Bye Lance

[Peter]

Pantani likewise, though I suspect there was more than EPO involved!

[Exit Stage Left]

There's room for a whole thread about pro's hair. Evidence of doping persists in hair, which is why the whole Festina team bleached theirs blonde in 1998. US Postal or Motorola all shaved their heads in one Tour, what year was it?
The Italians usually had good hair, especially Cippolini, Bugno and Poli.

[Peter]

Blimey, I'm learning stuff all the time - never knew about that Festina ruse!

[Exit Stage Left]

Pantani's entire team had their hair dyed Blonde in 1998, ostensibly to match the Yellow jersey, but eyebrows were raised at the time. Later on there was a tendency to dye the hair back to a natural colour, giving the key riders a Grecian 2000 look.



Bobby Julich came third in the Tour in 1998, he also came third in the 2004 Olympic TT, but he's now moved up to Silver following Hamilton's admission of doping, note Hamilton's hair in this shot. Julich is the second US winner of the Tour if you discount Pantani and Ullrich from the 1998 podium.

[spesh]

Unless they had been overdoing the Pot Belge in between races, the Festina squad would have been wasting their time:

To date, hair is not accepted in doping control, although France passed in 2001 a law allowing biologists to use this matrix to document doping (décret n˚ 2001-35 from 11 January 2001).

http://www.trimegalabs.co.uk/tests/hair-steroid-testing.php

And looking at that picture of Pantani, if the intention of bleaching was to beat the testers, he's screwed up by not bleaching his eyebrows, nor I suspect, the hair on his arms, feet, pubes, back, sack and crack... 

Colour me sceptical on the hair theory.

[Exit Stage Left]

Unless they had been overdoing the Pot Belge in between races, the Festina squad would have been wasting their time:

To date, hair is not accepted in doping control, although France passed in 2001 a law allowing biologists to use this matrix to document doping (décret n˚ 2001-35 from 11 January 2001).

http://www.trimegalabs.co.uk/tests/hair-steroid-testing.php

And looking at that picture of Pantani, if the intention of bleaching was to beat the testers, he's screwed up by not bleaching his eyebrows, nor I suspect, the hair on his arms, feet, pubes, back, sack and crack... 

Colour me sceptical on the hair theory.

How closely did you follow the 1998 Tour Spesh?
I was probably at my keenest about then, riding an Audax SR series, two 10 mile time trials a week, open TTs, including my first 24 hour, and finishing the season with a LEJOG surrounding my 40th birthday. I read Cycling Weekly and Cycle Sport from cover to cover and the coverage in the Guardian every day, although I only bought my first computer in 1999, the year I first rode the Paris Brest Paris.

Colour me sceptical about your views. After all, Lance is being condemned by an organisation that didn't exist when he won his first Tour, on the the basis of a test that didn't exist when he gave the sample.

[citoyen]

I've made my mind up on the likely outcome of the Lance problem, which is a peace and reconciliation model. Lance may be formally stripped of his titles, but they will live on in public memory. I'm looking for signs pointing in that direction, so I'm blind to those signs pointing elsewhere. What do people feel was the strongest part of Hamilton's testimony?

Armstrong doped, there's no two ways about that. Tyler's testimony doesn't tell us anything we don't already know in general terms, it just fleshes the story out with names, dates and places. You can either believe him or disbelieve him, that's up to you. Fwiw, I believe most of what's in the book, though I'm slightly wary of accepting it entirely at face value because it's clearly written in a way to make you feel sympathy towards Tyler (much like David Millar's book). Coyle says there's lots of stuff that got left out of the book because he couldn't corroborate it. Most of what Tyler says tallies with what other former team-mates and associates of Lance have said. Are they all lying? Is this really some massive anti-Lance conspiracy? Was he really the only one riding clean and convincingly beating all these dopers? Or is that argument just as ridiculous as it sounds?

d.

[Exit Stage Left]

I ask myself what it is that I want from the Tour. Mainly it's to sit down to watch the highlights show in the summer, with the predictable rythym of the race schedules, marvelling at the shots the cameramen come up with, and trying to get the department numbers before they come up on the screen. It's about knowing enough background to be able to poo-poo, (Or should that be Poupou)  the commentary in front of your mates, when the commentary is only supposed to be inclusive to a general audience anyway. It's about inferring character from a grimace or a flick of the elbow. I've never felt it was fixed like television wrestling, but it's obviously not 'Chariots of Fire'.
It's corrupt, and the race often goes to those with the sharpest elbows and the biggest ego, but that's a lot like life. I look at Hamilton and I ask why he was never a contender. He rode as fast as Armstrong, a Gold medal in the 2004 TT proved that. It's down to the character faults we see in the Hardtalk interview, which reminded me of the thwarted character in a gangster movie who ends up in cement boots at the bottom of the Hudson River, when he's squealed to the Feds, and then been hung out to dry. These long form interviews are actually extending the pleasure I get from the Tour, rather than detracting from a Corinthian ideal which I've neither expected nor demanded from three weeks in July.

It's up to me how I consume the dish that the ASO puts before me, and I'm minded to think that too many cooks spoil the broth.

[citoyen]

For anyone who's interested, here's a helpful article on the differences between the US and UK editions of The Secret Race...

http://www.veloveritas.co.uk/2012/09/18/the-differences-between-the-us-and-uk-versions-of-the-secret-race/

[spesh]

For anyone who's interested, here's a helpful article on the differences between the US and UK editions of The Secret Race...

http://www.veloveritas.co.uk/2012/09/18/the-differences-between-the-us-and-uk-versions-of-the-secret-race/

Ta. 

Most of what's in that list has already been discussed, in varying degrees of detail, elsewhere, underscoring what I'd said earlier about there not really being much point in redacting bits of a book for a given market.

The "Motoman" angle is something that has generated a lot of traffic in the last week, though as Cervelo co-founder Gerard Vroomen notes, some people have been making a little too much of the pictures of Philippe Maire with ex- and current riders that have been circulated across the interwebs.

http://gerard.cc/2012/09/17/motoman-madness/

[spesh]

Today's L'Equipe contains an interview with Travis Tygart, which someone has translated - syntax-wise, some of it does look like a Google translation, but you should get the gist:

Is USADA paranoid? It looks like FortKnox here.
We have been doing this since two years. Before, our doors were open but since the BALCO case everything changed. We received death threats for the first time. Two for Terry Madden, my predecessor and a bit later one for me and my family when the Landis confessions came out. The FBI dealth with them. We reacted quickly. My office is now inaccessible to visitors. The blinds are down and the cameras are on 24/7.

And the Armstrong case?
That resulted in three death threats, all made by individuals I think. Once again, the FBI is involved.

 

At best, it's probably deranged Armstrong fanboys, but if the Feds discover any of the threats come from the "inner circle", that would be seismic.

Take us through an aspect of the case the general public has difficulties to understand. You sanctionned Armstrong from 1998. What happened to the eight year statute of limitations?
The statute of limitations is a right granted to the defense. But this right doesn’t exist if the other party can prove that the athlete who committed foul play influenced the witnesses that appeared to be able to prove his guilt over the years. Or if he hid the proof or lied under oath. We are certain this is the case in the Armstrong file and will explain this to UCI when we hand over the file.

When?
It’s imminent. At the end of the month.

So the USADA dossier lands in Aigle this week. It's implied elsewhere that all the evidence will be in the public domain by the end of the year. The intro to the L'Equipe interview states that the damage to Armstrong will be thirty times worse than anything that's come out thus far.

Johan Bruyneel, Armstrong’s mentor refused your judgment and opts for a hearing in front of an independent USADA panel. He plays it big?
Oh for sure. I don’t know what he hopes for. Winning time? Take advantage of the inertia of the system? He will be heard before the end of this year. The hearing will be public. Lance Armstrong may be called upon to tesify, under oath. Like all the others. In that game there is no safety net. If he lies under oath, it’s serious.

What's the betting that Bruyneel changes his mind about arbitration at the last minute? 

Last detail. Have you and Armstrong ever met? At least one time? Face to face?
No. We talked on the phone twice. It was all very formal. I offered him to find a solution, to cooperate. If he would have accepted the offer, he wouldn’t have lost his seven Tour de France titles because we wouldn have taken his cooperation into consideration. But the next day he attacked us and the constitutionality of our investigation.

He has lost?
Indeed.

http://tourdejose.com/2012/09/24/transcript-of-travis-tygarts-interview-with-lequipe/#more-1712

Also summarised at Cycling News. The translations in the CN piece are subtly different, but the gist is the same:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/tygart-received-death-threats-during-usadas-armstrong-investigation

[sg37409]

Its all building up nicely. This time its UCI on the offensive.  I hoep the showdown between these 2 doesnt disappoint.
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/uci-questions-usada-on-armstrong-file-delay

[Hot Flatus]

Unless I'm misreading between the lines, it really is all about the UCI

[tom_e]

It does look a bit weird.  The courts already decided it was USADA's authority, USADA put together a case, Armstrong declined to defend himself, and thus the legal decision goes one way, as far as I can tell.  Either the UCI really doesn't understand the rules or they're just posturing for PR?  Either way it looks really bad, as it appears to be giving up any pretence of being a dignified governing body which should in principle be neutral to the question of deciding one athlete's drug status.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

The UCI are next in the firing line and want to strengthen their position.

[Hot Flatus]

Absolutely.

It's from the Team Armstrong book of tactics of trying to discredit your accusers.

The UCI already look totally shit for failing to do the job that USADA is doing.

[spesh]

Retweeted by Not Pat McQuaid (UCI_Overlord)

Sarcastic Tom ‏@sarcastitom
UCI: "Are we there yet?" USADA: "Five more minutes." UCI "Are we there yet?" USADA: "Don't make me stop this car."

 

[spesh]

Today's Cycling News report on David Walsh's latest piece in the Sunday Times underlines some stuff in the Hamilton book about the complicity of the USPS WAGs*. Walsh's report is behind the Murdoch pay-wall, chiz, but someone's posted the text in a comment on NY Velocity's page on the Kimmage defence fund. 

http://nyvelocity.com/content/features/2012/paul-kimmage-defense-fund#comment-106569

Turns out that Kristen Armstrong wasn't just aware of what was going on, but was dealing. Which begs questions about Sheryl Crow, who was in a relationship with LA from 2003 to 2006...

One rider tells a story from the 1998 world championship at Valkenburg in Holland when cortisone pills, wrapped in tin foil, were given to the Postal riders on the US national team for the road race. According to the rider’s affidavit, the pills were wrapped in the foil and handed out by Kristin Armstrong, the champion’s former wife. “Kristin is rolling the joints,” one rider joked at the time.

And whilst the USADA didn't receive any of the non-Grand Jury evidence from the FDA investigation, in a way, the Feds made sure that those who were testifying to USADA were being on the level.

In an interview with L’Equipe in France, the head of USADA, Travis Tygart, said he believed all the witnesses his agency interviewed had told the truth and that there had been “confirmation” of this. Tygart might have been referring to the presence of US Justice Department official Mike Pugliese at USADA’s interviews with witnesses.

During the interviews, Pugliese sat silently but with transcripts of interviews these witnesses had given before a Grand Jury or to federal officers in the case against the team that was dropped in February. “As you gave an answer to a question,” one witness said, “you were very conscious of this guy checking it against the answer you had given to the Feds, so you really wanted to make sure you got it right.”

USADA did not receive any material from the aborted federal case and Pugliese sat in on the interviews solely to check if witnesses confirmed accounts given to federal officers and to see if the Justice Department should open a civil case against Armstrong and the owners of the team.

* With the honourable exception of Betsy Andreu.

[Biff]

* With the honourable exception of Betsy Andreu.

How I admire that woman. Balls of steel.

[DrMekon]

Put $10 in the kimmage defence fund on the basis that it might lead to more cycling enjoyment than a £7 trinket for the bike.

[Hot Flatus]

Methinketh his costs will be awarded to him 

[Rhys W]

Not surprising, reading Tyler Hamilton's book it seems the WAGs were in on it anyway. Not the kind of thing you can hide from a partner, keeping mysterious medical products in the fridge.

[Biff]

I guess 'boy butter' had a rather different meaning chez Armstrong.

[Toady]

Not surprising, reading Tyler Hamilton's book it seems the WAGs were in on it anyway. Not the kind of thing you can hide from a partner, keeping mysterious medical products in the fridge.

Oh, sorry, dear.  Is that what it was?  I thought the milk was a bit off.  Still, at least my haematocrit levels will be OK.

[citoyen]

I don't really know what to say about this. It's just astonishing...

http://www.scribd.com/doc/108847964/Judgment-Floyd-Landis-En