The new improved Lance Armstrong discussion thread.*

[rich p]

I posed a question a few weeks ago about the methods Sky use to ensure they hire riders without a doping history.
It seems it doesn't work because it's been more than a whisper for years that Rogers and Barry were suspicious and now Possoni has been revealed as a Ferrari client. Add to that Yates, the dodgy doctor from Rabobank and possibly Bobby Julich then Sky have a few skeletons in the cupboard.

 

[yello]

In fairness, I think Cunobelin did make a good point. I just failed to see how it was relevant... but perhaps it was too oblique for me. It was like there were similar keywords (drug testing, anonymity, evidence) but it didn't otherwise fit the context.

 

[laurence]

In fairness, I think Cunobelin did make a good point. I just failed to see how it was relevant... but perhaps it was too oblique for me. It was like there were similar keywords (drug testing, anonymity, evidence) but it didn't otherwise fit the context.

they all crossed the line too.

probably been through countless lawyers by the time it hit the page

 

[dellzeqq]

Are you enjoying a glass of something there dell?

answer me this. Would you rather
- be very, very cross about Lance Armstrong
or
- not be too bothered, reasoning that it's in the past

If I were to be sour about drugs cheats then I'd be kicking all the people that I admired in cycling over a thirty year period in to the long grass. I'll settle for remembering the good times.

Smoking Joe may be right. This may be the beginning of a reckoning - but somehow I doubt that Armstrong will live the rest of his life in penury and obscurity

 

[yello]

answer me this. Would you rather
- be very, very cross about Lance Armstrong
or
- not be too bothered, reasoning that it's in the past

Are those my only choices? I'd like to choose a path somewhere between the two.

I thought you were only have fun dell so I responded, I thought, in kind. I don't live in a black and white world, shades are wear (note the deliberate typo) it's at man. Armstrong is both saint and sinner. A supreme athlete and a doper. I can remember it all. Remembering the bad stuff doesn't pain me.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

If we didn't know better, we might think dell was in the running for UCI President...

There are other options than being 'very, very cross' and 'not being too bothered', like for example being interested in the truth and considering how this could be a springboard to a wider reform of professional cycling - and given that Armstrong is still denying every single last aspect of this, it's not yet the time to forgive and forget.

 

[ufkacbln]

Medical ethics? We are talking about policing compliance with a banned substance regime in sport. What has that got to do with medicine?

One of two things happened here, and you need to make up your mind which.

This was part of a research project and the samples should be anonymised (standard research ethics requirement), in which case if the samples were identified , the research process is compromised and invalidated.

Or it was a formal test of a B sample, in which case the WADA regulations were breached.

Which way do you want to invalidate the result?

 

[DogTired]

Well, he did do it. He cheated. He lied.
View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtZhG2kWVLY

Agree, in my cynical view the winner gets the cheque. But in terms of bike handling, he's a poof as the following demonstrates.


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZmJtYaUTa0&feature=player_embedded

 

[yello]

One of two things happened here, and you need to make up your mind which.

You know, before you posted that, I typed up a longish post addressing that very point.... and then binned it! Not because it didn't matter but because we'll never know. Picking one is a somewhat futile exercise.

For what it's worth, I don't think option 1 (retest of anonymised samples) was a breach. Precisely because they were anonymised. I suspect lab re-tests are not uncommon, to test new tests amongst other reasons. I'd even imagine that's partly why samples are stored.

If there was a breach, it's when the results came in and someone then tapped a number into a computer to find out who the sample belonged to. Out of curiosity or whatever. They then maybe picked up the phone and spoke to a journalist. I don't know who was in a position to do that but I assumed it wasn't the lab... maybe only UCI or AFLD. I certainly don't think it happened the other way around. I don't think anyone ordered a retest of Armstrong's samples.

But, as I say, it's all speculation and we'll never really know. It certainly doesn't matter what I think. The official line is 'no breach', obviously. However it happened, USADA didn't order it and the information was presented to them, even if it be fruit from the forbidden tree (or whatever the expression is). And, as has been pointed, USADA have stated that they don't rely on this information and feel they can make a case from witness testimony alone. Personally, I go with that.

 

[DogTired]

I don't care. A drugs cheat has been routed out, the governing body exposed as corrupt and inept. No can we get on with re-building.

Couldnt agree more but its nice to tie up the ends and stop the nonsense snowball. The research project which identified positive EPO tests was anonymised. The tests were complete and finished and the reports done with the positive results were assigned to the random ID. So the research is not compromised and is not invalidated. Post this a reporter managed to piece together that LA was responsible.

So there is no argument that this invalidates the results.

 

[Happiness Stan]

Well, he did do it. He cheated. He lied. He bullied other riders, although one former team mate has been on Radio 5 this evening to say that he saw nothing and was never put under any pressure. He's not particularly generous about his competitors. He may not be a nice person at all, but, then again, he never pretended to be a nice person. But...........he was a great, great cyclist. And whatever name they put on those seven TdFs now, nobody other than a few thousand cyclists and the French will think that anybody other than Armstrong won those races.

He's got away with it ........and married Cheryl Crow. That's the way it is, and the rest of the world is going to just have to suck it up.

View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtZhG2kWVLY

A professional bike rider manages to ride across a field - whoop de woo. I'm even more impressed how he walks out in front of the speeding pack in order to remount. Once a dick, always a dick.

 

[dellzeqq]

A professional bike rider manages to ride across a field - whoop de woo. I'm even more impressed how he walks out in front of the speeding pack in order to remount. Once a dick, always a dick.

get some sleep. You'll feel more at one with the world in the morning.

 

[ufkacbln]

I don't care. A drugs cheat has been routed out, the governing body exposed as corrupt and inept. No can we get on with re-building.

Thank you.

 

[ufkacbln]

Thank you, neither UCI or USADA comes out well

 

[DogTired]

You know, before you posted that, I typed up a longish post addressing that very point.... and then binned it! Not because it didn't matter but because we'll never know. Picking one is a somewhat futile exercise.

For what it's worth, I don't think option 1 (retest of anonymised samples) was a breach. Precisely because they were anonymised. I suspect lab re-tests are not uncommon, to test new tests amongst other reasons. I'd even imagine that's partly why samples are stored.

If there was a breach, it's when the results came in and someone then tapped a number into a computer to find out who the sample belonged to. Out of curiosity or whatever. They then maybe picked up the phone and spoke to a journalist. I don't know who was in a position to do that but I assumed it wasn't the lab... maybe only UCI or AFLD. I certainly don't think it happened the other way around. I don't think anyone ordered a retest of Armstrong's samples.

But, as I say, it's all speculation and we'll never really know. It certainly doesn't matter what I think. The official line is 'no breach', obviously. However it happened, USADA didn't order it and the information was presented to them, even if it be fruit from the forbidden tree (or whatever the expression is). And, as has been pointed, USADA have stated that they don't rely on this information and feel they can make a case from witness testimony alone. Personally, I go with that.

OK, to clear this up, again. Lab develops a test for EPO. They want to check it so get samples from 98/99 TdF to run against. The samples have a 6 digit number which is matched to the doping control form but is essentially randomly assigned. Many months later whispers come out that a lot of the tests were positive, but no-one know whose. The doping control forms were held by the UCI. A reporter from L'Equipe approached the UCI and LA to ask if he could have access to the doping control forms for those years. Unsuspecting, access was given and he managed to match the named forms to the EPO results.

So its not a breach, a reporter had a lot of work to do, went about it cleverly and access was by permission of the UCI AND Lance Armstrong himself. Conceptually its not hugely different from the police matching the fingerprints (as a random key) on a TdF trophy to a lying fraudster.