patentcad

Fixed for your outlook after the upcoming Pcad Cycling Zen Self Loathing/Awareness Seminar.





It's sold out by the way.

coasting 

If Alberto starts posting here, I'll do a walk-out like america when Armadinajad was speaking at the UN. Who's with me?

tuxbailey

But what is the point for racing if you suspect your fellow competitors are cheating? Should one just treat it as the have and have nots (similar to equipment?)

I mean, it got to be discouraging if you always miss the podium and later foind out that the winners cheated.

Disclaimer: I don't race nor have the capacity to do so, hence I probably don't know what I am talking about.

SBRDude

If pro sports degrade into Professional Wrestling, then most of our kids will probably be saved from the temptation...

Spring Water

As a 3, I don't think about doping when I'm racing. If I lose it's not because they were doping. I'm pretty confident of that.

wait...

RecceDG

Pretty much.

It's clear that not so very long ago, it was possible to beat the testers. You could dope with near-impunity, and the catches were (in relation to the numbers) few and far between.

But now, I think all the evidence is that the testers are ahead of the dopers. The tests are orders of magnitude more sensitive. Tests are more frequent (for some, to the point of near ridiculousness) and they can test for far more things than they once could.

Plus samples are being banked. It is now possible - even likely - that samples can and will be tested retroactively when new tests or more sensitive tests are developed.

You might maybe still get away with it for a little while, but one tiny slip and the Eye of Sauron will be on you full-force. They will go through your body fluids with the finest of fine tooth combs and whatever is there, they will find it.

And once that is done... you're finished. Over.

I get it for a domestique. They're disposable; their whole job description is to sacrifice themselves for the benefit of the team's GC contender. Plus, they are probably never going to be contenders in their own right, by which I mean they lack whatever physical or mental spark it is that identifies a contender. They have greater need for chemical assistance, they are more desperate to keep a slot on the team, and if they get busted, it can be denied as a "rogue element" rather than team policy. Plus they just aren't as important as individuals, so they aren't going to get the same level of scrutiny. I can understand why these guys dope.

But a modern GC contender? The risks are SO high, the rewards SO low, that I'm astounded that any of these guys would run the risk of being caught. Contador is now ruined forever and all his past successes are now suspect. His future earnings potential is GONE.

Look at the people willing to throw rocks at Armstrong - who never failed a doping test. What will Contador's legacy be now?

DG

The Weak Link

No se preoccupe, amigo.

tuxbailey

Maybe AS really scared him into doing it. He felt the threat and wanted to hang on at any cost. I wonder if they will still go on vacations together.

Well, LA supposedly had failed before...

JoeOxfordCT

If Alberto is removed as the winner from the TDF then really what was the point of watching....again, not defending AC or doping per se but really, do we want to see results of races re-stated years down the road. ?

Hypothetical:

AC is removed as winner from TDF 2010 because of current scandal.....AS is pronounced as new winner.....18 months later a new test finds negative results for AS. Denis Menchov is pronounced as the new winner......14 months after that another test DQ's Menchov and Sammie Sanchez becomes the new winner....

Is this what we want ? Would this be acceptable in other world sports ???

patentcad

I can get my upgrade without doping.





Watch me.

AMFJ

^Reggie Bush just turned his 2005 Heisman back in.

If the doping occurred DURING the event, then I think the title should be removed. All testing should be done with a few months of the event. So it isn't like 3 years from now you can test someone--or at least you shouldn't.

In this case, the positive test came out within a few months. That seems reasonable to me to remove his placement. Whether or not you name AS the winner, or you simply leave 1st as vacant is a different discussion.

But saying that once the event is over the results are in concrete---that seems to encourage people to dope, and not have to face one consequence of testing positive.

patentcad

Good question.

The worst thing about doping in sports is that is casts a pall over every participant. The most unfair aspect of the whole sorry affair is that we now have to wonder if any result in any race - pro, and even to some extent on the amateur level - is clean or not. So Armstrong's own legacy is already tainted to some degree by the mere suspicion of doping. If he really was clean, that's the most bitter angle on this whole thing. But of course we all think maybe he wasn't regardless of how many doping controls he passed. And why wouldn't we think that at this point? Like I said.

It's a problem.

Quel

I say we find everyone guilty all the way down the line until I am finally declared the 2010 Tour de France champ.

logdrum

Yeah on Cialis and Viagra...

patentcad

I can assure you that there are 10-15 guys in the 35+ (and even the 45+) the local races I participate in who can crush 99.999% of the 41 and 98% of the 33 on any given day.

roadiejorge 

me cago en la ostia!

umd

It means you stick your head in the sand and pretend it's not an issue...

ILUVUK

I'm single-handedly bringing credibility back to the sport of cycling. Unfailingly, when people watch me race, all can agree that I'm as clean as the proverbial whistle.

gsteinb

eff. I hope I don't have to race against those guys.

logdrum

So you confirmed Cialis use? Do they get it that hard enough to break my tibia?

learnmedia

According to Kohl, never failing a test is irrelevant. “It’s impossible to win the Tour de France without doping,” said Kohl, who was in Leesburg, Va., to speak at the United States Anti-Doping Agency’s science conference. “You can tell by looking at the speed of the race. Every year it has been about 40 kilometers per hour. It’s the same the year I raced, the year Floyd Landis won, this year. It shows riders are still doping.”

That's a sad, yet frank, assessment of pro cycling. Should we believe Kohl? Quoting you Pcad, why wouldn't we?

ls01

The only remedy I see is to make the penalty for use, harsh enough that it is just not worth getting caught. But then you run into the mistakes, contamination of food, false positives,etc. then guys are getting banned for life who really dont deserve it.
Maybee a 3 strikes aproach to a life time ban. with suspension penaltys for the first 2 , say 6 mos. for #1, a year for #2, and life for # 3. I doubt that even this would completely stop the ped use, there are always people who think they can beat the system no matter how sophisticated it is.
I dont know, it is a problem.
I just cant see opening the flood gates and completely deregulating ped use. Those guys would be dropping like flies. To much envelope pushing. dead athleates aren't good for any sport. I just think that deregulating the ped's is a sure way to make a bad problem much, much worse.
Like the man said, its a problem.

merlinextraligh

I don't think that's clear at all. I think its an ongoing battle that ebbs and flows. New tests get developed, people get caught, new people move on to new protocals, and the testers have to catch up again. The history of doping is the dopers are ahead of the testers, the testers catch up and catch some, then the dopers pull ahead again.

It's a never ending cycle, and the people that think," Well at lleast we've put an end to it this time" are ignoring both history and human nature.

learnmedia

I'd say track and field is running neck and neck with it (no pun intended). I'm reminded of a former female colleague who was a world class sprinter who told stories at work about how all of the sprinters in track doped--male and female. It was just a case of where they were in their doping cycle. She said that whenever you saw a sprinter pull up due to a hamstring injury mid-race, you could be 99.9% sure that they found out that testing would occur post race. If you didn't finish the race you were not tested.

smithsb

I don't see what the big deal is. If they just ditch the plastic IV bags and start using glass bottles, everyone is golden again. Right?

Seriously--a lot of us have been disillusioned about the sport for a long time, precisely because the doping techniques are always a few steps ahead of the testing procedures. I wonder if Lance, in order to keep himself above suspicion, would be willing to submit some of his samples to this new test (if they haven't been tested by tour officials already).