Armstrong positive in 1999?

[MacRoadie]

Ashenden may know a lot of stuff...but he doesn't even seem to have heard about serial dilution. See the first comments here: http://nyvelocity.com/content/features/2009/spiking-armstrongs-99-samples

He's not exactly infallible.

Sure, because you definitely want to give equal weight to a bunch of anonymous guys who cherry-pick the article and add weight to their comments with "it's so easy I learned that in 5th grade" type quips.

 

[BroDeal]

The Ashenden interview is one of the most compelling pieces on doping I have ever read. It is beyond doubt that Lance used EPO during the '99 Tour. Especially read the part about how hard it would be to intentionally spike samples, actually more than hard, virtually impossible.

The impossible part of spiking samples is that no one at the lab knew which sample belonged to whom.

 

[ergmonkey]

This whole "need an A and B sample to establish a positive" is such ignorant lawyeristic BS in the 1999 test situation.

Yes and no. As a lawyer, two things jump out at me:

1) when it comes to actually sanctioning a rider, it is important for a lab to follow protocol and for the due process rights of the accused to be honored, however they have been codified by the governing body; and

2) it is amazing to me how many fans think that their personal opinions of guilt/innocence ought to adhere to legal standards. As a private person, I am perfectly content to connect the dots using my own intellect, deductive powers, and basic understandings of human behavior. Who cares if my/your/some-other-random-forum-poster's opinion is 100% legally tenable? The question is why EPO appeared in the samples, not whether the samples are legally binding (besides, they're well outside the eight-year statute of limitations at this point anyway...)

 

[Elagabalus]

Maybe he chose to omit that fact seeing since its pretty simple to do. Or it wouldn't fit his story so didn't bring it up.

Hogwash. The French Lab was faced with the challenge of determining which sample/samples belonged to which rider (the samples did not belong to just Armstrong alone) and then dilute them.

Let's not call it a "test". Or call it positive since it wasn't an official test and I agree that Armstrong should not have been sanctioned for it. Let's just say the samples showed the presence of EPO in the Armstrong's blood. Also blood sample degradation would not create a false positive.

 

[Hugh Januss]

Hogwash. The French Lab was faced with the challenge of determining which sample/samples belonged to which rider (the samples did not belong to just Armstrong alone) and then dilute them.

Let's not call it a "test". Or call it positive since it wasn't an official test and I agree that Armstrong should not have been sanctioned for it. Let's just say the samples showed the presence of EPO in the Armstrong's blood. Also blood sample degradation would not create a false positive.

I agree completely, right up to the point where you start calling the urine samples blood samples.

 

[BroDeal]

2) it is amazing to me how many fans think that their personal opinions of guilt/innocence ought to adhere to legal standards. As a private person, I am perfectly content to connect the dots using my own intellect, deductive powers, and basic understandings of human behavior.

Well, there is where you are going wrong right there. Armstrong fans have not proven to have an intellect nor any deductive reasoning powers nor much understanding of human behavior.

 

[this_is_edie]

I love repetition.

it is getting ridiculous isn't it?

 

[Elagabalus]

I agree completely, right up to the point where you start calling the urine samples blood samples.

Oooops! Well, you know what I mean ....!

 

[Hugh Januss]

it is getting ridiculous isn't it?

Hey, I live in LA, I just look at it as sharpening up my responses just in case the Grand Jury calls me.

 

[python]

the op deserves credit for being able to reignite (flame up ?) the most discussed and analyzed subject about texas doping.

one thing he (and just about EVERYBODY) forgot to mention…

upon return from his retirement last year, texas was offered by the afld a perfect, GOLDEN chance to shut up his critics and to put away the story about his 99 doping FOR EVER.

‘retest your samples texas, we still have enough of your piss, and let it be done with’



the offer contained the most generous conditions anyone could dream of:
(i) if you don’t like our french lab, choose any of the 34 WADA labs. ANY.
(ii) use any and as many scientists as you wish to witness the retesting
(iii) everyone understand you can’t be sanctioned even if the test goes bad.
(iv) implied was complete cooperation regarding the sample identity

texas flunked, balked, dodged…

end of the doping story.

ps addressing the op point by point is a waste of time. it was done many times.

 

[I Watch Cycling In July]

1) when it comes to actually sanctioning a rider, it is important for a lab to follow protocol and for the due process rights of the accused to be honored, however they have been codified by the governing body; and...

Thought that might get a bite our of some of our lawyers . I actually totally agree with the above and wasn't trying to argue that Lance should have been sanctioned on the grounds of those results.

2) it is amazing to me how many fans think that their personal opinions of guilt/innocence ought to adhere to legal standards.... The question is why EPO appeared in the samples, not whether the samples are legally binding (besides, they're well outside the eight-year statute of limitations at this point anyway...)

With you on that one too. It's particular silly in this instance where the information is, statistically speaking, MORE compelling than if there were a sanction-able A and B positive.

 

[spetsa]

Sample handling, accelerated measurement procedure, chain of custody for samples, some of these urine samples had been opened without any record of when they had been opened and for what purpose, the stability test before an urine sample can be qualified as constituting an Adverse Analytical Finding wasn't done, No records of the storage
temperature for these samples during the past six years were available. I guess I could go on but you get the point. You cannot have a positive result from a flawed test, and a B sample.

The last sentence is true. You also can't have a positive test when you buy your way out of your B samples ever being tested.

 

[DirtyWorks]

Public Strategies

Sample handling, accelerated measurement procedure, chain of custody for samples, some of these urine samples had been opened without any record of when they had been opened and for what purpose, the stability test before an urine sample can be qualified as constituting an Adverse Analytical Finding wasn't done, No records of the storage
temperature for these samples during the past six years were available. I guess I could go on but you get the point. You cannot have a positive result from a flawed test, and a B sample.

When presented with authoritative information on the issue, you just find another angle to create the illusion of doubt. The result is incoherence.

When Landis was doing this, it was generally disregarded for what it is, incoherent. Now that Public Strategies is trying the same tactics, it's supposed to work?

Give up the Armstrong newspeak. Please.

 

[I Watch Cycling In July]

one thing he (and just about EVERYBODY) forgot to mention…upon return from his retirement last year, texas was offered by the afld a perfect, GOLDEN chance to shut up his critics and to put away the story about his 99 doping FOR EVER.‘retest your samples texas, we still have enough of your piss, and let it be done with’

Yep. A stability test, DNA test and EPO re-test would address the storage, chain of custody and sample tampering claims. (Assuming there are technical difficulties with tampering with the remainder of the B sample - which I never quite got to the bottom of last time we had this discussion).

 

[Anonymous]

Sample handling, accelerated measurement procedure, chain of custody for samples, some of these urine samples had been opened without any record of when they had been opened and for what purpose, the stability test before an urine sample can be qualified as constituting an Adverse Analytical Finding wasn't done, No records of the storage
temperature for these samples during the past six years were available. I guess I could go on but you get the point. You cannot have a positive result from a flawed test, and a B sample.

And none of that changes the fact that when they were tested for EPO, nobody knew teh identity of the rider because Armstrong hadn't provided the numbers for connecting them yet, nor does it change the fact that there was synthetic EPO in them. You can flail away with all this gobbldy *** if you want, but only a moron thinks he was only on his bike busting his a$$ 6 hours a day, what are you on? He doped dude. You got suckered by a scam artist who uses cancer patients for cover. What does that make you? Well, by the voracity of your defense, I think it is clear that you are running from that question.

Toodles!

 

[ChrisE]

Ashenden may know a lot of stuff...but he doesn't even seem to have heard about serial dilution. See the first comments here: http://nyvelocity.com/content/features/2009/spiking-armstrongs-99-samples

He's not exactly infallible.

Plus he was floored by FL's recent revelations about EPO microdosing. He should read CN forums to learn all the new PED rage.

 

[ChrisE]

Thought that might get a bite our of some of our lawyers . I actually totally agree with the above and wasn't trying to argue that Lance should have been sanctioned on the grounds of those results.
.

LOL, yes we all love repetition. I had several rabid posters in here admitting that he should not have been sanctioned after several pages of a thread last year or maybe earlier this year. No protocol was followed in this whole issue. Whether you or I or anybody else thinks that he doped has nothing to do with whether he should have been sanctioned.

Wash, rinse, repeat. CN forums go round and round.

 

[uspostal]

the op deserves credit for being able to reignite (flame up ?) the most discussed and analyzed subject about texas doping.

one thing he (and just about EVERYBODY) forgot to mention…

upon return from his retirement last year, texas was offered by the afld a perfect, GOLDEN chance to shut up his critics and to put away the story about his 99 doping FOR EVER.

‘retest your samples texas, we still have enough of your piss, and let it be done with’



the offer contained the most generous conditions anyone could dream of:
(i) if you don’t like our french lab, choose any of the 34 WADA labs. ANY.
(ii) use any and as many scientists as you wish to witness the retesting
(iii) everyone understand you can’t be sanctioned even if the test goes bad.
(iv) implied was complete cooperation regarding the sample identity

texas flunked, balked, dodged…

end of the doping story.

ps addressing the op point by point is a waste of time. it was done many times.

Was all this to be done with a unsealed sample, or was it a sample that was already opened without anybody being presant to witness it. To risk a 150 - 200 million dollars worth of lifes work over a sample that has been opened already is crazy. I don't think the LA haters would even do that. How many people on the us postal / discovery / radio shack team have failed a drug test while riding for those teams ???

 

[Nick777]

Was all this to be done with a unsealed sample, or was it a sample that was already opened without anybody being presant to witness it. To risk a 150 - 200 million dollars worth of lifes work over a sample that has been opened already is crazy. I don't think the LA haters would even do that. How many people on the us postal / discovery / radio shack team have failed a drug test while riding for those teams ???

Your sig contains spelling errors, just so you know.

 

[ChrisE]

Was all this to be done with a unsealed sample, or was it a sample that was already opened without anybody being presant to witness it. To risk a 150 - 200 million dollars worth of lifes work over a sample that has been opened already is crazy. I don't think the LA haters would even do that. How many people on the us postal / discovery / radio shack team have failed a drug test while riding for those teams ???

According to them they would. Of course I am sure if they ever get accused of anything they will all just go quietly, regardless of the circumstances.

Thy name is hypocrisy. Welcome to the forum, uspostal.

 

[RTMcFadden]

The Ashenden interview is one of the most compelling pieces on doping I have ever read. It is beyond doubt that Lance used EPO during the '99 Tour. Especially read the part about how hard it would be to intentionally spike samples, actually more than hard, virtually impossible.

Actually, spiking a sample would be a fairly simple task.

 

[hrotha]

Actually, spiking a sample would be a fairly simple task.

However, spiking Armstrong's samples in particular, without knowing which ones they were, wouldn't. Read the interview, it's all there.

 

[editedbymod]

Actually, spiking a sample would be a fairly simple task.

It would be a simple task. However it would 100% certifiable that the sample had been spiked. You cannot replicate the way EPO is first absorbed by the body and then passed into the urine by dropping EPO into a sample.

In addition the testers who were conducting the research on the unknown Armstrong sampless had no idea some bright spark at l'Equipe was linking sample number to athlete. How would they know which 6 to spike of the 100's of samples?

Good try.

 

[Squares]

So given the choice between the word of Ashenden, one of the highest regarded anti doping experts in the world,

Sorry Hugh, but I have to ask, isn't Ashenden the scientist that published a paper saying the analytical test he developed could never have a false positive result?

Unfortunately, that is impossible. Every analytical method or test has a false negative rate and a false positive rate. Those rates may be very very low, but they do exist.

Anyway, I do respect his work, but given my scientific training, I have always taken issue with that one statement.

Unfortunately for the OP, the test does in fact show that synthetic EPO was in those samples. What he and many on here miss is that given the issues with sample handling and such, it cannot be definitively proven that it got there through LA injecting synthetic EPO into his body.

It is likely that he took his shots and doped all along, but he has been too good at beating the testing labs or burying the results.

 

[Squares]

You cannot replicate the way EPO is first absorbed by the body and then passed into the urine by dropping EPO into a sample.

So, could it be spiked by giving yourself a big dose by injection, waiting 8 hours until your body had absorbed it, passed it into your urine, you pee in a cup and spike the sample with urine that has a high level of EPO.

That would allow it to be processed into the form detectable in the doping test, right?