Thomas accussed of doping amongst others

[montage]

List of L'Equipe released this morning:

"The riders were ranked with numbers from zero to ten, with zero being no suspicion, and ten being the maximum."

"From six to ten, the circumstantial evidence of possible doping was "overwhelming". According to the paper, some of the riders located to the top of list have already been singled out by the biological passport and evaluated by the panel of nine experts, even if no procedure was opened. "Still, some of the files' commentaries are damning. Recurrent abnormal profiles, enormous fluctuations, identification of the used doping product and means of administration..." wrote L'Equipe's anti-doping expert journalist Damien Ressiot."

Thomas was rated a 6 out of 10.

Full list and article here http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/ucis-suspicious-list-leaked-from-2010-tour-de-france

Does this hold any substance? I find it very hard to believe, and will be pretty gutted as Geraint is possibly my favourite rider in the peloton, and it isn't as if he has gone from zero to hero overnight.

Wiggins isn't looking too good at 5/10 either, again somebody who very few would consider a doper.


I'm confident this is a bunch of bollocks, but if it turns out to hold any truth that may well be my interest in the professional cycling over.

 

[Crackle]

Well if you look at the names near the top, you do find yourself nodding a bit but you have to wonder at what point it all becomes a bit vague and less certain. It's still in it's infancy really the bio-passport.

If Thomas and Wiggins are doping, they're fairly crap at it.

 

[John the Monkey]

AFAIK, no one knows the basis for the scores.

Biology is messy - if the Biopassport has hard thresholds, I'd assume that there will be riders who cross them innocently, and riders with more to hide who do not (or perhaps "manage" their passport values so that they do not). This is, as I understand it, a basis on which to target tests - clean riders may get more visits, but will continue to be clean. The dodgy ones who score high will get more visits and *may* get caught. The dodgy ones who score low will at least have the extent of their cheating limited by trying to stay under the BP's thresholds.

Think of it as the basis for a really crap game of Top Trumps, not for pointing fingers.

 

[raindog]

Not sure what to make of this. It was confidential information that was never meant to be seen by the riders, let alone the public. Are people's careers going to be affected unnecessarily? It's not even absolutely clear what the list means.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

You think because Thomas and Wiggins and British, they can't be at it, Montage? Come on...

The biological passport may be messy, but once you get up into the 8s, 9s and 10s here, we are looking at people who are basically flaunting the fact that they are cheating. And the names don't surprise me at all.

 

[John the Monkey]

Oh, and as someone on twitter has just pointed out, Mr. Thomas lacks a spleen, which may make the values fluctuate somewhat.

 

[Keith Oates]

List of L'Equipe, says it all really !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Dave_1]

disgusting piece if journalism by L'equipe. Definitely no rider should agree to be interviewed by such a rag

 

[Noodley]

You think because Thomas and Wiggins and British, they can't be at it, Montage? Come on...

I think you made that up in your own head FM.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

I think you made that up in your own head FM.

I'm not accusing them of doping. Not at all. All I am saying is that there's no reason to be 100% certain about those two compared to many other non-British riders on the list. Personally, I'd like to think they aren't doping, but that feeling is clearly a cultural / personal one. It has no real evidential basis, although there is a strong circumstantial case for Thomas being clean, as someone else pointed out above.

L'equipe is one of the only institutions that takes doping seriously. I'm glad they've published this.

 

[ohnovino]

They could have written an article about how the biological passports are being used, what types of anomalies are showing up and what their consequences are. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has no idea of what constitutes "normal", "abnormal but explainable" and "abnormal through doping".

Instead they've published a list that will tarnish the reputations of dozens of riders, who will never be able to prove they were 100% clean and who have no way of defending themselves against their ranking.

I'm normally in favour of l'Equipe's stance on doping (their Schumacher reporting was amazing), but I really don't know what they were hoping to achieve with this.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

they've published a list that will tarnish the reputations of dozens of riders, who will never be able to prove they were 100% clean and who have no way of defending themselves against their ranking.

I don't think it tarnishes anyone's reputation who wasn't already suspicious. There are those who have more of a reason for odd biological passport readings (Thomas apparently amongst the them), but then are those who do not. Menchov's presence near the top of the list isn't going to surprise anyone, least of all him, for example.

And just to be very clear, this is not L'equipe accusing anyone of doping. This is the doping control list from last year's TdF, indicating the basis on which riders were targeted. What's particularly interesting to me is how few of the 'dead certs' were actually caught with a positive test. Either the dopers are getting much better at planning their doping strategy, masking and micro-doping, or the testing isn't good enough, or the whole biological passport strategy has some major flaws one way or the other.

 

[yello]

And just to be very clear, this is not L'equipe accusing anyone of doping. This is the doping control list from last year's TdF, indicating the basis on which riders were targeted.

That's my take on it too. Further, it's UCI's list. One might accuse L'Equipe of dodgy practice (or whatever) for publishing it but one might also consider the 'why' of it being leaked to them.

I read it like a weightings list. Something like an insurer might use in assessing risk when deciding your premium!

One can dispute the weightings or the manner of their derivation (plus it could be considered similar to an assumption of guilt) but that the fact such a list exists surprises me not. In fact I'd go further; I'd assumed this was exactly the sort of thing the blood passport was being used for - targeting suspicious riders.

 

[montage]

You think because Thomas and Wiggins and British, they can't be at it, Montage? Come on...

It's more the persona of the riders, and their palmeres

 

[rich p]

I'm ambivalent about the list being published raw but I know little of the science. The passport isn't enough on its own to nail a rider then, even with a score of 10? I thought Pelizotti was done under the passport anomaly rule but again I stand to be corrected.

FWIW, I think the fact that Wiggins has been vocally anti-doping, published his blood values voluntarily and urged others to do the same indicates he's clean. If he was doping it would be an extraordinary course of action.

So by my guesswork, 5/10 for Wiggins indicates the measure is not black and white. Like FM, though, the names in the higher bracket are on everybodies list of major suspects.

The middle numbers may attract suspicion and opprobrium unfairly as a result.