Astana?

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Apr 10, 2019
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Kinda surprised to see HGH being used by gc riders right before a gt. I guess it's because it has some benefits and is hard to detect while also having a short glowing time.
The dosages are probably low, but some of the potential side effects like increased insulin resistance seem to be counter productive for cyclists. Now I'm sure that cyclists probably don't use the amount of hgh + insulin that would cause organ growth/an hgh gut, but it's still something that probably has more of a benefit if you use it in training instead of risking to get caught in a race.
 
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Sep 26, 2020
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Apr 13, 2021
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The question now is how come Lopez is the only one involved? do we have more names?
Cycling news indicating that his abandon from the Giro could have been related to that problem. The Arrest came one day after his abandon from the Giro.
I remember they said, when he climbed off on stage 4 before any GC action, that he had knee injury or hip injury or something. And of course everybody was wondering why Astana sent him to start the Giro with injury. Lol
 
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Apr 10, 2019
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Was that also what happened in the 2020 Giro?

At least he's younger than Samu was when he had the same idea, so we might see him back on the road again some day.
In 2020 he crashed out of the opening TT, Vlasov was the Astana rider who dnf stage 2 because he was sick and vomiting at the side of the road (and got roasted by Beppe Martinelli, because you still finish the stage or some bs like that, no wonder he went to Bora soon after).
 
Sep 26, 2020
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In 2020 he crashed out of the opening TT, Vlasov was the Astana rider who dnf stage 2 because he was sick and vomiting at the side of the road (and got roasted by Beppe Martinelli, because you still finish the stage or some bs like that, no wonder he went to Bora soon after).

Yeah, that was faulty memory, but at least I got the year right.
 
Jun 19, 2009
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Astana have been so bad in recent years they probably qualify under the "just another small team getting riders popped" umbrella
 
Jun 25, 2015
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Like everyone else, I can't imagine how toxic MAL had to be for Astana to sack him. Which is too bad -- I had high hopes for him as a real GC contender.

It would be nice if he had the nous to try to salvage his career while he's still young. Maybe lawyer up, tell the UCI what he knows in return for a feasible ban and come back full of contrition. But that won't happen.
 
Jun 24, 2021
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Kinda surprised to see HGH being used by gc riders right before a gt. I guess it's because it has some benefits and is hard to detect while also having a short glowing time.
The dosages are probably low, but some of the potential side effects like increased insulin resistance seem to be counter productive for cyclists. Now I'm sure that cyclists probably don't use the amount of hgh + insulin that would cause organ growth/an hgh gut, but it's still something that probably has more of a benefit if you use it in training instead of risking to get caught in a race.

If you google "menotropin", it is a hormone, but not human growth hormone. My brief wiki research revealed that it is commonly used as a fertility drug. It increases LH and FSH, which in turn make the body naturally produce more testosterone.

That said, I'm sure riders are still using HGH. Especially since they are adding a section to the bio-passport specifically for the monitoring of HGH. I believe both HGH and HMG (menotropin) are peptides, and I remember hearing Floyd Landis on a podcast say that detection time for peptides is ridiculously short.
 
Vicente Belda Jr is a soigneur at Astana and he's involved? Mwahahahaha jesus christ

Yes, at least since 2015 apparently.

His name only must have let him jump to the top of the CV queue when Vino was looking at the possibilities for admission.

It seems that his son was a part of the doping ring with the dad, good old family business. When the first Maynar news come out I think I saw something regarding the involvement of Vicente Belda Papi son, but I thought it was David Belda.

 
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Jan 7, 2010
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Hit butt-buddy Johan is probably still mad that Vino came back and Yana got sacked. Rumour has it that he was consulting her behind the scenes...

This is true, armstrong and johan also never got over the fact that they got thrown out of astana in favour of vino. Yana left the team in horrible shape in terms of riders signed etc. Armstrong is just seething that he is not allowed back while another doper is. the problem was how armstrong treated people, something he never seems to grasp since he is a sociopath. He constantly brings up in his podcasts how much he hates vino, how he bought the olympics and lbl, happens almost every other episode, deep seated anger
 
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Aug 19, 2011
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well, Vino bought races, got a positive during the TDF, his team had half a dozen positives and he still runs it and the team still going. I'd get behind anyone, even Lance, calling out Astana.