fietsbob

F1 drivers live there too.. waiting for the Monaco National anthem to be played for the Podium top 2 places ...

jefnvk

My bad on the classification, but my general point remains. If it isn't performance enhancing, why bother with a limit? If it needs a limit, it should be banned.

Maelochs

Because some stuff is useful in normal doses and might be a PED at higher doses?

As an asthmatic I can say .... I cannot get better performance than my best from an inhaler ... but I can get better performance than none at all. Some days I just can't breathe ... but with the inhaler I can ride.

Imagine if diabetes meds could, if taken in extreme doses, boost fat metabolism (as this drug, salmonbutterball, supposedly could) and glucose conversion .... should every diabetic be ruled out of competition?

What about athletes who needed psych meds?

If in extreme doses the best medication for a certain condition could provide an advantage ... you either ban everyone who is not in perfect health or you set a max limit.

I don't think the issue here is max limits anyway ... it is a culture is sports in general in which a certain amount of cheating is accepted, a certain amount of doping is accepted, and the focus by the controlling interests (the money people) is on the money made by offering entertainment instead of the challenge to the human spirit offered by athletic competition.

Rules change so the sport is more exciting on TV ... because entertainment is what "sports" is really about nowadays. "Stars" get special treatment---they can beat their wives, shoot up night clubs, **** fans, and get away with it ... because "Stars" sell the product, they enhance marketing which increases income, and "sport"---the actual pitting of human against human---is passe anyway.

In a culture of decent people All cheating would be scorned. People who cannot win without cheating are Losers ... not just not winners. The glory of sport is supposed to be the struggle, the effort, the nobility gained and expressed by human striving, by people reaching deeper and pushing harder and going beyond limits.

Nowadays, all that stuff is considered trite BS. Even winning is not as important as Earning, and if competitors need to destroy their bodies and their honor with PEDs to keep setting records to help the hype machine, so be it.

So ... when our ten-year-olds want to do drugs to excel in elementary school sports, or amateur racers dope to win ribbons in races they are paying to enter ... we should accept that we accepted all that long ago when we decided that it was fine if spectacle was what we were really after.

Doge

I agree. Accidental or not, effective or not both need the same sanctions or we will never see changes.

I predict:
Red jersey goes.
Smallest suspension they allow (what is that?).

Maelochs

Time served. However many days it is from the Worlds to the first even he plans to race in 2018 (Abu Dhabi, Tour Down Under?) Should be able to squeeze a three-month "suspension" in there.

Retroactive, of course, because the case will be in arbitration until 2019.

Am I being cynical or realistic?

You know the world is forked when you really cannot tell.

HardyWeinberg

It is performance enhancing and has been documented to be so, when ingested, not inhaled. It is not possible to get to the level Froome tested at (or even to the legal limit, half the level he tested at) from permissible inhalation use.

Doge

When I started officiating soccer games I was concerned about if players intended to do what they did. I was corrected by a wise senior referee.
For youth, those starting, you instruct a bit. For the real game - you call what you see. It was simple and pure.

I do not like the consideration of intent, or the advantage. While there is a moral/ethical component, I don't care about that with regard to the sport. It is a distraction that costs too much to deal with and not part of cycling.

Hearings and arbitration will cost hundred of times what more testing will that will catch more that are not in compliance. The sport would have done well to penalize immediately based on result. The excuses should be dealt with outside of the sport.

Shimagnolo

Not directly cycling-related, but alarming:

NYTimes: Why Do So Many Winter Olympians Have Asthma?

Exercise-induced asthma has been diagnosed in as many as half of all elite cross-country skiers and almost as many world-class ice skaters and hockey players. It’s far more common in winter athletes than in those who compete in the summer, although nearly 17 percent of Olympic-level distance runners have been given the same diagnosis.

https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/...s-have-asthma/

torero310

Ok honestly they should have 2 types of races for pros... ones where everyone's a doper and one where arguably everyone isn't a doper. I mean does it really matter? I get why some drugs are straight cheating but I think WADA needs to overlook health conditions that won't have a huge factor... for example if you have asthma you can't breathe therefore take some drugs and your lungs open up. If you have no muscle, you aren't going to be able to power up a climb even if your lungs are open. And seriously... just start testing drugs and see if there's an actual performance increase.

torero310

If you don't mind me asking? Is there a reason you (correct me if I'm wrong) don't like Team Sky? (granted I like all of the teams in pro races currently). And I agree with you on the rest of it.

Iride01 

During the Vuelta there was at least one time while on camera that Froome appeared to me to be using an inhaler. Several stages I seem to remember Contador using one.

I imagine the desire to make seven figures will tempt many pro's. Maybe a salary cap would help along with raising the minimum salary for the others. You might think that awful, but I'm only talking what the team pays as a salary. With no chance to make several magnitudes more salary than another it might lessen the desire to dope.

Winning pros can make big time money from endorsements, but they might think twice about doping then. What company will want to risk a doper endorsing their product and the potential fallout from the public?

Doge

I would think every rider would use an inhaler Asthma or not if it helped them ride better.
Just as long as they stay under the limits.
Go over, get caught, get suspended.

79pmooney

I don't have a ton of sympathy for Froome/Sky. They certainly should know nearly exactly by now how an inhale affects his urine. To be twice the limit? Maybe a lowly Continental team that just landed a pharmaceutical sponsorship could claim they just didn't know how an allowed number of snorts would show, but Froome? Sky? After six years and how many tests? On the team of marginal gains? Missing by 100%.

They missed. It is clear in the rules. (It is also clear that the day they missed, Froome was clearly not the struggling rider of the day before.) He/Sky should be penalized. If he isn't, the rules don't mean much.

Ben

RFEngineer

"CMG: There are two medications that are used as immediate relief. Salbutamol and Terbutaline. Salbutamol doesn’t need a TUE as long as you don’t exceed a certain amount. And, to be honest, you can’t go near that amount using an inhaler, unless you are taking 20 to 40 puffs [a day]. You just can’t."

This anti-doping doctor said it's very difficult to reach the limits for Salbutamol using an inhaler....
Alan

work4bike

Someone please explain.... How much does this drug open up the airways of an athlete that suffers from asthma in comparison to the airways of an athlete that doesn't suffer from asthma?

My point is, would this drug help a non-asthmatic athlete?

It would seem to me that an athlete's airways are open as much as possible; however, an athlete that suffers from asthma would not, but any use of this drug would open the airways only so much, thereby not giving them any real benefit over non-asthmatic athletes. But I've never heard of this kind of "doping", so I need some catching up...

Moose

It's killing me that so many are still chiming in with this position. If you read the thread and the linked articles you whould have the answer to your questions.

See my quote above and also the post directly above yours.

It's fairly obvious that they are trying to accommodate asthma sufferers by not restricting the drug entirely but some athletes have perhaps used this loophole to give them a perceived edge.

work4bike

First off Moose, not all of us are glued to our computers; this is the first time I read the thread and the first hearing of this allegation, despite having it in my email (which I just noticed after reading it here). And I'm not all that up on the issue of doping, but just curious enough...

Secondly, your post makes it seem as if you think you have some required burden to enlighten those unenlightened – it's NOT, you don't have to post anything if it's a burden.

I did read you post after posting my post (and other posts) and some links, but haven't gotten around to all – I only have so much time. I'm sorry if I don't take your post as gospel; I'm not saying it's wrong, but the way you worded it was not convincing or only creates more questioning.

If Salbutamol has been found to enhance performance when ingested rather than inhaled, then why isn't it at least a TUE?

If Salbutamol is on the list of substances that can be used to mask the presence of other PED's, then why isn't it a banned substance?

And my original question still is not answered by your post. How is this drug a performance enhancing drug? Does it do something other than opening airways? And if not, how much do airways constrict in athletes? Should that tape that opens the nasal passageway be banned?

If you feel it's too much of a burden to address these questions, then don't worry, I won't hold it against you and I don't think anyone else will care.



.

texaspandj

Is chris froome really asthmatic?
Aren't some asthma meds steroids?

Moose

I am not qualified to answer your questions...they are good ones though, hopefully someone can come along and shed some light on them.

Maybe they are just trying to protect the athletes from themselves.

If a rider thinks he can get an advantage, it may not matter whether the benefits are quantifiable...they could still go overboard and pose a health risk to themselves. That seems to be the case here because Froome had way more of this stuff in his system than typically found after normal use of the substance.

Perhaps limiting the concentrations of drugs is as much for the athletes health as it is to maintain a level playing field.

No one wants to look back years from now when a bunch of aging athletes have failing livers or other such maladies from abusing chemical substances and wonder if it could have been prevented.

Shimagnolo

Not much different from now as we look at aging boxers and football players with failing brains.

work4bike

I remember seeing a post here by someone that seemed to indicate it was banned because of it simply having a placebo effect; however, that just doesn't seem right to me, since there are so many placebo effects out there -- it just seems unreasonable to attempt to regulate placebos.

As for the health issue, that's a possibility, but I would think that the organization would come at health issues in a much different way, making it absolutely clear that their concern is health and not at all PED related.

It seems it would be more advantageous to address these health concerns in ways that don't attempt to ruin one's reputation, in a way that stripping away one's titles would definitely do. I don't know, maybe very heavy fines or not allowing them to participate in certain events...

It's also kind of slippery, because you can make an argument that how the riders ride are very dangerous to their health, but it's kind of forced on them. Maybe they shouldn't ride in the rain or maybe they need to greatly reduce the peloton size....

Shimagnolo

Now here is an idea: Homeopathic drugs!
You could get the placebo effect, but there would be no worries about a positive drug test!

HardyWeinberg

Demonstrated to enhance performance of cyclists both trained and untrained when ingested but not when inhaled in therapeutic doses (which cannot produce the output that Froome's body did)

Brief thoughts on Froome's salbutamol result | The Science of Sport

To get a handle on what Froome had to have been doing, the amount allowed into your body for therapeutic use (1600 micrograms in 24 hours) is less than the amount Froome was peeing out (2 micrograms per mL of urine)

fantom1 

Can you explain a little bit more what you mean? 1600 is obviously more than 2, but I realize that is not what you are saying.

fantom1 

Also, FWIW, two cyclists have received suspensions for salbutamol in recent years, and both of them had LESS in their samples than Froome...doesn't look good for him or cycling.