Which famous person referred to Team Sky's 'marginal gains' as "bollocks"?
...
Greg Lemond. Heard of him?
LeMond didn't call Sky's training methods bollocks, it's Brailsford's claim to have invented a new approach to training that he called bollocks. As far as LeMond is concerned, Sky are only using the same methods that he was using over 20 years earlier.
beating known doped ascent times
Not really. Even if you can pick individual examples where Froome beat a time set by Armstrong or Pantani or whoever on a particular climb, the overall trend is slower climbing than in the 90s and 00s. You only have to watch clips of the Tour from the 90s and 00s to see the differences very clearly. Froome's best times on most of the major climbs are nowhere near the likes of Pantani or Armstrong or even 'Big' Miguel Indurain.
None of which proves Froome is clean, of course, but you need to be wary of placing blind faith in the pseudo-scientific witterings of people like Antoine Vayer and Ross Tucker.
You have misquoted me, I didn't say that Lemond called Sky's training methods bollocks. I said he called marginal gains bollocks.
Here is what Lemond said:
"Others make us believe they are ahead of the best scientists, the famous Team Sky marginal gains! What bollocks! There are no new methodologies. That is wrong. In this area too, miracles do not exist."
He is calling the concept of 'marginal gains', bollocks. The key word here is 'gains'. It's an explanation for why Team Sky riders go faster, and it doest involve doping.
With regards to ascent times, I agree, it is very difficult to compare climbs because of differences in where they appear on a given stage on a given Tour and differences in the dynamics of the race on a given day.
And yet....
Froome holds the 3rd all time fastest ascent time up AX3. He beat two of Armstrong's ascents (03/05) but not Armstrong's 01 time.
Funnily enough here's what Brailsford said the day before Froome made his record climb:
"At some point in time, clean performances will surpass the doped performances in the past."
Yeah, Dave, of course they will.
Here's what Froome said immediately after the stage:
""absolutely no way I'd be able to get these results if the sport hadn't changed."
Here are the other top ten climb times of AX3...
1. Laiseka 22:57, 2001
2. Armstrong 22:59, 2001
3. Froome 23:14, 2013
4. Ulrich 23:17, 2003
5. Zubeldia 23:19, 2003
6. Ulrich 23:22, 2001
7. Armstrong 23:24, 2003
8. Vinokourov 23:34, 2003
9. Basso 23:36, 2003
10. Armstrong 23:40, 2005
So Froome is saying that he wins because he is not racing against dopers. And yet his climb on the day he said this was in top 3 when the other 9 times were all from known dopers.
Funny that isn't it. Nothing to see here. No evidence. Move along....