Sky - gaming the system?

[The Family Cyclist]

I'll probably regret posting this as it's not far off the helmet debate in that people have their opinions and are fairly strongly held.

I'd love to be convinced Wiggins and Froome are clean and that sky have given us great British champions (we will ignore the Kenya thing for the purpose of this).

I could accept the whole jiffy bag thing as explained

I could accept that Froome took his medicine for asthma and for whatever reason it have a slightly high reading.

Unfortunately for me I find it harder to accept that both can be explained away. Whatever the truth is it has certainly tarnished my love of the tdf

[andyoxon]

^
This.

Just suspend your disbelief and enjoy the racing.

But yes. Naive. Lance Armstrong never failed a test (apart from the one he failed, but paid $100k hush money). Very few big busts have been as a result of anti-doping tests.

OOI does a 'lens of poetic faith' work for you when watching the TdF?

In English please.

A 'lens of suspension of disbelief', doesn't have the same ring to it...

['Suspension of disbelief'] was coined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1817 with the publication of his Biographia literaria or biographical sketches of my literary life and opinions:

    "In this idea originated the plan of the 'Lyrical Ballads'; in which it was agreed, that my endeavours should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic, yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith."

[Ian H]

I'll probably regret posting this as it's not far off the helmet debate in that people have their opinions and are fairly strongly held.

I'd love to be convinced Wiggins and Froome are clean and that sky have given us great British champions (we will ignore the Kenya thing for the purpose of this).

I could accept the whole jiffy bag thing as explained

I could accept that Froome took his medicine for asthma and for whatever reason it have a slightly high reading.

Unfortunately for me I find it harder to accept that both can be explained away. Whatever the truth is it has certainly tarnished my love of the tdf

Why should they be any 'better' than all the other great cyclists? 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_at_the_Tour_de_France

[Hot Flatus]

In answer to Andy's question, yes, the lens of disbelief works, although I'm afraid I'll never celebrate a Froome win. It's just too obvious. Miraculous transformations mean one thing only.

I much prefer the other GTs though, especially the Giro.

[DaveJ]

In twenty years time we'll have a much better idea whether we could have been cheering on the best stage racer of his generation, or should having been booing yet another another drugs cheat.

There's something sad about that, our own cynicism may prevent us from fully enjoying the now.

[DuncanM]

In trying to put this particular case to bed, this ruling opens a huge new can of worms.
The press release says

WADA recognizes that, in rare cases, athletes may exceed the decision limit concentration (of 1200 ng of Salbutamol per ml of urine) without exceeding the maximum inhaled dose. This is precisely why the Prohibited List allows for athletes that exceed the decision limit to demonstrate, typically through a controlled pharmacokinetic study (CPKS) as permitted by the Prohibited List, that the relevant concentration is compatible with a permissible, inhaled dose.
In Mr. Froome’s case, WADA accepts that a CPKS would not have been practicable as it would not have been possible to adequately recreate the unique circumstances that preceded the 7 September doping control (e.g. illness, use of medication, chronic use of Salbutamol at varying doses over the course of weeks of high intensity competition).
Therefore, having carefully reviewed Mr. Froome’s explanations and taking into account the unique circumstances of his case, WADA accepts that:

• the sample result is not inconsistent with an ingestion of Salbutamol within the permitted maximum inhaled dose;
• an adequate CPKS is not practicable; and
• the sample may be considered not to be an AAF.

So they are saying that he's not going to be banned, because it's possible that he took a legal number of puffs and returned that urine sample. Not certain (as the CPKS would have demonstrated), not even probable, just possible. This is not in line with how this rule has been applied previously - it has always been that if you exceeded the limit in a test, you had to prove your innocence.  There have been 11 athletes in the UK who have tested above the limit for Salbutamol in the last 10 years - all have been given bans. There are a number of professional cyclists likewise. Are their bans now null and void, because despite the urine concentration it was possible for them to have been within the permitted dose?
Who should Pettachi and Ulissi (and anyone else who was banned for Salbutamol) be suing?

Can open, worms everywhere.

[Cudzoziemiec]

In twenty years time we'll have a much better idea whether we could have been cheering on the best stage racer of his generation, or should having been booing yet another another drugs cheat.

There's something sad about that, our own cynicism may prevent us from fully enjoying the now.

Given the number of cheats proven and suspected, it's probably the whole system and environment we should be booing, or at least casting a critical eye over. And not just racing.

[Hot Flatus]

It's professional sport

[Peter]

Yes:  drugs, sandpaper, etc. - all part of the same human weaknesses.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It's a human weakness that extends far beyond sport.

[Ian H]

It's a human weakness that extends far beyond sport.

Human nature, you mean?

[Samuel D]

It’s a weakness that extends beyond people.

However, some people keep this weakness under control. Those who dismiss this possibility perhaps reveal by their doubt their own weakness. They cannot imagine that others would resist cheating if the stakes were high enough. Maybe it’s because my whole life is lived according to principles that others reject that this is less troublesome for me.

More importantly, the scope for cheating in cycling has been drastically reduced. So even where cheating happens, it’s tinkering at the edges of legality rather than the large-scale banned methods of the blood-transfusion and EPO eras. The fuss caused by Froome’s AAF for an asthma medication shows that the moral stance on cheating has changed, as in its own already-dated way does Wiggin’s TUE. You could argue the puritans have gone too far, but their zeal was aroused by the injustices of the Armstrong years.

[Hot Flatus]

It’s a weakness that extends beyond people.

However, some people keep this weakness under control. Those who dismiss this possibility perhaps reveal by their doubt their own weakness. They cannot imagine that others would resist cheating if the stakes were high enough. Maybe it’s because my whole life is lived according to principles that others reject that this is less troublesome for me.

This isn't about you and your moral superiority, Samuel

More importantly, the scope for cheating in cycling has been drastically reduced. So even where cheating happens, it’s tinkering at the edges of legality rather than the large-scale banned methods of the blood-transfusion and EPO eras. The fuss caused by Froome’s AAF for an asthma medication shows that the moral stance on cheating has changed, as in its own already-dated way does Wiggin’s TUE. You could argue the puritans have gone too far, but their zeal was aroused by the injustices of the Armstrong years.

The scope for cheating by the old methods has reduced. It would be naive to think that new methods have suddenly stopped being developed.

This leads onto another view regarding Froome's AAF.  Nobody really believes that Salbutamol accounts for Froome's unbelievable ascent from soon-to-be  ex-World Tour cyclist, to almost winning a Grand Tour, in a matter of a few weeks. The knowledgeable fan knows something else accounts for it, but in the absence of anything else they'd prefer to see him sanctioned by something rather than get away with everything.

The truth is it will likely be years before we find out what has been going on over the past 7 years...But we know something has been going on.

[sojournermike]

It’s a weakness that extends beyond people.

However, some people keep this weakness under control. Those who dismiss this possibility perhaps reveal by their doubt their own weakness. They cannot imagine that others would resist cheating if the stakes were high enough. Maybe it’s because my whole life is lived according to principles that others reject that this is less troublesome for me.

More importantly, the scope for cheating in cycling has been drastically reduced. So even where cheating happens, it’s tinkering at the edges of legality rather than the large-scale banned methods of the blood-transfusion and EPO eras. The fuss caused by Froome’s AAF for an asthma medication shows that the moral stance on cheating has changed, as in its own already-dated way does Wiggin’s TUE. You could argue the puritans have gone too far, but their zeal was aroused by the injustices of the Armstrong years.

I'm not sure the scope for cheating is that reduced. There are a lot of new things going on out there, even without full scale epo/blood bag use.

The doping authorities seem ever weaker against the big name/money athletes - there has been a story aobut Serena Williams this week that flags all sorts of issues, but the journalist just asks why she is being victimised...

[Peter]

I'll probably regret posting this as it's not far off the helmet debate in that people have their opinions and are fairly strongly held.

I'd love to be convinced Wiggins and Froome are clean and that sky have given us great British champions (we will ignore the Kenya thing for the purpose of this).

I could accept the whole jiffy bag thing as explained

I could accept that Froome took his medicine for asthma and for whatever reason it have a slightly high reading.

Unfortunately for me I find it harder to accept that both can be explained away. Whatever the truth is it has certainly tarnished my love of the tdf

Why should they be any 'better' than all the other great cyclists? 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_at_the_Tour_de_France

That's a good read, Ian.  I have been wondering why I am more fed-up about drugs in sport now than when I started to be interested in cycling, which was in the heyday of Jacques Anquetil, who magnificently included sex in his pre-match routines.  Perhaps it's because they didn't deny what they were doing, although they didn't particularly advertise it.  I think it was Coppi who said that he only took drugs "when it was necessary" and when asked when it was necessary,  replied, "Almost all the time."  He remains a beacon to me, doping not withstanding.  Similarly with Eddy, who also doped and was occasionally disqualified for it.  Eddy will always be the greatest.  They were all at it.  Their soigneurs and managers may have denied it - but I don't think the riders did to the same extent.  There's that fabulous picture of Eddy riding out of a snowstorm on a mountain stage - no jacket, wearing track mitts.  What was he on?  Just about everything, I should think.  Magnificent!  I don't approve of drugs in sport because they are bad for you and a bad way for kids to go.  But the lying is the thing that really depresses me.

[DuncanM]

It's worth listening to the latest Ross Tucker video (even if you normally don't like him) because he raises some interesting questions about what this means for the future of drug testing in general, across all sports. It's here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_UOGgBy_gk

Personally I think the difference between the olden days and the EPO era (and since) is that stimulants can make you push yourself harder, but they can only get out what's there. So in the olden days, if you took something to perform one day, you paid for it the next. With EPO (and blood bags and...), you are changing the rider such that they are capable of much greater sustained performance than they would have been capable without the drug. Maybe that's no great distinction. I do think it meant that you couldn't compete in the EPO era without taking it, whereas maybe you could in the stimulant era. Both were clearly dangerous (in different ways).

[Peter]

That's interesting, Duncan.

[A Cyclist]

Very interesting press release from UCI:

http://www.uci.ch/pressreleases/response-public-comments-the-proceedings-involving-froome/

[rafletcher]

Really, posting it once would have been sufficient. Three times is overkill.

[A Cyclist]

Really, posting it once would have been sufficient. Three times is overkill.

All three threads are discussing the Froome case and it appears to have relevance to this thread, the TdF thread and Doping In The Pro Cycling World, particularly as it really does question whether tests are fit for purpose.

[mattc]

Really, posting it once would have been sufficient. Three times is overkill.

All three threads are discussing the Froome case and it appears to have relevance to this thread, the TdF thread and Doping In The Pro Cycling World, particularly as it really does question whether tests are fit for purpose.

Quite.

In fact, we should really have MORE threads about Sky/Froome.

[A Cyclist]

In fact, we should really have MORE threads about Sky/Froome.

That was the case with an attempt to move all the vitriol to one place to allow other threads to just concentrate on the racing:

https://yacf.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=108240.0

But is was not to be.

[Hot Flatus]

Bit rich complaining about the same topic spreading across several threads when you are operating a sock puppet, Veloman/A Cyclist.

[hubner]

I always thought this would be the verdict.

There was no way Froome was going get banned and go down in history as a doper. Not when his team has put £40million(?) into the sport.

Can you imagine one of the all time greats turns out to be a cheating liar!

[sojournermike]

Can you imagine one of the all time greats turns out to be a cheating liar!

If we think of the TdF 5 time or more winners as among cycling's greatest, what do their records tell us?

Anquetil never denied using drugs.
Merkx failed three drug tests yet we (including me) consider him to be the greatest cyclist of all time.
Hinault is in the record books as clean but is not without suspicion.
Indurain only got caught using Salbutomol, the same drug Froome uses.
Armstrong, the cheating liar.

Only 1 out of 5 not being a known drug user.

You are correct - the cheating liars are not considered the greats. It isn’t to do with doping