have to? Well let me not add to speculation but factually record an event that exhibits the "lengths" the BC of the time would go to, to "support" its then rising star, in an area in which they were actually mandated to support her. One of the "marginal gains" BC "invented" specially for Beijing 2008 was to provide Nicole with a skin suit for the Road Race. In 1999 and 2000 at the National Road race champs she rode with a skin suit in her team colours and she asked BC if they could provide a skin suit with pockets in GB colours for the upcoming 2000 Junior World TT and Road Champs. The question was asked in plenty of time in advance so it could all be done calmly. "No" came the clear verbal response. The question was then asked, very politely, again in writing and the response was then confirmed, also in writing. The flappy, jersey and shorts that were too big for her was all she would get. So I wrote back to CEO Peter King and told him I accepted his decision and that I would then be asking the GB kit supplier to make a skin suit with pockets and I would pay for it. However, I also recorded that I would send on a copy of the invoice to UK Sport along with a copy of his written confirmation of the BC refusal to provide the kit. Peter changed the decision and they provided a skin suit. Most years getting the GB skin suit required plenty of planning and proactive fore-warning, but it was no always successful, some individuals in the "support" system just seemed to be slow learners, when it came to some riders. For one instance, wind on 8 years, Sept 2008; marginal gains is everywhere, Beijing medals are in the bag, Team Sky is being plotted, riders are being given the wink - of course it is all male. In Nicole's book she records the stand off she had on the eve of the 2008 World Road Race Champs with Sir David Brailsford. They hadn't got a GB skin suit for her with the latest Sky logo on. She had, thoughtfully, brought along an earlier skinsuit without that new logo, but otherwise identical. Brailsford - you can't wear it. Nicole - your "support" staff have not "supported" me. Much was cut from The Breakaway due to restrictions on size. At least that last section of the account I relate was left in.

dodgy

I think you need to be a little clearer of your quoting, TonyCooke.

neonriver

From Cyclingnews

"Armitstead's statement also thanked British Cycling for their support. The governing body has said that they did not put any funds into supporting Armitstead's defence but had sought their own legal advice in the event that the appeal was unsuccessful and she was banned, which would have forced them into selecting an alternate rider for the Olympic Games. "

Richmond Racer 2

dodgy wrote:

I think you need to be a little clearer of your quoting, TonyCooke.

Agreed.

salsiccia1

neonriver wrote:

From Cyclingnews

"Armitstead's statement also thanked British Cycling for their support. The governing body has said that they did not put any funds into supporting Armitstead's defence but had sought their own legal advice in the event that the appeal was unsuccessful and she was banned, which would have forced them into selecting an alternate rider for the Olympic Games. "

That sounds a lot different to what was previously reported about BC funding the appeal.

Richmond Racer 2

Salsiccia1 wrote:

neonriver wrote:

From Cyclingnews

"Armitstead's statement also thanked British Cycling for their support. The governing body has said that they did not put any funds into supporting Armitstead's defence but had sought their own legal advice in the event that the appeal was unsuccessful and she was banned, which would have forced them into selecting an alternate rider for the Olympic Games. "

That sounds a lot different to what was previously reported about BC funding the appeal.

Colour me surprised. It was the Daily Hate. All other sites and publications lifted their story verbatim and checking of facts is very 20th century

Shadowrider

The Cooke family have an incredible way of making everything in cycling about her. When's the new book coming out or are you still flogging the last one? Dull.

bobmcstuff

http://inrng.com/2016/08/armitstead-whe ... h-cycling/

Hate Mail wrote:

Sportsmail understands the testing official did not explain to hotel staff why he wanted to know Armitstead’s room number at her team hotel in Sweden at around 6am. Having been refused the information by the hotel, he then attempted to contact Armitstead on a mobile phone that the cyclist had put on silent while she slept. No further attempts, it appears, were then made by the testing official and a missed test was logged with UKAD.

larkim

Anyone else surprised that this has all been transacted so swiftly? To get to CAS based on a ban which might have taken place from 11th July in advance of the Olympics sounds like it was expedited quite rapidly. Would this have happened for less of a "star"?

salsiccia1

Richmond Racer 2 wrote:

Salsiccia1 wrote:

neonriver wrote:

From Cyclingnews

"Armitstead's statement also thanked British Cycling for their support. The governing body has said that they did not put any funds into supporting Armitstead's defence but had sought their own legal advice in the event that the appeal was unsuccessful and she was banned, which would have forced them into selecting an alternate rider for the Olympic Games. "

That sounds a lot different to what was previously reported about BC funding the appeal.

Colour me surprised. It was the Daily Hate. All other sites and publications lifted their story verbatim and checking of facts is very 20th century

I couldn't quite bring myself to read the Daily Nazi article, but the BC funding bit is being reported elsewhere. Just shows what one simple distortion does to the narrative.

If the fact that BC didn't fund the appeal is true then I'm relieved, as I genuinely don't think they should be involved in defence of riders in anti-doping cases.

MrSweary

This all seems a little melodramatic. Am I right in understanding she was tested the next day after the 1st test?

The way I see it.. 1st test - Not her fault. Entirely a failure of the testing body to follow their own procedures.
2nd test - admin oversight. Doesn't sound great but these things do happen, even to organisational geniuses.
3rd test - missed because of a family medical emergency. What is wrong with this?

I accept that cycling isn't an easy sport to believe in but that is only because we know what has gone on. But to get to the level of scepticism where you start to implicate the hotel or refuse to give her the benefit of the doubt for a family medical emergency... taking it too far in my opinion, in this case. I doubt the public will view her any differently, if they have an opinion one way or the other. It isn't as if she hasn't been extensively tested anyway.

salsiccia1

Shadowrider wrote:

The Cooke family have an incredible way of making everything in cycling about her. When's the new book coming out or are you still flogging the last one? Dull.

Totally unfair - I posited the hypothetical question about whether BC would have funded an appeal by Nicole in the same situation (which is now moot as it appears BC didn't with Lizzie Armitstead), and Tony replied with an example where BC hadn't supported Nicole, which I think was their default position not just for Nicole but women cyclists in general previously.

PeteinSQ

I would be absolutely amazed if she is a doper.

I've spent a day in her company and she's never off her mobile phone - sending text messages to Philip Deignan I imagine. It doesn't surprise me, or seem sinister that her phone would be on silent during the night.

PeteinSQ

Also, if you did want to be really cynical about Lizzie and believe that she's a doper that would presumably implicate Deignan and Team Sky by association. Something I also refuse to believe.

DeVlaeminck

Shadowrider wrote:

The Cooke family have an incredible way of making everything in cycling about her. When's the new book coming out or are you still flogging the last one? Dull.

Yeah how dare he comment in response to him and his daughter being mentioned.

epc06

MrSweary wrote:

This all seems a little melodramatic. Am I right in understanding she was tested the next day after the 1st test?

That is irrelevant.

MrSweary wrote:

The way I see it.. 1st test - Not her fault. Entirely a failure of the testing body to follow their own procedures.
2nd test - admin oversight. Doesn't sound great but these things do happen, even to organisational geniuses.
3rd test - missed because of a family medical emergency. What is wrong with this?

If here phone is on silent when she says she is available for testing, then it is her fault.

Shadowrider

Salsiccia1 wrote:

Shadowrider wrote:

The Cooke family have an incredible way of making everything in cycling about her. When's the new book coming out or are you still flogging the last one? Dull.

Totally unfair - I posited the hypothetical question about whether BC would have funded an appeal by Nicole in the same situation (which is now moot as it appears BC didn't with Lizzie Armitstead), and Tony replied with an example where BC hadn't supported Nicole, which I think was their default position not just for Nicole but women cyclists in general previously.

He's posted 5 times, the last before today was last year when she went for Froome for some much needed publicity. He came here today because he knew this would be getting discussed and he could fire in a sob story about Nicole. Your question was purely coincidental in his post, it'd have happened anyway.


Nicole isn't the only person who's been hard done by BC.

slowbike

EPC06 wrote:

If here phone is on silent when she says she is available for testing, then it is her fault.

I dunno what phone she's got - but mine has a DND option that I can have on a timed function - so it automatically turns audible notification on and off when programmed to do so. I can also override that for contacts in my favourites list.
First one is easy enough to achieve - although could mean you're woken up if you chose an inappropriate time - easier if you're on a set schedule day in day out
Second one is only achievable if you know what number the testers will use to contact you with.

DeVlaeminck

EPC06 wrote:

If here phone is on silent when she says she is available for testing, then it is her fault.

Obviously not according to the rules otherwise she would now be serving a ban.