Autobus

...I suspect he might have had a little "help" in the out-of-control drug infested 90's (Exhibit #1: The Festina scandal) . How could he have competed fairly to win five in a row?

Basso acted meek and humble, and he was a cheat. When Simoni commented that Basso's 10 min+ win in the '06 Giro was "extraterrestial", now we know why.

What does this have to do with Indurain? I'm just saying that Big Mig was quiet, shy just like Ivan B. and retired into absolute obsurity. I'm hoping that his awesome big engine was why he dominated those TDF and never lost a time trial in his 5 wins, but can anybody know for sure?

Drug testing is 10x more stringent now than 15 years ago, and guys are still stupid enough to dare to cheat. Greg Lemond noticed that guys he used to flatten were dropping him like they were on mopeds in the early 90's.

I dunno...I'm so disappointed in the whole sport. I just ride to stay in shape these days....

epobuster

[QUOTE=Autobus;7149042 I'm hoping that his awesome big engine was why he dominated those TDF [/QUOTE]


I liked to think the same thing - that if there was anyone who wasn't doping it was Big Mig, and that his performance was down to his physical attributes (superhuman lung capacity and 28 bpm heart rate). Now I think I was just being naive. Remember Banesto teammate Delgado's extraordinarily high testosterone level in his 1988 winning year? He got away with it but, as you say, tests were far less stringent then.

And now? Yes, testing has improved, but the cheats have moved even further ahead, particularly with synthetic variations (just look at BALCO, and this is just one of many companies making a fortune from what they would rather call supplements). I berlieve there are just as many drug cheats now as ever.

bac

You were .... I was ........ now we both know better.

... Brad

efficiency

Who cares? You can't judge Indurain by the standards of today.

Dolomiti

Did any of Indurain's rivals *not* dope? Some were doping to the limit, probably more than he was (dangerously high hematocrit... Riis for example). I'm sure Indurain was on the same stuff everybody else was. But he was just a much better cyclist than the others, so he whipped them.

lotek 

yah, and I'm crushed thinking that Wim van Est crashed because of doping. . .
please, just because a rider did well does not mean he was doping.
Just because Doping is rife within the peloton now doesn't mean we have to
throw out and disregard every result that came before.

I am not so naive as to think these guys survive on 'mineral water alone' (apologies to Jacques Anquetil)
but I have to take a innocent until proven guilty view of things. If they didn't test positive it didn't happen.

marty

stevesurf

...and Jacques Anquetil was mine in the 80's; thank you for remembering him. He would have won more races, in addition to the five Tours he won if he had a better diet and drank less. I believe he was the first some of the newer Campy gruppos that still adorn many of our steel bikes.

I have to believe this year's tour was full of amazing talent that did not dope, considering the difficulty. That said, I'm sure the riders know their own hemocrit levels and can begin a mild "therapy" early on so as not to raise a flag.

I honestly don't care; I just love the sport.

Alekhine

I wish they'd just let the riders dope themselves up at this point.

This TdF would have been so much more interesting to me had the names Basso, Contador, Landis, Sevilla, Mancebo, even Ullrich (if he had lasted until 2008), and so many others been included in it, drugs or no drugs, and no matter what teams they were on. I can't help it, because I know it's not just drugs that made all the above great at what they do.

Anquetil's position on it was always interesting to me. It was completely laissez-faire and he had no problems just saying it out loud, likening it to the prescription of drugs for various reasons for any worker in any milieu who feels pain or exhaustion.

We talk about doping like it's this enormous bugaboo, and it's maybe some terrible influence on children who want to get into this stuff, how it's unfair to the riders who don't do it (but we're never sure if there are any left who absolutely don't), and we point fingers to the 1967 Simpson incident, but I'm not sure any of those things are some catch-all ethical truth, considering that society seems to have no problem glamorizing so many other bugaboos like man-vs-man violence (most definitely including sports) or unbelievable avarice, gluttony, and interpersonal superficiality via commercial media, to any number of extraneous deaths in every industry one could care to name (re: Simpson), and of course, pharmaceutical sales being the cornerstone of modern medicine. Not to adopt the "two wrongs make a right" idea, but it really is pretty weak stuff compared to some of the crap we push on people daily and don't have police knocking down doors over.

/end soapbox. I say let 'em shoot up and let's see who wins. There are too many top riders missing right now that I want to see racing each other.

Autobus

I don't even want to go there with Lance Armstrong on the same subject, but I'll guess we'll never know...

Autobus

You mean 60's??

pmurph

For those interested in Anquetil, Sex, Lies and Handlebar Tape by Paul Howard is a great biography.

roadgator

Thats about where I am. The doping in and of itself inst what bothers me as much as the duplicity and denials. Inventing "vanishing twin" theories (Hamilton), brow-beating dissenters (Lance), and other stunts because you are too much of a coward to own up to your deeds is what really turns my stomach to watch.

As for the riders of the 90's, I still like to believe that the best men won those races. If they all doped, the bar was higher, but the field was probably still level.

Now, with cyclists getting popped left and right its really hard to say who is or isn't clean, and the question of whether the best rider in the world wins the tour is not nearly as clear.