And triathlon forums, too for that matter.

As for your other points of people not speaking out



I would like to think I would have stood up and exposed the sordid details, but that's subjunctive, and we can posit all we want about coulda woulda shoulda. Fact of matter is that life was already hard enough not to cheat, and to expose others means doing so at great risks to your own reputation and financial stability. You may think you will have the swagger to confront rampant cheating, but if you've seen what has already happened to those (e.g. Andreus, Walsh, and Lemond) who confronted the cheats, would you be so brave?



This demeans the careers of those who eschewed cheating and PED. Names such as Gilles Delion and Tim Johnson. You want your arguments to be taken seriously then cut out the hyperboles.

I'm not familiar with Deloin or Johnson but if they stood up they have my admiration.

I'm very aware of what happened to Emma O'Reilly, Betsy Andreu, Walsh, Lemond and others, that is why I get angry.

From somebody who doesn't really follow cycling: Is there reason to believe the TUE isn't legit? If not, then who cares?


cliff notes on that?

tour de france climb
froome was hungry
rules said no more feeds at that point in the race
porte went and got froome some food anyway
froome penalized a few seconds

Seen by almost all people in cycling as no big deal.
But then if you are trying to convince people you aren't doping, you might not commit intentional fouls.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

If they want us to trust that they are not breaking rules that we cannot see, maybe they should stop gleefully breaking rules that we can see?

They clearly stated after the feed incident that the they balanced the risk of Froome bonking and loosing lots of time against the small penalty they thought they would receive for breaking the rules. Clearly their thought is that rules should be broken if the upside is big enough and the consequence is small enough, not that the rules should not be broken. So whether they are doping or not is probably based on the their belief of the upside of performance versus the chance of being caught and seen as dopers.

Right.

Though we would not suspect a basketball team of doing steroids for intentionally fouling the center when he gets the ball close to the rim.

So I dunno.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

Just throwing some numbers around.

Let's say 25 riders. 3, maybe 4 bikes per rider. (Training, racing, TT and backup racing for at least some of them.)

Let's call that 80 bikes.

Say, half price on SRM's if they are buying them or about $2,000 each for D/A SRM's with PC7's.

That's $160,000.

That isn't chump change. Especially if Stages was not only give them free power meters, but paying on top of that. It could have been a net gain of over a quarter of a million dollars..

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Kevin

http://kevinmetcalfe.dreamhosters.com
My Strava

That is actually the perfect analogy. That or a brush back pitch in baseball.

Getting penalized for feeds when feeding is closed has been going on since I've been following cycling, which is over 30 years now. Sky did not come up with this. I've seen Indurain do it.

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Kevin

http://kevinmetcalfe.dreamhosters.com
My Strava

Not quite perfect. I think one difference is that an intentional foul is designed to actually get the penalty. The foul is committed in hopes of a penalty. Nobody is trying to get away with anything. The gamble is not whether you might get penalized, it's whether they're less likely to score from the line (and perhaps to regain possession faster). Further, the intentional foul is considered by everyone, players, refs and fans to be a legitimate part of the game. There's absolutely nothing underhanding or sneaky about it.

The gamble in taking an illegal feed in a race is whether or not you'll get caught. Still on a different level than doping, but not the equivalent of an intentional foul in basketball.

I'm going to have to disagree. The yellow jersey in the Tour de France is never going to get away with something like that in the last 20km on Alpe d'Huez. Everybody knows that. What you are doing is trading a time penalty for an illegal feed for a much bigger time penalty for bonking on a mountain stage. Take the 20 second penalty in order to avoid losing 3 minutes.

BTW, also implicit in the basketball intentional foul is that you are likely trading the at worst possibility of your opponent making both foul shots against what you are presuming is the sure chance of scoring 2 when they are up close. So the worst case is that they still get the 2 points, but more likely than not they don't and you come out ahead on points by fouling.

In either case, somebody is purposely breaking the rules ("cheating") because even the outcome of getting caught is better than the outcome of not doing it.

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Kevin

http://kevinmetcalfe.dreamhosters.com
My Strava

You are supposed to use a yellow jersey provided by the tour, not your own.

Sky got away with using their own. Sort of semi-shady maybe, as I think they got permission, but maybe a lesser team would not have gotten permission.

Oh, I don't think anyone bought them other than for price and simplicity. Having a pro team sponsored by them, just give some legitimacy I suppose.

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TrainingBible Coaching
http://www.trainingbible.com

Whenever you point out to anyone in the UK the fact Stages must be less accurate than a complete power meter, the usual retort is 'it's good enough for Sky so,it's good enough for me'

The difference between top elites is small. The gains from doping are large. With ineffective doping enforcement, a governing body actively helping riders break the rules, and a sport with history of endemic dope use, doping is the price of admission. Pointing out some poor saps who were not willing to do what is necessary to succeed in their profession does not change that. It is a shitty situation. It was not the riders fault. They just did what they had to do, and if any one of them decided not to then there was a thousand riders with a more realistic view of the sport who were willing to take their spot. Point out someone contending for major wins in the EPO era who was not doping. The top ten list of every GT tells the tale; the Tour's is bad enough but the Vuelta and Giro's lists are a joke.

I would take that to the top half, at the very least presently and 98% in years past.

And I would say the samething for pro Track, and Tri's....

Don't look behind the door you may not like what you see.