Are you also incapable of understanding the different magnitudes of traffic offenses? Do you think 5 mph over the speed limit is just as bad as 40 mph over in a school zone? Do you consider speeding an offense as great as drunk driving or vehicular homicide?

I'm sorry you don't understand shades of grey. It's a basic concept that helps one not fail at life.

He's not a pro cyclist anymore and obviously doesn't train like one with a 27min swim and a 1:19 run ... SO, i'm sure w/kilo is not what it was when he had a syringe in his ass and a testosterone patch in his arm pit. Maybe we shouldn't compare Colom the pro cyclist to Colom the Professional Age Group Triathlete

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Dave Latourette
http://www.TTENation.com

I understand what you are saying, but breaking a rule by going a few miles over the speed limit is different than breaking a rule that gives you a competitive advantage in an athletic competition.

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team website: http://snappletriteam.com/

team blog: http://snappletriteam.com/?page_id=10

The failure in your speeding analogy in this case is that the argument for a lifetime ban is generally predicated around emerging (though by no means definitive) research that suggests that the benefits of doping are, to a certain extent, permanent. That's not analogous to speeding in your car.

This is precisely why I think the ban for things that are only banned in-competition (and where there is no long term benefit - like stimulants) should be less than for something where the effects may be much longer lasting.

I don't subscribe to the view that doping is somehow so morally reprehensible that it deserves a lifetime ban. I subscribe to the view that a permanent, ill-gotten advantage is simply not fair to other athletes. Michael Vick's dog-fighting did not do anything to improve his passer rating. Of course, if it did, he probably would never have been banned in the first place...

I think it's very hard to analogize doping to anything other than a crime where there is a residual benefit. The best analogy for doping that i can think of is in finance. You look at something like the mortgage fraud of the part of the Aughts. If you make $50B through shady business practices and the justice department fines you $5B, well, that's a pretty clear net benefit to the bank. Doping is the same way.

So the question is, how big does the deterrent need to be in order to remove that net benefit. WADA has already decided that a 2-year ban was insufficient, and they are moving to a 4-year ban on Jan 1, 2015. The question is, really, is a 4-year ban even sufficient to remove any net benefit. And the answer is not clearly yes. It may be that only permanent banning will work, at least for some offenses. Michael Milken's crimes, but also his knowledge, residual wealth, and influence all led the SEC to decide that he required a lifetime ban from securities trading. That's the same argument that I think is applicable in certain doping cases. I think it was clear Milken could never be "just another trader" ever again. It's not clear that someone can be "just another athlete" ever again, but there are signs pointing that way (in certain cases).

THAT is the argument against second chances. IMO, anyway...

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

To Dan Stubleski, I thought the physical confrontation on stage was inappropriate and disrespectful to a whole lot of people other than Colom.

______

Uh what happened?

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@brooksdoughtie
USAT-L2,Y&J; USAC-L2
http://www.aomultisport.com

Agreed. The fact is he has more natural cycling talent than just about any AG triathlete....in the world. You don't get to the level he did without being a huge talent. Not a lot of age group triathletes got to his level.

The fact is the best/fastest triathletes on the bike with a very few exceptions would be lucky to find themselves as a low (slow) man on the totem pole for a Pro Continental team. They just aren't that talented as cyclists.

I made a list in an earlier post of pro triathletes that have pro tour level ftp's. I'll redo it, start list now:

List over.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Maybe so, BUT, he did it in a sport that everyone was doing it and everyone is still doing it today. Who did he have a competitive edge over? In cycling EPO wasn't advantage to the everyday pro's. It was job security. It was only an advantage to those who had a legitimate shot at winning.

You can call me what you want, but I say until he's actually caught cheating in AG or Pro triathlon racing, it's not fair to judge or speculate.

the guy who wanted to race clean and found there was no place for him in the sport. The guy he had an advantage over quit cycling because he wasn't willing to dope. The guy he had an advantage over never even got to be on the starting line.

If you want to read a good article along these lines, read this by the Canadian MTBer who Ryder Hesjedahl beat out for the Olympic team: http://www.cyclingnews.com/...ls-doping-confession

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

He doped. He cheated. He's done. Bye.

Slowtwitch loves gossip...

When Colom went on stage, Dan gave him an earful during the awards presentation. I didn't hear what was said (I was close to the stage, but not that close, and there was a huge PA system going...). Once Colom got his award and stood next to Dan, Dan basically turned 90deg and faced him and was speaking directly to him (Colom did not acknowledge him and continued to face the crowd). When their AG presentation was done, Colom went to go off the stage, and Dan kind of half-blocked his way and half-body checked him. If it was a basketball game, Dan would have been called for a "moving pick."

I do not know if Colom said anything back to Dan at any point. Nothing beyond that. I thought it was unfortunate, because, honestly, Dan looked a bit the bully. I thought Sam Gyde's "Dopers Suck" statement was much more appropriate.

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

 

>Look at the head coach of the Louisville Cardinals football team. He was definitely given one and is making good of it. Michael Vick is another. Just because someone did something bad once doesn't mean they are garbage for life.
>is a rule.


If Bobby Petrino and Michael Vick are your poster children, your argument is walk-jogging its way meekly toward the finish line. :)

I never said I was. I do this for fun and for the exercise. Now the fun is getting suck right out of it. I will shut my mouth and not care any more. If that is the way you want it.

>Maybe so, BUT, he did it in a sport that everyone was doing it and everyone is still doing it today.

>it's not fair to judge or speculate.

I'm not sure how you reconcile these two claims. That vast majority of pro cyclists have never tested positive for anything, and you judge/speculate that every single one of them is a doper. Then you say it's not fair to do the same to an admitted doper? (he didn't just test positive, but admitted to EPO use).

Yeah that's a bit unfortunate, emotions get the best of people at times.

*And no I wasn't asking to start gossip. Just asking for more clarification, since it was acknowledged by yourself 1st hand.*

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@brooksdoughtie
USAT-L2,Y&J; USAC-L2
http://www.aomultisport.com

Aren't you speculating just a little, Jordan? Do we have a list of all these guys that quit or decided not to race in pro cycling?

Every year I see a Le' TDF thread and discussion thread on here. In those threads you'll see the same guys chatting it up that are the biggest anti doper advocates on ST, but for some reason those 3 weeks in a July are ok when we know they peloton is still juiced to the gills.

I don't advocate doping, but I do advocate against the no one deserves a second chance. A lot of those pro cyclist were young and got caught up in the EPO circus. If they join our sport to get away from the madness that is pro cycling because they want to race clean, I'm not going to take the high horse route. We have all done things we wish we could go back and do over. That's just how I am. I respect your views and where you stand,

Colom cheating in cycling gave him a competitive advantage over every single person in cycling that didn't violate the rules on performance enhancing drugs. Saying that everybody was doing it is only true if the only people who are included in "everybody" are those that were using PEDs.

That being said, I'm not speculating as to what Colom is doing or not doing now. The only point of my post was that violating a rule on a speed limit is not the same as violating a rule that is designed to create a fair competition.

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team website: http://snappletriteam.com/

team blog: http://snappletriteam.com/?page_id=10

Yes, he is.

This is a very good analogy.

Have you seen the hematocrit levels of pro cyclist? They are all right at the legal limit. You don't get to that level on training alone. Not to mention that even people like Lemond to this day say the sport will never be clean. The sport would degrees. No one wants to see the riders going slower. No one would ever watch it anymore.

Can you legitimately tell me you believe pro cycling is a clean sport now regardless of no one failing drug tests? How many tests did Hincappi/LA pass?

No one wants to see the riders going slower. No one would ever watch it anymore.

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I don't think anyone would even be able to tell a difference if the avg. speed dropped by 2 mph or say runners were 18s/mi slower. They would still be far and away "better" than anything mere mortals can do. The quality of racing would not suffer.

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@brooksdoughtie
USAT-L2,Y&J; USAC-L2
http://www.aomultisport.com

While I agree Sam Gyde's statement was more appropriate, or at least more my style, I respect Dan for not allowing Omertà to become our sports norm.

And WTF is Colom racing AG? That's equally pathetic. I would get it if he was older, not competitive and putting a few beers back but clearly he's racing competitively.

Thankfully Lisa H didn't get a sniff of podium!

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@rhyspencer

They called the top 10 pros up on stage. Lisa H was top 10 so she went up.

I tend to agree with Jordan that a statement along the lines of Sam Gyde would be better. Don't worrry, Sam will be in Kona and I fully expect, that the entire Doper Suck clothing will take off like hot cakes just like the Realstarky clothing. Then Sam can get the ENTIRE 35-39 podium in Kona to wear the clothing...Hey I have a job and business opp for Realstarky.....license the "dopers suck" logo and trademark from Sam Gyde and sell it at Kona at Lava Java. Then use the proceeds to up the prize money for the 7th place pro who hopefully is a non doper, unlike today's women's 7th place pro, who as we know is none other than Lisa H

Your comments clearly show that you are not qualified to lecture.
As you lack basic understanding of what was actually stated.

Speculations, such as what FTP Colom may have rode at, how he got there and what that means.... apparently are all your specialty.

I do know, that if you are able to ride at a significant higher FTP (you may like that) and finish that far ahead in a Tri (compared to other ex-pro cyclists who gave Tri a try),that this fact is remarkable (given his history).
And I know a little bit (unfortunately) about how one can get to be that kind of "outlier" (you will like that) the artificial way even without EPO .

No more no less....

So, NO, I have no proof, and neither do you.

>Have you seen the hematocrit levels of pro cyclist? They are all right at the legal limit.

A pro cyclist or all pro cyclists? Just Chris Horner's since he's released his publicly. His is apparently fairly mundane, excepting some anomalies that experts argue over (which I'm not an expert). I haven't seen any other cyclists release their data. Are you aware of other publicly released data? Or do you have private access to all pro cyclists passport files? If you do, I'll just have to accept your argument as-is since you'd be undoubtedly barred from releasing details of those files without athlete consent.

Here's Horner's data. His hematocrit is right in line with the average for men. Maybe you can see other Bad Things in there. I'd have to go read a lot of Wikipedia articles before acting like an expert on the data.


>Can you legitimately tell me you believe pro cycling is a clean sport now regardless of no one failing drug tests? How many tests did Hincappi/LA pass?

I've made no claims of any sport being clean. I'm just asking for consistency in *your* argument. You can't ask us to give Colom the benefit of the doubt for possibly being a clean second-chancer while not yourself giving the benefit of doubt to athletes with pristine public records. Say Taylor Phinney and Van Garderen, for example, who you've just effectively accused of being dopers without having really provided a rational basis for arriving at that conclusion, other than participating in a sport that's been rife with doping, and may still be.

But if you took growth hormones and your feet are now US11 and you were US9 before (happened to many pro cyclists) and your hands became huge... it doesn't go away ! Now these are easy things to see if you pay attention, harder to see is how much muscles the "so called athlete" which I would call the "bastard" developped ??? It's not just the hands and feet, these are just easier to spot, but it is true for the muscles too !

And then there is of course all the training and adaptation that wouldn't have been possible without doping !

Jordan pointed you to a study that shows long term effect of doping, I've seen another I'll find the reference and post again later today but I'm sure if scientists look they will find more evidence.