I think people are being a bit old school with this sort of speculation. With Lance and JB's resources, it is very unlikely that they're using any sort of 'traditional' methods of doping (traditional as in stuff that has been around for more than 5 years).

Google 'designer steroids' and 'SARMS' for some interesting reading. The science of doping is still advancing at a very rapid rate, and you can be sure that Lance and JB are going to make sure they stay on the cutting edge.

It's not their resources that I'd consider. It's the resources of guys like Thomas Wiesel that make this REALLY believable.

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

Trust me, my head is not in the sand here. I never once said I believe that Lance never used drugs. I just said that here needs to be some concrete evidence to what Landis said. If there is then fine, Lanced et al doped. If not then there is not much to hang your hat on. Landis' word is pretty tarnished right now and like it or not Lance's is not. One on one, Lance wins as he always seems to do.

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Heath Dotson
HD Coaching:Website |Twitter: 140 Characters or Less|Facebook:Follow us on Facebook

Excellent point.

Being off one year is enough to establish reasonable doubt.

A good friend of mine was a well known criminal defense lawyer in Canada. He told me that if you have to defend someone you know is guilty, you have to do a few things. First, stretch the trial as long as you can and second, come up with as many potential points of doubts, even if they are absolutely incredulous.

The reasons are that you keep planting doubt. You might raise 50 issues, each absolutely impossible but slowly people will get a sliver of reasonable doubt and be forced to acquit.

That is what I am seeing here and by watching Lance over the last 10 years or so. People are building up doubt despite overwhelming evidence because of character flaws in the witnesses, threat of lawsuits from the large team of Lance's lawyers, Lance's involvement with cancer research and the need of people to have heroes that are above everyone else.

If you are determined to believe Lance, you will find enough of the little slivers of doubt to give you comfort. If you look at the facts and look at Lance's relationship with Ferrari, the eye witness accounts of Andreu and many others, the constant threat of lawsuits, the false claims of being cleared of drug use by "winning" the case against SCA, the culture of cycling in Europe, the long history of drug use and the fact that almost all of his rivals have tested positive so he beat them while clean, it's just really stretching common sense.

"Landis specifically said that it was the 2002 TdS"

Really? I know that's how it's been reported in some places but it'sa not my read on this quopte at all:

"2002: I was instructed on how to use Testosterone patches by Johan Bruyneel during the During the Dauphine Libere in June, after which I flew on a helicopter with Mr Armstrong from the finish, I believe Grenoble, to San Mauritz Switzerland at which point I was personally handed a box of 2.5 mg patches in front of his wife who witnessed the exchange. About a week later, Dr Ferrari performed an extraction of half a liter of blood to be transfused back into me during the Tour de France. Mr Armstrong was not witness to the extraction but he and I had lengthy discussions about it on our training rides during which time he also explained to me the evolution of EPO testing and how transfusions were now necessary due to the inconvenience of the new test. He also divulged to me at that time that in the first year that the EPO test was used he had been told by Mr Ferrari, who had access to the new test, that he should not use EPO anymore but he did not believe Mr Farrari and continued to use it. He later, while winning the Tour de Swiss, the month before the Tour de France, tested positive for EPO at which point he and Mr Bruyneel flew to the UCI headquarters and made a financial agreement with Mr. Vrubrugen to keep the positive test hidden."

Is there more info I'm missing?

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"Are you sure we're going fast enough?" - Emil Zatopek

Don't forget the fact that samples of Lance's that were tested post facto once there was a urine test for EPO tested POSITIVE. That's what makes the UCI's "head in the sand" stance on this so absurd...

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

Don't have much to add but I thought this deserved to be quoted.

This raised an eyebrow for me, too, and is certainly the weakest link IMO.

Apparently if we have a conversation during 2010 it means what we talked about happened in 2010. I'm with you I don't get where the timeline is misplaced. He said he had a conversation in 2002, not that lance won the 2002 tds

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Ride Scoozy Electric Bicycles
http://www.RideScoozy.com

Don't forget the fact that samples of Lance's that were tested post facto once there was a urine test for EPO tested POSITIVE. That's what makes the UCI's "head in the sand" stance on this so absurd...

I missed a few points but really, was trying to say that Lance is dismissing this very casually and simply referring to Landis's credibility but he might be making a mistake. Lance wants this to go away because there are a lot of years where these incidents have been spread over but if people start putting them all together, it does create a lot of doubt.

That is why Lance will not sue, he does not want this drawn out in the U.S. When problems were happening in Europe, he could rely on the anti-French tone of his accusations, or the "they hate American winners" thread that he would cling to. If another American and former teammate starts making accusations and some of the older incidents that most Americans are not aware of surface, he will start having to defend himself.

If another rider/coach/trainer/doctor comes forward to corroborate Landis it will be devastating, particularly if that person doesn't have a particular axe to grind. Lance is hanging his hat on Landis's character but another witness may end that over used defense. With Landis naming so many and more to come, it is not looking great for him.

Damn - Propecia is banned. I guess when I make it to the pro ranks I will have to give up and let the bald spot run wild. (HaHa).

Actually, it's now off the banned list. Lund's case really exposed how absurd it was that finasteride was on the list in the first place, so they took it off (without much fanfare).

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

My reading on this is that Landis is relating a series of conversations in 2002 which refer to the 2001 TdS and TdF. Seems pretty obvious since the Dauphine Libere precedes the TdF. Landis' timeline holds up in this instance. Armstrong and UCI are both going to have to backtrack on their claims that Landis was wrong about his timeline (Oops, score one for Floyd).

"As Armstrong hinted at yesterday in his remarks, he had best seek some professional help."

Armstrong may well be right, but it wasn't that long ago that everyone said the same thing about Jose Canseco and his coming clean story.

The fact is that pretty much every outlandish accusation made by Canseco turned out to be pretty much right on the money.

A bit off topic, but triathlon/cycling needs to adopt polygraph testing, not more drug testing protocols.

Works in many other sports, including natural bodybuilding. Sure..lots of holes in the theories, but cost A LOT less, takes less time (immediate, actually) and the results are more accurate.

Wrong. Polygraph testing is bunk pseudoscience and is very, very easy to beat.

Dan, you're not only an ST poster, you're also a journalist. I'd expect a better analysis from you regarding this.

I also expected better analysis, or even powers of observing the obvious, from the baseball media in the 1990s, but they too were shocked (SHOCKED I tell you!!!) about the doping scandal, just as the cycling media is shocked and simultaneously and suspisciously non-inquisitive about scandals in cycling.

You see the comparisons I'm drawing.... not saying you've got your head in the sand, just an observation.

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Eric Reid AeroFit | Instagram Portfolio
Aerodynamic Retul Bike Fitting

“You are experiencing the criminal coverup of a foreign backed fascist hostile takeover of a mafia shakedown of an authoritarian religious slow motion coup. Persuade people to vote for Democracy.”

Didn't Lance say the same thing about LeMond? Or was it Frankie?

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

Two comments by Landis have stuck with me since he uttered them. As his initial defense, he said that he stood accused of being stupid. I know it was meant to imply he would have to be stupid to dope in the midst of the tour, but there's also the interpretation that he was smart enough to dope and not get caught.

The other came during his drawn out defense. Something along the lines of "Don't get in a fight with a crazy MF'er with nothing to lose." The fiasco with LeMond and some of his other reported antics support the crazy MF'er claim. His riding career appears to be over, so what's left to lose?

My feeling is that he was doping all along, screwed up and got caught by a group of screw ups in their own right. My interpretation of the lab results is that he should have walked, not because he was innocent but because the lab made errors. The pressure of the defense, etc took its toll and I really think we're left with a crazy MF'er who resents just about everyone involved with cycling and who knows a lot. I guess only time will tell if he can keep a lid on the crazy long enough for what he knows to be heard.

"I think you're assuming that the way positives ought to be (or are supposed to be) handled is the way they are handled. It wouldn't surprise me at all to find out that's not the case."

i think it's very possible that the system might have broken down. when a cop gives you a ticket, and you show up in court, if the cop doesn't show up in court then the case is dropped and you're free. that happens a lot. it's a breakdown in the system. my point is, can you count on the cop not showing up in court?

what i'm saying is, lance and johann not only had to hope the system broke down, they had to count on the system breaking down, otherwise lance is paying a substantial bribe on the freak chance that each of the several checks and balances breaks down.

now, maybe there is a way it would work. perhaps WADA got the notice of the adverse finding, but the name was not matched to it. likewise, perhaps the lab generated the adverse finding, but did not have access to the name of the athlete. so, for landis' accusation to be true, it seems to me three things would have to happen:

1. the UCI would have to be the testing authority for the adverse finding. for example, let's take the Tour of Calif. my guess is that USADA is the testing authority (only the IF and the anti-doping agencies can be testing authorities). that's a lot of people in the loop. if the UCI was the testing authority, then that takes one more entity out of the loop, and makes the secret easier to keep.

2. neither the lab not WADA could have known the athlete's name, rather, they would have been apprised of the positive, but, just with a code or number attached.

3. if both the above were true, then the UCI, if they took the bribe, needed to count on its ability to successfully tell WADA, "nothing to see here, move along, move along."

number 3 above is not at all out of the question. that routinely happens, because a lot of adverse findings are negated due to TUEs, explainable testosterone-to-epitestosterone ratios, and whatnot.

still, i think that's a big secret to keep, and, it's one thing for a positive for albuterol to result in no sanction, but i think WADA, and the lab who generated the positive, would raise eyebrows if, say, a positive for EPO did not result in any action.

finally, all these records are still available, i would think. if there was a positive test generated in, say, the 2002 tour de suisse, then, how was that adjudicated? i don't see why you couldn't know the answer to that by tomorrow afternoon.

so i do think, on balance, knowing something of how this system works, that the ducks would have to line up pretty neatly, and while it's possible that landis' version is accurate, i think landis not only has his credibility problem, there is just a nuts-and-bolts problem with this particular charge.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Steve, I don't know what his motive really is either, but does that matter? Let me take that one step further: does it really matter as long as what he is saying is true? Whether he's had an epiphany about cheating in sports, bitter that his life has largely been ruined by doping and others continue to succeed while guilty of the same acts, drawing attention to himself, whatever his motive may be is secondary if some of the true story comes out.

Whistle blowers are often bitter ex-employees. States witnesses are often saving their own hides. Having an ax to grind doesn't make the story untrue.

Most athletes who test positive keep their mouths shut, do their time, and are welcomed back into the brotherhood. Welcomed back because they keep their mouths shut.

 


Or, one person in a pivotal role throws another rider to the wolves by assigning the adverse result to the wrong person. The lab isn't supposed to know the identity of the test subject, to the best of my knowledge.

I don't know how hard it would be to conspire at this level. There are a lot of hand written documents for the express purpose of preventing it. As hard as it may be, I'm still amazed at the level of conspiracy and fraud people are able to carry out.

Paranoid as Landis might be, his results were released prematurely to beat the lab from leaking it to L'Equipe.

I have often asked myself what the true cost to the cycling world would be if Lance was found to be guilty. What I find ironic is that Lance being found guilty would be terrible for his rivals. The amount of money Lance has brought into the sport as a result of opening the doors to the American market is amazing. This money flows to all (pro riders on other teams, other team managers, cycling unions etc). I ask this question...would it be better for all if his guilt remained hidden. Conspiracy I know...but a damn good one.


P.S. I know LeMond was the first to open up cycling to the American market - but nowhere near the levels Lance has done. Too bad, because I truly because LeMond to be a genuine guy.

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Adrian in Vancouver

"really, so would the lab, presumably, because the lab would know that its positive test is being hushed."
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Does the lab really know who any given test result belongs to? If they do, I would think that it would be a major chain of custody flaw. If they don't, would they be able (or care) to track some random positive that could belong to almost anyone at any level of the sport?

Haim

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"Sometimes you need to think INSIDE the box!" -- ME
"Why squirrel hate me?"