Professional Cycling - Why is Astana out . . .

Why is Astana out based on one rider's positive, but T-Mobile not out based on one rider's positive?

kessler did not test positive in the TDF

Astana was "invited to withdraw." They accepted the invitation.

Who knows if T-Mobile was invited to withdraw?

Why is Astana out based on one rider's positive, but T-Mobile not out based on one rider's positive?

Code of Ethics...I believe it is an Astana thing...but I am not completely sure on that...

According to the ethical code of the Astana Cycling Team, Alexandre Vinokourov has been suspended of the team with immediate effect. The rider asked nevertheless [for] a B-analysis. Informed by the Astana management, the organisers of the Tour de France invited the team to withdraw, [and] was immediately accepted."

astana pulled out at the request of the tour organizers. vino was suspended immediately.

sucks for everyone who worked so hard to make it to the tour.

nor did Sinkewitz.

Funny how the results of that one took a month to get released and Vino's about two working days...

Funny how the results of that one took a month to get released and Vino's about two working days...


I think it was the result of the fact it happened in an ongoing stage race, and Astana's reaction to the positive A.

As pointed out by our Vino in another thread, we shouldn't even know about this until the B sample is back.

However, Astana had a problem under their ethical code regarding allowing Vino to continue in the race with the positive A, so when they make their decision and report it to the Organizers the cat is out of the bag.

Astana also has a bit of extra scrutiny this year after the Puerto scandal decimated their team (then Liberty-Seguros) in 2006. So I'm not at all surprised that they swallowed the bitter pill of withdrawal from this year's Tour.

It really sucks for Klöden and Kasechkin, both of whom had decent GC placings. I bet that Klöden is second-guessing his move away from T-Mobile even more than ever.

Ah, yes . . . I had forgotten that Sinkwitz was actually a pre-tour test that was announced during the Tour. That would seem to be a critical difference (to the extent that "you're a proven cheater" is a statement that can suffer differences).

The wrong blood was most likely a teammates.

One difference is that Astana is truly Vino's team. He owns it at least in part, I think his name is on their license, he rounded up all the sponsorship......

It really sucks for Klöden and Kasechkin, both of whom had decent GC placings. I bet that Klöden is second-guessing his move away from T-Mobile even more than ever.

Why? At least he got away with all of the "whole team was doped systematically" surrounding T-Mobile. But Astana is made up of a lot of riders who were involved in the two teams supposedly the "most" doped - T-Mobile and ONCE/Liberty-Seguros.'

It really sucks for Klöden and Kasechkin, both of whom had decent GC placings. I bet that Klöden is second-guessing his move away from T-Mobile even more than ever.

Kloden was Ullrich's buddy, there may be a good reason why he moved to Astana.

I wonder what happens to Astana now...

I wonder what happens to Astana now...

Maybe Manolo Saiz can get his PT license back now.

I suspect that the NEW, just-signed 10-year funding agreement is history.

Kloden was Ullrich's buddy, there may be a good reason why he moved to Astana.

Oh, right. Ullrich's buddy. Obviously then he doped. They probably shared needles :rolleyes: By this logic I suppose we must assume Dave Zabriskie dopes as well...friends with Floyd ya know. Roommates even.

There are plenty of reasons to suspect Kloeden doped (although he didn't get to Telekom until '98, the tail end of that heyday), but friendship with Jan isn't really one of them.

The wrong blood was most likely a teammates.


Can you expand on that...

<---noob

I wonder what happens to Astana now...

I imagine they will announce pulling sponsorship altogether after the end of the tour, and continue to ride the rest of the season ala Phonak. The team is nothing without Vino, not in sporting terms, but interest to the sponsor.

I was thinking that maybe he (vino) was getting pressure..and since maybe he thought he got away with it (from the TT performance) would explain his up (stage 15) and down (stage 14) performance over the last few days....and it probably was a team members blood. Most likely the team manager knew? and decided to take the withdrawl rather than embarrass the names of everyone and have one guy shoulder the blame....

just a theory...

and i know i'll get flamed...so bring it...

I think Astana were given the option of either getting kicked out of the tour or go away on their own accord.. that was the "invitation"..

Unless Vino was carrying refrigerated blood around under his saddle I can't see how his team wasn't implicated. If, and I stress if, he blood doped it would have taken military precision. One guy, focussed on riding, could not have organised it on his own.

If I woke up feeling particularly charitable I might believe that Vino snuck out of his room late at night, collected a package from a secret location somewhere in town where he knew the authorities wouldn't be looking, raced back to the hotel, snuck back into his room that he shared with no other rider, performed a blood transfusion on himself then snuck out again to dipose of the evidence. It's a possible scenario, yet far from the most likely one.

It would seem to be really bad news for Godefroot, Kummer, and Ferrari? Bjarne Riis said that Godefroot had turned a blind eye to the doping practices at T-Mobile.

I found these interesting. Again, I'm not saying they prove anything.

Here's Vino's consultant: http://www.velonews.com/tour2007/news/articles/12548.0.html

Here's his trainer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michele_Ferrari

And team manager Mario Kummer (see last story): http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2007/may07/may28news

"Mario Kummer rode for Team Telekom in the 1990s. He allegedly told Biver that he had been involved in the doping practices at that time, the newspaper reported. "This confession is enough for me," said Biver."

His teammate: http://sports.yahoo.com/sc/news?slug=ap-doping-kessler&prov=ap&type=lgns

Oh, and another teammate: http://www.cyclingpost.com/team/article_004963.shtml

And another teammate: http://thestar.com.my/sports/story.asp?file=/2007/7/6/sports/20070706082204&sec=sports

And the rest of his team: http://sport.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1064562007

Keep in mind that the standard of proof for doping that the Tour has adopted is that teams should be "beyond suspicion" - on this count Astana would appear to have failed miserably.

The wrong blood was most likely a teammates.

It'd be too easy to detect a teamate.
If the test is correct, more likely that they had a close relative that had similar enough blood that they thought they had their secondary blood tests covered.

Also the reason not to use your own blood (autologous) is because it will interrupt your training or isn't ferasible within the time frame that the blood will be good to use, so the chances of it being a teammate, or at least one that is in the TDF is slim unless it was a mix up, which I also think is unlikely.

Unless Vino was carrying refrigerated blood around under his saddle I can't see how his team wasn't implicated. If, and I stress if, he blood doped it would have taken military precision. One guy, focussed on riding, could not have organised it on his own.

Quote[If I woke up feeling particularly charitable I might believe that Vino snuck out of his room late at night, collected a package from a secret location somewhere in town where he knew the authorities wouldn't be looking, raced back to the hotel, snuck back into his room that he shared with no other rider, performed a blood transfusion on himself then snuck out again to dipose of the evidence. It's a possible scenario, yet far from the most likely one.]Quote

This what I believe. I don't think anyone does it on their own in the middle of a race. Too much planning. It was likely a relative in the area to watch the race, but still I believe the team officials knew and approved it. This seems even more likely for the riders from exUSSR teams where things were more controlled.

Joe

Unless Vino was carrying refrigerated blood around under his saddle I can't see how his team wasn't implicated. If, and I stress if, he blood doped it would have taken military precision. One guy, focussed on riding, could not have organised it on his own.

Quote[If I woke up feeling particularly charitable I might believe that Vino snuck out of his room late at night, collected a package from a secret location somewhere in town where he knew the authorities wouldn't be looking, raced back to the hotel, snuck back into his room that he shared with no other rider, performed a blood transfusion on himself then snuck out again to dipose of the evidence. It's a possible scenario, yet far from the most likely one.]Quote

This what I believe. I don't think anyone does it on their own in the middle of a race. Too much planning. It was likely a relative in the area to watch the race, but still I believe the team officials knew and approved it. This seems even more likely for the riders from exUSSR teams where things were more controlled.

Joe
Explanations are that prior this Tour, the French lab was not equiped for testing for homolgous blood transfusion and they are speculating Vino continued operating under that assumption.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2007/aug07/aug01news

(funny thing it's a single paragraph under the Mayo story rather than the Vino story)

Well now that BMC has pulled out ,their secound team in two years to go belly up remember Phonak. And that the team has said that they are taking August off I would think the are gone and that many of the riders will have a hard time getting teams. Remember Vino started in the old Soviet system when he was young and there doping was just the way things were done. Hopefully the whole team is now in the dust bin of history.

ibelievevino.com (http://ibelievevino.com/)

:roflmao::roflmao: