Yes, WOW.

Watched it a few days ago.. SO good.

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

Yup brilliant.

Watched it, Monday.

I actually have very little faith in any endurance sport being "fair". If you have the $$, you can beat the sytem.

Dude's FTP went up 99 W in a VERY short time. I don't know what is "real" and what isn't.

The Russian story just further adds to the doubts.

Yes, that's what I heard. Sounded like ftp went from 250 to 350 watts, while taking a drug protocol that supposedly wouldn't test positive?!?

Wowza... I guess when your protocol is determined by the head of a WADA lab, you know what works. I also guess the Doctors that have the same knowledge get big money.

I think the whole amateur doping story wasn't very well described and I wasn't exactly sure what he was trying to accomplish. Was he trying to show how good the drugs are or show how a amateur could beat a doping controls or both?

I also thought it was very odd he was unhappy with the race performance but he should be able to clearly show a better performance from the power numbers. A 100w FTP would show up easy in a year-year power comparison.

Otherwise the film was excellent.

He was trying to show how easy it is to beat the doping controls. Wasn't clear whether he actually went better though as he had mechanical issues in the race. Took a years worth of dope but forgot to charge his bike, doh !

I enjoyed the first half more than the second. It was interesting to hear how doping affected him, I agree that a 100w FTP increase without a better race performance sounds odd though. I would like to think that if my FTP went up by 100w, I'd be pro.

The 2nd half fell into the normal 'Russia bad' everyone else good theme. The doping investigations of the last few years leave me feeling duped. So Russia has the best state sponsored doping regime of all time, but are average. USA, China, Kenya, Jamaica and Great Britain win everything, but are not doping, or very little doping is going on there, and certainly unbeknownst to the state....

Just going to cue it up.

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I found this a bit odd. He also said an increase of 20%
But from 250 (isn't that low for some one that finished 14th in the haute alpes race?) to 350 is 40%

Agreed but I think the intent was to shed light on Rodchenkov more so than the "Russians". And even other heavies like Mutko. I'm not sure Rodchenkov's story has been told that much, especially considering he's gone into Witness Protection. If it wasn't for his docs WADA and IOC wouldn't have gone down the path they did IMO, he was the Edward Snowden of Athletic Doping, albeit more of a law-breaking "criminal" than Snowden.

thought the movie was incredible. It also highlighted how he totally stumbled upon Rodchenkov as a story while trying to focus on something else entirely. What a twist of fate!

As did I (bolded).......kind of....lol. The first half will REALLY make you question what is real and what isn't in sports. Doping's efficacy is real (the FTP # was staggering, to me). It's also undetectable. I know guys who doped to play amateur SOFTBALL. Nothing surprises me on the "who would do it" level. Nobody's checking.

If a test emerged, tomorrow, that would allow the governing bodies to check athletes - dating back 5 years - they would not administer it. They don't want to know.

"But from 250 (isn't that low for some one that finished 14th in the haute alpes race?)"

Exactly what I thought. Very odd.

indeed,

when did he do the hate alpes, did he have time off after? could have been at somthing like 280ftp+, had some down time and detrained to 250ftp, then with a bit of work come back strong and fast,

I watched it this weekend. Few things that stuck out to me
- Yes, 250 FTP seemed low to place 14th out of a field that size...unless only 13 guys in the field were remotely competitive. I know nothing about how competitive the race actually is, but they made it out to be some really competitive race.
- It reinforced my feelings on loving my mechanical groupos. Phew!
- I found it was an awkward transition between the doping for a year and then going into the Olympics. I mean it seemed logical the flow of events but it was awkward in that the whole racing thing kind of petered out and I don't think they truly quantified for people how much of an impact it was able to make on his training (even if he had a electronic failure in the race). Perhaps they wanted to simplify it for everyone by just saying he had a 20% power increase. Regardless, I don't really think the point they were trying to make came across very well.
- I enjoyed the second half (or 2/3) of the documentary quite a bit.

The guy said in an interview a couple of things of interest that didn't show in the movie:

- He had a mechanical, a crash, and a flat in the race; otherwise he would have finished higher
- After the prior year, he said he could barely walk for weeks afterwards. After doping, he said he could have
continued racing for many days. The recovery was stunning.

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"Go yell at an M&M"

The guy said in an interview a couple of things of interest that didn't show in the movie:

- He had a mechanical, a crash, and a flat in the race; otherwise he would have finished higher
- After the prior year, he said he could barely walk for weeks afterwards. After doping, he said he could have
continued racing for many days. The recovery was stunning.[/quote]

Yea ... I wouldn't be happy with my placing either after doing what he did to get there ... however, riding 60k+ on a single speed in the high Alps and still staying in the top 30 is a "VERY" impressive feat. Imagine how far back a pro would fall on a "Queen" stage on a single speed!

People who are trying to say doping doesn't work as advertised are full of crap (several studies out there about the ineffectiveness of EPO and other drugs) ... they do work, and work quite well. If they didn't, people wouldn't risk everything for it.

They also stated a 20% improvement in FTP ... though, they stated from 250 to 350 watt improvement ... not sure which one was accurate, though I'm guessing the 20% is more accurate and his initial 250 watt FTP was low given his 14th place finish in the first Haute race he did.

Doubt it. I think he just has tons of cash, tons of time, and needed an excuse to dope to the gills. Since you can monetize pretty much anything, there you go! Let's make a movie.
It was interesting and pathetic at the same time.

The movie never circles back around to how the guy was not going to test positive and how others, like Lance, beat the system. It explains how the Russians beat the system but that had to do more with tampering with vials and an inside job at the Russian lab during Sochi, which this guy and Lance wouldn’t have been able to do. And, does this guy self-impose a no racing ban on himself until he retests his FTP and it is a legit 240-260w?

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Straightenin' the curves; Flattenin' the hills
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Coached by Mike Plumb @ TriPower MultiSports
https://www.strava.com/athletes/1149072 - https://www.instagram.com/thoswoods/

Watched this AM on the trainer. My impression when watching was that it didn't circle back because the story morphed into something he wasn't really expecting it to when he began filming. Could be wrong, but I got the feeling the whole story about Sochi/prior Olympics/RUSADA's involvement/etc wasn't what was intended when he started, but he rolled with what was going on.

+1
Totally agree. What was his point in going through the doping protocol? If he knew the race wasn't going to be tested, then it wasn't to prove that the tests can be fooled (the entire peleton proved that). If anything, i think it proved one of Armstrong's points: everyone doped and I'm still the best. That is, you can dope but you have to have the gene and the work ethic to be the best in the world.

I also think the director and the film let the Haute Route !! result slip away too easily.and evolve into the Russian drama. Maybe if he'd placed higher (and the mechanical had little to do with his result), the personal doping portion would have been extended.

Captivating documentary, though.

What was really interesting to me was that the head of the Russian WADA lab seemed more than willing to risk everything to help him basically beat drug testing at a low stakes athletic event.

Like it was just another day at the office, no big deal.

That's exactly what the producer said in an interview I heard.

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"Go yell at an M&M"

Depends on how light they are...

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

It would have been interesting to have seen him compete to see how the testosterone improved his performance. Perhaps there will be an Icarus 2? Are there no long term side effects to taking the amount of testosterone he was taking? He didn't seem too bothered by putting all that shit in his body.

Even when you weight 140 pounds it is not that great (not that bad either). It would put you in the cat. 3 range.

That's just it. He knew the race purported that they WOULD be tested. The race director speaks of this in the athlete meeting - on film.

What's a bit funny is that he then seems to find out that they actually don't test. I guess his whole narrative about being able to dope and still test clean kind of goes down the drain at that moment.

Another thing worth mentioning is that most or all athletes at the highest level (athletes on the whereabouts system) would not be able to dope like this guy as you would get popped the very first time someone showed up at your door in an out-of-competition test. Most on this board might know this, but I'm not sure most of the audience of this documentary does.

So... In all sports they had dopers... Begs the question which Russian triathletes are using?

Fairly certain Grigory did say at one point in time that Bryan would need 2 week minimum before testing so it was in there but I'm not entirely sure how clear that would be for someone unfamiliar with it.

He did compete that year...and finished worse than the year before. My gut feel is he may have unconsciously "self-sabotaged"...

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

My bet is he intended to make a film about him doping as an amateur...and document his 'improvement' and success....with probably the climax of the film is him turning down a prize...ideally.

But, when he got connected to Rodchenko, he quickly realized he had a bigger, better story to tell....Rodchenko's.

My recollection of how it unfurled...(which is what I found interesting...it filled in a ton of gaps) as to how it went from suspicion to confirmation.
My timeline is a little hazy. But I remember reading an article or interview or something with someone who indicated someone big from Russia *might* be spilling some beans.
It could have been an interview with the UCLA lab guy......or another journalist close to the film maker, etc. It might have been an interview with that film maker. And would align with that early visit by Rodchenko to set up the doping program? Whow knows. I just remember hearing that serious stuff was gonna go down. And this was before WADA et. al. launched their formal investigations.

It was "a long time"....many months? a year? Before the Times article came out with the KGB, holes in the wall details and so on. I remember reading that article. And I remember, this...THIS...is who they were talking about in that earlier article. But, I also remember thinking that Rodchenko was the guy who was all but named in that previous article. And I remember thinking....with all that heat, how did they not get to him? Not that I completely suspect Russia of assassination or imprisonment or something. There's certainly ways they could have convinced him to cooperate with their narrative or voluntarily "disappear". A nice dacha by the sea and a new identity or something. But, he held all the cards. The heat was on. And they virtually let him go.

Either way, Rodchenko makes a hell of a lot more interesting story than "I doped, it worked and I got away with it until I unveiled my secret". Fascinating character. An evil genius? A genius with the proverbial gun to his head forced to do wrong? Was this a last act of defiance to clear his conscious that had bothered him all along or a way out as the noose was tightening and he'd make a great scapegoat for Russia/RUSADA/etc. I can't tell if I have any sympathy for him or not. Which makes for a terrific story.

Happy families...they are indeed, all alike.

Well he had a mechanical.I'm guessing he would have gone Ok though with his FTP improvements.

Yeah...and that mechanical was "forgetting to charge the Di2 battery" :-/

I'll bet that was the beginning of the wheels coming off (metaphorically) for him mentally. IIRC, his placing declined even further after that.

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

I though it was pretty good overall. The last 2/3 was better than the first 1/3 in my opinion. The parts about his doping experiment and the Haute route seemed a little slow and a bit self indulgent, and if they were going to include that in the film after it pivoted unexpectedly to the Russia scandal, they should've at least followed up with his drug test results post dope. The story behind Russia and Rodchenkov was more interesting to me. I hadn't heard all of the details or Rodchenkov's perspective before.

Good insight. This is very possible.

The initial clips of the race on 'riods looked to me like he was over-biking the hell out of his bibs. Then the Di2 thing, seemed to be convenient & concocted.

Besides not enough time and training, I don't think he's got the basic goods to P1 it. What's the math? How much can you extract using PEDs? My rough calcs based on say 100M dopers, are at best to 10%. improvement.

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i really enjoyed it even though it was really 2 shorts slapped together as 1 feature documentary. my thoughts:

(1) how creepy was the anti-aging md?
(2) how many triathletes work with the creepy md?
(3) fogel looked like just a recreational cyclist but then claimed that he was 14th in a race i never had heard of that he billed as the hardest amateur race in the world -- then gets doped up and does worse (even with the di2 charging failure it's not like he claimed he was killing it). how has he done in other cycling races (if he ever has done any)?
(4) he never explained why DOJ was going to arrest grigory. it's not against US law to be doping russia athletes in russia so there must have been more going on that wasn't told.
(5) it's shocking to think that grigory used to be a somewhat competitive runner. talk about letting oneself go to $hit.
(6) how much did putin pay boch to get most of the russian team in rio and all of it in next year's winter olympics?
(7) who was paying for the drugs fogel was taking and for grigory's trips back-and-forth when it still was a super-size-me-doping movie?
(8) is fogel off the dope and, if he is, what are some of his side effects?

So is Fogel now banned from any racing for the next 4 years?

Should be. Pretty clear evidence he doped and raced without a TUE. I also doubt he got the all clear from WADA or USADA to conduct his doping experiment.

Agreed. Wonder if the other top guys in that race were clean? If it's so easy to get testosterone, has to be AGers taking the stuff (I know this is a huge thread on its own). My friend raced IM and he's a 2x rowing olympian was asked to get tested but he couldn't make the test b/c he was traveling to the race. They didn't care and he still raced.

Would this mean Lance actually should still be considered an all time great? It's not all about the dope!

What I wanted to see was him explaining how he got into this mess to the WADA & IOC officials in that big meeting they had. "Today, I, some random competitive amateur cyclist will be Grigory's spokesperson because he was helping me dope and cheat your system."

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808 > NYC > PDX > YVR
2024 Races: Taupo

Haute route is very well known. Certainly in europe

Lemond and mercx are hardly the picture of health

I got that feeling too. It felt like he just fell into an opportunity. Had a inside scoop with the doctor and ran with it. The doctor got his escape from russia.

Yes, my understanding is that a certain proportion of samples get the CIR test for exogenous testosterone performed on them, even if they don't have a suspicious T:E ratio. He'd get popped the first time one of his samples had that test done on it. IIRC someone on this forum posted about failing the testosterone test, I think it was a few years ago now, and it had been quite a long time since they had last used exogenous testosterone when the CIR test was able to detect it.

well an interesting issue on the long term effects was brought up... how they sourced products (china). some underground labs produce low quality products that who knows - perhaps is the reason why many athletes who dope get cancer? it would be interesting to follow all the russian dopers now, cause supposedly they used the most purist product

i really loved how this movie completely derailed from a predictable finish and held on to the newly generated story. oscar worthy.

The guy who won that race, Peter Pouly, has a dubious history. He races on the Asia circuit and is very unpopular with other riders, according to cyclingiq - short on specifics though.

Has had 12 month doping ban and been dq'd for mechanical doping

He sounds completely clean

Ha ha yeah the producers would been mouths agape as the whole saga unfolded, going from doing a doco about an amateur doping to having one of the guys in the doco in the witness protection program to protect him KGB assassination!

Ha, you've got really low standards!

Agree.
I made it through about a third of the movie, then it became too much Blair Witch Hunt type of filming, pretending to run from KGB, etc. Dumb.

Where is this documented? Numbers? Athletes can get cancer too. Is there any evidence that athletes are getting cancer at a higher rate than the general population?
Given that most athletes in all pro sports use, or have used, PED's at some point, shouldn't we see mass amounts of pro athletes getting cancer???

Id suggest you watch the whole movie before you judge. RT score is 93/96% now.
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/icarus_2017/

Definitely blew me away, especially since I randomly picked it not knowing the entire plot twist. You just don't see documentaries scripted like this, they did a great job documenting the storyline and allowing WADA to allow camera in that debrief...I expect to see a documentary Oscar nomination for this, not a winner but a nomination.

I loved the look on the faces of the WADA folks - kind of a "Oh f$ck..." The movie really is two docs in one, with the latter being quite intriguing. Not knowing the story of the Russian, my jaw dropped as the events played out in real time during the shooting of the movie.

Its awesome.....

Plot for funding

"Going to take drugs to see if it improves personal performance"

Precis for Cannes

"Drop a list of every russian doper on WADA committee on film whilst they say they have never done more to ensure sports are clean"

Its amazing.........as is the haute route which is where this started

I can understand not thinking it's Oscar worthy. But it's pretty amazing what this guy stumbled into. He tried to make a documentary that only people on a site like this would prossibly ever pay attention to, then accidentally walked into a situation where he assisted in nearly getting a major country completely kicked out of the Olympics! All because of some goofy Russian guy he was talking to on Skype! That's pretty interesting if you ask me.

And to say it was pretending to run from the KGB is brushing over some major things. I don't think he had assassins assigned to chase him through dark alleys. But if you don't think there was some foul play in his associate who had a heart attack shortly after being forced into retirement.....

I'd have been slightly concerned for my safety. Even if it wasn't from the government, you have an entire country who takes pride in their sports putting blame on you.

I did HR Rockies this year, ~350 ftp and 69kg. Wasn't even in top 10, which were nearly all pros. Unless he weighs 45kgs, I can't imagine finishing 14th in an EU event @250.

Yes, not sure about those wattage numbers. For the average viewer, they barely understand anyways, but it seems strange to go from a pretty average 250w FTP. Assuming that is what he was measuring and his weight - maybe it was a 2 hour test instead of 20 min. I was amazed that he went to 350w, that's quite a jump, but I guess you can't dope electronic shifting. Seemed like he just lost it after that, but looks like he was about to drop anyways.

My wife really liked the film as well. Probably b/c I just said it was about cycling doping, but the Russian twist really caught us off guard. Wonder when someone will document the "activity" in China leading up to '08 Beijing Olympics...looks like they were making the "best stuff" at scale during that time.

China is a country with a huge population that can be scoured for talent but with all that latent talent plus whatever doping they were up to they still came in behind the U.S. in total medals. It looks like the best stuff was being made right in the good ol' U.S. of A. If you want to check out a grade A program then check out the Brits in 2012. That was so blatant it was ridiculous.

I've got no idea on the power numbers, etc. but he is being a bit misleading when he says he was 14th. I think many people hear that and think he might have been relatively close to the winner. However, looking at the results he was 2 hours and 22 minutes down.

http://www.timing4you.com/...BAL%20SOLO%20Men.pdf

I was in that race (Haute Route Alpes 2014). My Quarq died on the second stage, so I don't have good data, but my FTP was probably around 300W for 76kg. I finished outside of the top 100.

There's no way he finished 14th on a FTP of 250W.

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http://powerful-problem-solving.com

Goodness ... haute route is a mass start event? 300+ rolling off the line at the same time?

He's 61.3 kg, according to Strava profile.

I have no doubt that the 250W was at a detrained level.. Something over 300W might be realistic for undoped trained level.

Yes, sort of. They separated us in batches of 50 or so and released those at 1 or 2 minutes intervals. There was a neutralized section at the beginning of each stage and the race only started once you crossed a map a few kilometers later.

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http://powerful-problem-solving.com

Certain sections of each stage are timed and ranked. Sorta like road bike enduro

Dear Arnaud, with 76kg and 300w FTP you are really not a climber, you are just "not so bad" in the mountains with 3.94w/kg.
I know because I'm like you.

But I have a friend, with 260w FTP and he is 61kg, so 4.26w/kg. On short hills I'm stronger than him, because I can manage to put big numbers but only for short time (3-4 min max).

On the passes there is no way I can stay with him, he's just another category. On 7-8 km climb with 8-10% i just get 6-7 min, just because of physics.
What would it be if there are 30 or even 50km climbing like in such a race?

So 61.3 kg..

He stated that he almost had a 20% improvement. So his previously FTP could have been 291.

That sums up to a 4,75 W/kg which is a very good score -> cat. 1. Not sure if it is enough for a 14th place, but more plausible than getting a 14th place with 4,07 W/kg

It wasn't mechanical doping. He used a replacement bike that was 600 grams too light.

Care to expand that little nugget of info?

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Dont complain about the results you did n't get from the training you did n't do.

There is just one point to pinpoint on this categories: they are based on the performance of athletes regardless of doping or not.
And in general those numbers are based on the results (watt/kg) of the last, say, 20 years?
But in the '90 EPO was "practically" legal, and today faster athletes show the same numbers. There is no way the the categories reflect "clean" athletes potentials.
There a different researches (irish tri, bbc), that shows that about 10-15% of amateur athletes take forbidden complements. About them you can average about 3-4% taking serious help, like EPO or GH. Over a field of 300 there is then about 10 people taking such substance.
(sure those a simple statistics, there are other factors that can influence those numbers, but there is no way, I repeat, NO WAY, that everybody is clean. Just remember that with EPO microdoses any control is useless, France2).

So, in the end, if you are a gifted rider, with a watt/kg > 4.1 or 4.2 you can expect finish no more than a 5-15 place on a race such in the Icarus movie.

What's a bit funny is that he then seems to find out that they actually don't test. I guess his whole narrative about being able to dope and still test clean kind of goes down the drain at that moment.


Amateur/Age-Group testing is only going to be hit or miss at best. It's too expensive and the logistics involved are significant. I agree that from what we have seen, it's needed, but sports officials in various sports are struggling to keep up with the needs for testing at the pro/elite level. To test more thoroughly at the amateur/age-group level would require probably 10X the tests and 10X the costs!

Another thing worth mentioning is that most or all athletes at the highest level (athletes on the whereabouts system) would not be able to dope like this guy as you would get popped the very first time someone showed up at your door in an out-of-competition test.

Again testing of pros/elites is border-line doable/workable because it's a relatively small homogeneous group in each sport. They know there is Out of Competition testing and they know that they need to conform to the Whereabouts protocol. Try doing that and putting those sorts of rules and protocols on the masses of amateur/age-group athletes? Good luck!

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Goodness ... haute route is a mass start event? 300+ rolling off the line at the same time?


They do this all the time at many gran fondo races. It's not a big deal. People self-seed. It tends to be a VERY hard pace at the front for the first 5 - 10km or longer to weed out the wanna-be's and then it settles down.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Funny Haute Route story.

My wife signs up to do Haute Route Pyrenees last year. They send the booklet to us with detailed information about the parcours. I read it through carefully stage, by stage. I tell her that, when the Pros in the Tour de FRance go into the Pyrenees each year it's two maybe three stages followed by a rest day. At Haute Route, they find EVERY major climb in the Pyranees and you ride up and down all of those climbs in 7 days of riding/racing.. In short . . it's insane!

Because of all of my Race/Event Announcing work, I could not go. My wife, who's raced professionally as a triathlete in the past, finishing in the top-5 of several IRONMAN races around the world, and has bike raced at the Elite 1-2 level for a number of years with some top finishes nationally in Canada, said that Haute Route Pyreenes was the hardest thing she has ever done in her life! For the record she finished 7th overall among the women and was the 3nd Master's Woman finisher winning a $500 Mavic Gift Certificate . . woohoo!! The only women that were ahead of her were former, Pros and Olympic/National Team Members from various countries.

It is and is not a, "race". My wife described it as a, "competitive tour". She said that every day you had to turn yourself completely inside out, and were in total survival mode for much of each days stage! There were some teary, and emotional post-stage skype calls on most days!

Despite all that, she's talking with a group that is considering doing the Haute Route Dolomites in 2018! :)

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

I didn't like it as much as everyone else apparently. The first half seemed like a narcissistic AGer that wanted to dope, so figured he'd cheat and mask it as a documentary. Seriously doubt it would have gotten picked up had he not fallen ass backwards into the Russian doping thing

At the time when they said 'your power has gone up from 250 to 350' or whatever the values were, they never said FTP and I thought power in what context. Being that it seems low and he got through such a tough event where he implies there are a handful of dudes either freak athletes or clearly on something I can't see hid base FTP being 250 so I think people are speculating a bit.

In the U.S. I'd be happy if USAT would mandatory test 2 of 3 (or 3 of 5 if they go that deep) of the podium winners at National Championship events. Same for ITU. Place 1-3 and your names go in a hat. 2 out of 3 of you get to test. This has a cost associated with it, and I'd be happy to foot the prorated bill in the fee as an athlete at a National or World Championship event.

For WTS, I'd be happy if they'd mandatory test 1 of each AG podium at random at each event that has qualifying spots for their respective 70.3 or 140.6 World Championship races. This also has a cost associated with it and I'm also willing to foot the prorated bill in the fee.

Too much overhead and cost deterrent to levying testing on every USAT sanctioned event. An extra $5-10 per entrant for a random sprint is likely an additional cost deterrent to new triathletes coming out to smaller races. It's just not tenable in the long term unless testing becomes a) more effective and b) more cost efficient. I don't like dopers, but I'm not going to go to the mat over finding them at every race on the schedule. It's not possible. If some jerk is going to bring his low-T hormones or mexican EPO to the start line against me at a local-yocal race...whatever. You win the playground, you elementary school asshole.

The major championships above are an entirely different matter and I'd like the respective governing bodies to make at least minimum effort to catch the most blatant cheaters out there. Per the Icarus doc, there are plenty of holes in this approach. I don't think we'll catch the most sophisticated folks and certainly not all of them. But it would deter most and catch a few. That's better than putting on the blinders, effectively sanctioning rampant doping.

Yeah, I think they were just looking at some random segment and the "100W increase!" was a nice little sound bite. Had nothing to do with FTP as I recall.

Yep. During that segment, they were reviewing a ride, presumably pre-doped vs doped-- it was a sound bite, nothing else. The only indicative statement was a "20% increase in power," which is still impressive.

The Russian lab director was a fascinating character. I kinda think he was just trying to grab some cash from Brian early on-- he knew this amateur event either wouldn't test, or he wouldn't last until it mattered. Turned out to be his ticket out of Russia. Still can't quite figure him out. Had me on the edge of my seat the whole time.

There are quite a few examples of people who have fallen out of Putin's favour mysteriously dying.

Here is an incomplete list. http://uk.businessinsider.com/...assassinating-2016-3


I have no doubt the KGB was tracking him, and the US authorities think that is credible enough to put him in witness protection. At the very least, he would be rotting in a Russian jail if he stayed in Russia.

that he got the KGB to engineer an entire bottle-swapping scheme straight out of Q's lab, right under the officials' noses, was jaw dropping. Through that whole scene I'm thinking no way. But then came the forensics on the lids.

I liked the 1984 bit too. It did go a way to explain Rodchenkov's two-track morality.

"As Putin seethes over Olympic ban, doping whistleblower fears for his life"

https://www.yahoo.com/...-life-100019751.html

Are you speaking of the Rich Roll interview? Yes, I heard that too

I haven't seen Icarus yet, but once D'Kid lets me "borrow" her Netflix queue, I will

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

I dunno. Putin's alternative theory is entirely plausible...#blameBudweiser

“What are they doing with him there (in the US)?” Putin added.
“Are they giving him some kind of substances so that he says what’s required?”

https://twitter.com/...s/945795442910072832


There ya go

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

Finally got to see it yesterday, yes, it was all i expected

Towards the end though, in 2016, it would have been interesting to see what was going on with the doping investigation aligned with the election: WikiLeaks, Russian hackers, etc.

There have been thoughts that whatever Putin did to influence the election, was "revenge" for his athletes getting kicked out of Rio

"Oh, you think we're only fucking with the Olympics? Let me show you what we can do!!! Boys! HIT 'EM!!!"

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin