I'm dreading the Men's 100m Final in Rio, if he gets on the podium (or god forbid wins it) it will just be a slap in the face of everyone watching. What does that say about the state of the sport?!

So, it looks like Tom D. tested positive for synthetic testosterone in an OOC test from July 9th. He'll have to miss the Tour of Utah while they sort things out.

He also issued a very unequivocal denial on Twitter:

"Tonight has been one of the worst nights of my life. While I was eating dinner with my team the night before Tour of Utah I received a call For USADA notifying me that a out of competition test I gave July 9th has tested positive for, from what I understand, synthetic testosterone. I have not taken this or any other banned substance.
I spoke with them and my team and I will have to sit out the Tour of Utah as I wait for the B sample as well as look into All the possible ways that could have produced this result. I would never ever take anything like this especially after everything I have gone through the last years. This makes absolutely no sense. I will now, as I wait for the B test, have the supplements I take, tested to see if this is what caused it. I feel incredibly hurt, frustrated, and angry by this. I don't understand how or why this happened and still can't even accept this is true. I love cycling. I love it so fucking much. I love the races, the rides, the people, the businesses, I love it all. Nothing compares for me."

Interesting situation. It will be intriguing to see how it all unfolds.

I thought the final version of that story was that Floyd was doing blood bags during the TdF, not testosterone, but that his doctor cocked up and gave him a blood bag which had been extracted during a training camp in which he was dosed up on testosterone as well? So he got the double whammy of a load of fresh blood AND a big dose of testosterone. Which would certainly go some way towards explaining his performance that day!

This is called doing a 'Vino'

Floyd had him amazing day because he kept dumping water bottles on himself. Everyone now knows that dumping water on yourself is a proven performance enhancer.....

OK, complete sidetrack on the TD discussion, but I said from day one that this was an overlooked reason that helped Flandis stay away.

No, not the actual dumping of water, but the continual calling up of the team car to get more bottles, etc. Each bottle was a "sticky bottle", which in essence was the same as having a guy to draft behind for a brief moment. It was like having a teammate to help him.

He clearly couldn't have consumed that much water, so they came up with the idea of dumping it over him, whcih allowed him to keep getting more bottles. It really was a brilliant strategy.

(an no, I am not saying that is the only reason Flandis stayed away....just that it definitely helped him manage his energy that day)

Nope. Landis still adamantly denies using testosterone during that Tour.

The whole Cannondale-Garmin team has pulled out of the race. While it might seem like a good PR move to JV, this further damages the Tour of Utah.
.

Link?

OK, complete sidetrack on the TD discussion, but I said from day one that this was an overlooked reason that helped Flandis stay away.

No, not the actual dumping of water, but the continual calling up of the team car to get more bottles, etc. Each bottle was a "sticky bottle", which in essence was the same as having a guy to draft behind for a brief moment. It was like having a teammate to help him.

He clearly couldn't have consumed that much water, so they came up with the idea of dumping it over him, whcih allowed him to keep getting more bottles. It really was a brilliant strategy.

(an no, I am not saying that is the only reason Flandis stayed away....just that it definitely helped him manage his energy that day)

i like danielson's wikipedia page:

Born in East Lyme, Connecticut, Danielson currently resides in Boulder, Colorado, with his wife, Stephanie, and their children, Steven (b. 2010) and Stella (b. 2012).[2][35][36] After spending his childhood years in Connecticut, Danielson attended Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado.[36] Danielson considers both Boulder and Durango as his home towns. In addition to being married, Danielson has a girlfriend named Kourtney Compton, whom he met in Utah where she was working as a podium girl at the Tour of Utah.[36] It also appears he has doped... again.

not saying that the sticky bottle didn't help, but cold water really helps on a hot day.

i remember doing my first cat 3 race with two ice socks down my back, and it must have looked ridiculous. The race was only 45 min, and it was in the high 80s with heat index in the mid 90s. I felt surprisingly fresh the whole race and ended up breaking away from quite a few riders with a better resume and got 2nd.

People often talk about losing watts in the summer heat, but i've found a properly soaked cold jersey + ice sock means no loss in power.

What is an ice sock?

It's quite interesting how 'doping' as a topic of discussion has become quite normal and almost 'every day' Dan? I'm thinking, we've got threads like the ITU discussion thread where people go to specifically talk all things ITU. Is it getting to the stage we need a Doping thread? I don't mean that to suggest to stop these types of threads as they'll always happen - and I see no reason why they shouldn't to be honest. But I wonder if a PED thread may serve to both give us an opportunity to openly discuss/debate the whys and wheres etc, but also be quite a good resource? Realise it could potentially be a nightmare to moderate, would just need to state rules at the outset, kinda like your 'about this forum' thread.

Just a thought....