Anti-doping scientist questions the tour has become cleaner (interview)

[DirtyWorks]

...mproved training can't account for the level of increase in supposedly clean performanced?

That is the message from more than one trained persons observing the event/cycling.

This anonymous w@nker most agrees.

 

[buckle]

The interview was fine because of its innate humility/vagueness. This guy doesn't have all the answers and expresses his own uncertainty and confusion. Works for me. Science is only 50% of the answer to the doping problem. The rest is morality - it's wrong to cheat.

 

[Benotti69]

various questions but no conclusions.....................?

now I have a question..................if training at altitude affects values for biopassport how come it has no impact on future performance?

the placebo effect is mentioned obviously if riders believe training at altitude is advantagous then they are gaining psychologically

Mark L

training at altitude works 2 ways. It explains blood value anomalies and provides and opportunity to dope. There are big gains to be made by altitude training.

 

[el_angliru]

I didn't think the interview was that great or inciteful. Quite a lot of the interviewer trying to put words into the guy's mouth.

Perhaps something is lost in the translation. My English isn't the best. And some things are lost by not having the video (Froome's tweets were shown on screen, for instance, and there was some introductury remarks from the host in the studio, which I've left out). Anyway, I agree that there perhaps isn't too much insight but we can't really expect him to deliver any smoking guns. It's not his job to call out names. What's interesting IMO, is that he's actually saying what a lot of the sceptics in The Clinic have been saying for a long time. But it's remarkable that this is coming from a "real" anti-doping scientist (no offense to the skeptics of The Clinic ).

In fact he actually says that altitude training is useful for mountain finishes.

Carsten Lundby has counducted some extensive studies on altitude training with real elite athletes. And I'm sure he's referring to his own studies. And I don't think his conclusion is that altitude training would work for a mountain top finish. It's more like altitude training would possibly work for an event at high altitude, for instance Worlds or Olympics in Mexico City or Bogota. Altitude training for Tour de France doesn't work the same way because you're at altitude a long time before the Tour starts, and you'e spending most of the time in between at low altitude anyway. So the effect of the altitude training is lost (MTF or not). That's my understanding (without having read Lundby's or any other recent papers on the issue).

The most interesting thing he said was that he thinks there has been no improvement in training methods since the EPO era. Is this true? I don't know. Or did he mean that improved training can't account for the level of increase in supposedly clean performanced?

I think he means improved training can only account for a very, very small fraction of the improvements you could otherwise obtain by doping. He was vey dismissive about this (he used the Danish word "vås", which I translated as nonsense. Perhaps rubbish would be a better tanslation).

Finally, I have to stress that Carsten Lundby is no "average Joe". He has published several scientific papers and studies, for instance these, available in full text without registering:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1111/j.1476-5381.2011.01822.x/
http://jap.physiology.org/content/105/2/417

 

[King Boonen]

The alps is easy to reach from many major European cities though isn't it. Tenerife is not.

You should probably check flight schedules. Tenerife is easy to reach from many more locations than the Alps are.

 

[roundabout]

Yeah, I'd probably hide out in St. Moritz if I was up to no good.

Oh, wait.

That's been done.

 

[King Boonen]

If you really want to hide make friends with Quintana and Uran.

 

[Le breton]

Would be great to hear more from Cartsen Lundby now because the quoted interview was too early in that Tour.

Why.
The guy is a fool.
He didn't even notice that performances, watts/kg on climbs, have been dropping.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Testers are not doctors, they don't travel in packs and they don't wear distinguishing clothing. They don't get off the plane in white coats with stethascopes round their necks. Please explain how any team will be able to monitor a conservative estimate of 8,220 people a day?

Answer, they can't. They don't know the testers, they're not given a list with photos by the UCI and ADOs. You are talking utter rubbish.

Until someone has been to the island and traveled to the hotel, when the pro teams are there, it's conjecture either way, IMO.

I don't think one person's opinion should necessarily be ridiculed in favour of another's.

As an example: how many of those tourists are flying in at 4-5am and traveling directly to the hotel by 6am to meet the whereabouts hours of most riders?

Given you cannot usually check in until 10am, any tourist arriving that early to the island would be doing something else in the morning to soak up some time. Conjecture again, but I have traveled overseas and that has been my experience.

Even if they arrive a day early and stay elsewhere, they have to travel to the hotel at an ungodly hour. The car will stand out like the proverbial.

I agree on the whole stethoscopes and sample tubes dangling around the necks thing, but there are clearly advantages going to Tenerife beyond good weather and roads.

Further, if there are so many tourists day in day out on that tiny island, how is it a good training ground - surely there'd be copious quantities of traffic and cars getting in the way of the cyclists? Clearly not the case, so perhaps they stay near the beaches, with only the occasional visit to what is essentially a barren, unaesthetic location on top of the volcano. From a tourist perspective, I mean.

 

[claveyrolat]

Well you can go to wikipedia and divide the number of visitors by 365, make the testers wear a sthetoscope or call me names but it doesnt change the fact that on an island, the testers are gonna be spotted, and it will give the dopers enough time to deal with it.

It happened in Jamaica, and i am sure it happens in Tenerife.
On an island everybody is the cousin of my cousin!

Go to Tenerife and tell me if nobody spots you before you talk to Chris Froome!!!

 

[buckle]

Why Tenerife? Because it is an island.
Why an island? Because everybody knows everybody.


I read (can't find the old link) about the track and fields team in Jamaica. Why did they all train there, rarely going out, always preparing in their homeland before big events?

Well, that's (partly) because when half a dozen white guys with medical stuff land at the airport, 5mns later the whole bloody island knows about it !!!

It might surprise some of you, but if you have ever lived on an island you know what i am talking about.


Same goes with Tenerife. There is one aiport.
You just need to know a couple of guys there, with photos of the anti-doping crew (just in case they dont stand out and try to camouflage)

Sorry about the triviality of my post, but i just felt that sometimes trying to find some elaborate answers makes you forget simple common sense.

Sorry for the troll but there are at least two major international airports in Tenerife. Anybody arriving by chance would not be noticed as millions visit the island each year. The will and possibly the means to catch dopers is not there and never will be. In cycling, the rate of return for catching people is ridiculously low.

On a similar theme and earlier this month, FIFA celebrated its own failed processes at the soccer World Cup. These sports and their respective products are simply "too big to fail" in the language 'de nos jours'.

 

[McLovin]

I mean you have altitude training in the alps.

Not between October and June.
My question is: how they take the doping substances there? The reasonable answer is: by plane. But do they take that risk?
1. They can be busted at check in.
2. They can lose a bag full of doping products with Sky/Astana etc. name on it.

I found hard to believe that they go 1300 km from Spain with a dinghy just to deliver a bag of drugs.
This interview doesn't bring anything IMO. Just some randm guy's suspicions.

 

[poupou]

Well you can go to wikipedia and divide the number of visitors by 365, make the testers wear a sthetoscope or call me names but it doesnt change the fact that on an island, the testers are gonna be spotted, and it will give the dopers enough time to deal with it.

It happened in Jamaica, and i am sure it happens in Tenerife.
On an island everybody is the cousin of my cousin!

Go to Tenerife and tell me if nobody spots you before you talk to Chris Froome!!!

They can cross list of passengers and WADA accredited testers, that would need a bit of cash to people working at police airport or in flying compagnies.

 

[melkemugg]

Not between October and June.
My question is: how they take the doping substances there? The reasonable answer is: by plane. But do they take that risk?
1. They can be busted at check in.
2. They can lose a bag full of doping products with Sky/Astana etc. name on it.

I found hard to believe that they go 1300 km from Spain with a dinghy just to deliver a bag of drugs.
This interview doesn't bring anything IMO. Just some randm guy's suspicions.

Why do people think they still do blood bags and bags of pills? Just do some extra puffs from your inhaler and your good to go.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Not between October and June.
My question is: how they take the doping substances there? The reasonable answer is: by plane. But do they take that risk?
1. They can be busted at check in.
2. They can lose a bag full of doping products with Sky/Astana etc. name on it.

I found hard to believe that they go 1300 km from Spain with a dinghy just to deliver a bag of drugs.
This interview doesn't bring anything IMO. Just some randm guy's suspicions.

You know Fuentes and his family lives there, yeah?

Armstrong and friends were buying or receiving EPO from Ferrari on Mt Teide, so the process of getting the drugs onto the island is a non-issue.

 

[sittingbison]

Moving the Tenetife talk to the Tenerife thread. Keep it there

Cheers
Bison

 

[Master50]

What I found interesting was his speculation about the doping method. If blood manipulation has been turned down because of the bio passport the 50% limit etc. then what are they taking to get the same boost as the early EPO days? IE blood boosting cannot account for performance increases like 1999.
If the current performances are doped there must be something new going on besides blood manipulation.
Of course there are other experts saying the w/kg numbers are within normal limits for pro cyclists?
This goes to the heart of every discussion on every rider currently being accused of doping in the clinic.

 

[red_flanders]

What I found interesting was his speculation about the doping method. If blood manipulation has been turned down because of the bio passport the 50% limit etc. then what are they taking to get the same boost as the early EPO days? IE blood boosting cannot account for performance increases like 1999.
If the current performances are doped there must be something new going on besides blood manipulation.
Of course there are other experts saying the w/kg numbers are within normal limits for pro cyclists?
This goes to the heart of every discussion on every rider currently being accused of doping in the clinic.

Wasn't the limit started in 1998?

Regardless, if they get a boost like riders did from 2000 on, that was one hell of a boost. I fail to see your point.

Riders can be and almost certainly are manipulating blood now, just doing it differently than they were before the passport. Plenty of riders have commented to that effect.

 

[neineinei]

Michael Rasmussen had a dig at the bio passport this week.

He says that in stead of draining 1 liter of blood one day you can drain 250 ml every five or six days over 3 weeks, and the bio passport system will not be able to detect it. Anti Doping Denmark says he is right.

http://jyllands-posten.dk/sport/cyk.../kyllingen-rytterne-kan-sagtens-vaere-dopede/
http://ekstrabladet.dk/sport/cykling/article4937556.ece

He also claimed there are no tests for insulin and IGF-1, but Anti Doping Denmark says this is wrong. They have testing procedures for insulin and IGF-1 since half a year ago.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

50% Hct rule was introduced in 1997.

As for

IE blood boosting cannot account for performance increases like 1999.

The Italian OC paid Conconi to study EPO and its effect on riders - in an attempt to come up with a way of detecting EPO doping. Ferrari was a student of Conconi.

The boost from 1999 onwards was very finely tuned Hgh / test usage, coupled with EPO and blood transfusions.

If your Hct starts at 42, 49.8% Hct is a massive boost.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Michael Rasmussen had a dig at the bio passport this week.

He says that in stead of draining 1 liter of blood one day you can drain 250 ml every five or six days over 3 weeks, and the bio passport system will not be able to detect it. Anti Doping Denmark says he is right.

http://jyllands-posten.dk/sport/cyk.../kyllingen-rytterne-kan-sagtens-vaere-dopede/
http://ekstrabladet.dk/sport/cykling/article4937556.ece

He also claimed there are no tests for insulin and IGF-1, but Anti Doping Denmark says this is wrong. They have testing procedures for insulin and IGF-1 since half a year ago.

So I take it you can reinfuse 250ml as well then? If the BP can't detect it going out, it can't detect it going back in, right?

ETA: thank you very much for the links!!

 

[thehog]

Why.
The guy is a fool.
He didn't even notice that performances, watts/kg on climbs, have been dropping.

They've been dropping?

That's news! Or was that from Sky/JV/Walsh doctrine of clean cycling?

 

[Tonton]

Not between October and June.
My question is: how they take the doping substances there? I found hard to believe that they go 1300 km from Spain with a dinghy just to deliver a bag of drugs.

50% Hct rule was introduced in 1997.

The Italian OC paid Conconi to study EPO and its effect on riders - in an attempt to come up with a way of detecting EPO doping. Ferrari was a student of Conconi.

Dinghy? No. Random car? Probably. Interesting to see how the TdF is avoiding Switzerland and its customs these days

Italy, in a nutshell, hired mercenaries to study PED, guys who were allowed to have 'clients' on the side. It was doomed to fail. France, on the other hand, had and still has its Ministery of Health (i.e. government) in a leading role, with Police and Justice resources. Even before '98 and the Festina scandal, politicians found it popular to champion anti-doping in sports and fund public research and facilities. Actually, this movement started in the late '80's, with a major boost following the Ben Johnson scandal, when the same politicians realized how the French public opinion was against doping and obviously tried to recuperate people and votes. After all, an anti-doping stance is cheap and easy compared to solving the middle east crisis or creating (at the time) three millions jobs

The doctors in the state run program don't have clients. Biologists, scientists are mostly everyday people, geeky, who don't care about sports and can't by statute make money on the side or (if caught) they'll lose their safe government job and pension.

Question: how is the funding evolving through budget cuts, with now five million unemployed French?

 

[zigmeister]

Michael Rasmussen had a dig at the bio passport this week.

He says that in stead of draining 1 liter of blood one day you can drain 250 ml every five or six days over 3 weeks, and the bio passport system will not be able to detect it. Anti Doping Denmark says he is right.

http://jyllands-posten.dk/sport/cyk.../kyllingen-rytterne-kan-sagtens-vaere-dopede/
http://ekstrabladet.dk/sport/cykling/article4937556.ece

He also claimed there are no tests for insulin and IGF-1, but Anti Doping Denmark says this is wrong. They have testing procedures for insulin and IGF-1 since half a year ago.

Need more specifics, the entire forum needs more specifics when talking these things in general.

Are they talking uring IGF-1/GH, or Blood? Because urine tests are useless and for GH don't exist reliably. Only blood testing does.

Here is the problem, 95%+ of all testing done is urine...so, not very reliable in the sense if you don't use the test that can actual detect these things, then there of course is an easy way to avoid. Rasmussen knows, he doped, they are still using methods today to avoid detection by knowing the science. Dopers aren't stupid, only the ones getting caught are.

 

[Gavandope]

Then there's the prospect of new experimental drugs to boost RBC not yet on wada's radar and gene doping. The latter without having all your nucleic acids sequenced and carefully studied to find any incompatibilites is the equivalent of Russian roulette.

Interesting comments from Rasmussen, I thought Ashenden's analysis of Armstrong implied they could measure it after the 2009 transfusions. Though he didn't have any idea about micro dosing epo, and this is what you could probably call micro transfusing!