Chris Hoy - hard work and dreaming big

[blackcat]

muscular christianity, purity, stiff upper lip, rugby, chariots of fire, harrow, oxbridge, gordonstoun, locke

 

[ebandit]

.......all that *** died about 60 years ago........don't believe what you see on the TV.........the reality of British youth is this.......

.........not your characature

Mark L

 

[blackcat]

but the caricature is intentional, it is meta.

now you will get the point.

 

[Hawkwood]

the track sprint discipline v track endurance.

mid-late 90s that all the traditional track endurance crossed to the road for coin ($$$)

think about Robert Bartko winner of the Sydney pursuit in about 4'18" or 4'19". Rule of thumb would say with tech improvement he could have got another second lower by 2012. Bartko struggled to match the 6 day pair marvulli and risi

There are many inputs of performance, but one cannot be overlooked but is, is the team leadership and an entire team of resources behind you.

See about 2003 and Raimondas Rumsas 3rd in the TdF which when you take out the TTT he beats Beloki. Think about the resources put behind Raimondas Rumsas v Armstrong. On Lampre or Fassa he would have been given very minimal help. He needed Edita being his motoman strikethru motowoman.

If you swap out the resources and team support and Ferrari from Armstrong to Rumsas and give Armstrong Lampre and Edita, then the results are reversed. This is the cypher for Wiggins.

I might be getting your point back to front, are you saying that Wiggins' success in endurance track events was an indicator of possible success on the road with the necessary full team back up etc?

 

[blackcat]

I might be getting your point back to front, are you saying that Wiggins' success in endurance track events was an indicator of possible success on the road with the necessary full team back up etc?

no, i was not saying that.

i was saying, there might be ~30-50 riders in the peloton, who can do the ergo tests, and have the potential to win GC in July. Heck, Cecchini said, lose 6 kgs spartacus, and you can win the Tour.

If you go back to a HighRoad Tour in about 2008, Gerdemann. Martin, Cav. Well Martin climbed REALLY well into yellow. Gerdemann had a fantastic tour the year (did he get yellow in CSC or was it Highroad). I might be conflating Gerdemann with Martin, in that it was actually Linus in the yellow (I know he has worn the jaune) versus Tony in yellow.

But Riis said Gerdemann was the next Ullrich and could win in July. Madiot was bullish on Mcgee.

There are a few things that need to sync to win in July. A Patron re: team, and head manager, behind you. The resources. The doctor (doping). But most importantly the will and motivation.

listen, all pro cyclists have an unceasing motivation. However, the motivation to win in July needs to be off the curve.

So, if you marry those 6 or so imputs. You can get a Tour winner. Perhaps if Katusha came along 6 years ago, Menchov might have a few TfF wins. P'raps if Astana came along about the same time, Vino or Kashechkin might have a few TdF wins.

I am more impressed by Wiggins getting off the couch and stopping the room temperature ales and winning in July.

P'raps, when he added a more choreographed doping program focusing on gc and o2 vector, he got the most out of his potential. Perhaps, he was always resting on his laurels as a pursuiter and not bothering with road racing. I think Mcgee could have matched Wiggins at their same ages with the equivalent time to peak for a track event. Wiggins always got Mcgee when he would have a lead in to the track events off a full time road season where he was the team leader on FGJ. With Wiggins, British Cycling were always paying part of his salary from lotteries so he could put more preparation on the boards.

Dekker was always tangibly superior to Nibali.

So others who could have won with the equivalent imputs as Wiggins

Ullrich
Kloeden
Landis
Dekker
Nibali
Rumsas
Froome
Basso
Evans
Vinokourov
Kashechkin
Martin
Mayo
Ricco
Gesink
Kirchen
Andy Schleck
Frank Schleck
Kreuziger
Valverde

 

[More Strides than Rides]

Not directed at any recent reply, but I've face-palmed myself a few time reading this thread. People think performance is like racing video game. Upgrade your suspension,and your car goes x faster. Upgrade your tires, your car goes y faster.

The intersection of talent, work/adaptation, and doping is hardly understood scientifically. People throwing out percentages for a marginal gain, or for doping are talking out of their asses. I bet even Ross Tucker would say he is talking out of his *** with the 5% number, because no one knows for sure. Look at Di Luca v1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, all doped, but totally different riders. Same thing with talent. Look at Andy Schleck's talent (for responding to dope) vs a Lemond with talent in the form of VO2 max. Totally different

Talent, training/adaptation, and doping don't add up like chips on a poker table. They don't even work and interact like levers on a sound mixing table. Compare it to economics: Wheat prices in Australia have some affect on airline tickets from Toronto, but only if its Christmas shopping season (I'm obviously not an economist, my point is its complicated and even the most knowledgeable only barely understand). Some posters on both sides of the Hoy clean/dirty discussion need to understand this.

 

[oldcrank]

no, i was not saying that.

i was saying, there might be ~30-50 riders in the peloton, who can do the ergo tests, and have the potential to win GC in July. Heck, Cecchini said, lose 6 kgs spartacus, and you can win the Tour.

If you go back to a HighRoad Tour in about 2008, Gerdemann. Martin, Cav. Well Martin climbed REALLY well into yellow. Gerdemann had a fantastic tour the year (did he get yellow in CSC or was it Highroad). I might be conflating Gerdemann with Martin, in that it was actually Linus in the yellow (I know he has worn the jaune) versus Tony in yellow.

But Riis said Gerdemann was the next Ullrich and could win in July. Madiot was bullish on Mcgee.

There are a few things that need to sync to win in July. A Patron re: team, and head manager, behind you. The resources. The doctor (doping). But most importantly the will and motivation.

listen, all pro cyclists have an unceasing motivation. However, the motivation to win in July needs to be off the curve.

So, if you marry those 6 or so imputs. You can get a Tour winner. Perhaps if Katusha came along 6 years ago, Menchov might have a few TfF wins. P'raps if Astana came along about the same time, Vino or Kashechkin might have a few TdF wins.

I am more impressed by Wiggins getting off the couch and stopping the room temperature ales and winning in July.

P'raps, when he added a more choreographed doping program focusing on gc and o2 vector, he got the most out of his potential. Perhaps, he was always resting on his laurels as a pursuiter and not bothering with road racing. I think Mcgee could have matched Wiggins at their same ages with the equivalent time to peak for a track event. Wiggins always got Mcgee when he would have a lead in to the track events off a full time road season where he was the team leader on FGJ. With Wiggins, British Cycling were always paying part of his salary from lotteries so he could put more preparation on the boards.

Dekker was always tangibly superior to Nibali.

So others who could have won with the equivalent imputs as Wiggins

Ullrich
Kloeden
Landis
Dekker
Nibali
Rumsas
Froome
Basso
Evans
Vinokourov
Kashechkin
Martin
Mayo
Ricco
Gesink
Kirchen
Andy Schleck
Frank Schleck
Kreuziger
Valverde

At the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games only days
after finishing the Tour de France, McGee caught Wiggo
in the final of the individual pursuit, my friend.

 

[The Hitch]

Not directed at any recent reply, but I've face-palmed myself a few time reading this thread. People think performance is like racing video game. Upgrade your suspension,and your car goes x faster. Upgrade your tires, your car goes y faster.

The intersection of talent, work/adaptation, and doping is hardly understood scientifically. People throwing out percentages for a marginal gain, or for doping are talking out of their asses. I bet even Ross Tucker would say he is talking out of his *** with the 5% number, because no one knows for sure. Look at Di Luca v1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, all doped, but totally different riders. Same thing with talent. Look at Andy Schleck's talent (for responding to dope) vs a Lemond with talent in the form of VO2 max. Totally different

Talent, training/adaptation, and doping don't add up like chips on a poker table. They don't even work and interact like levers on a sound mixing table. Compare it to economics: Wheat prices in Australia have some affect on airline tickets from Toronto, but only if its Christmas shopping season (I'm obviously not an economist, my point is its complicated and even the most knowledgeable only barely understand). Some posters on both sides of the Hoy clean/dirty discussion need to understand this.

The fact that every single gt contender and remotely succesful rider for a period of time beginning at some point in the 1990's and ending at some point in the 2000's was doping in and of itself proves doping a a variable was far greater than all of the other ones you name.

If they weren't you could argue that the effects of doping may be smaller than people think. But the fact that heavy doping is universally acknowledged now as having been an absolute requirement for top level racing proves that the impact of doping is massive and far greater than marginal tyre advantages etc.

Sometimes its not worth complicating things when they are this simple.

 

[oldcrank]

Not directed at any recent reply, but I've face-palmed myself a few time reading this thread. People think performance is like racing video game. Upgrade your suspension,and your car goes x faster. Upgrade your tires, your car goes y faster.

The intersection of talent, work/adaptation, and doping is hardly understood scientifically. People throwing out percentages for a marginal gain, or for doping are talking out of their asses. I bet even Ross Tucker would say he is talking out of his *** with the 5% number, because no one knows for sure. Look at Di Luca v1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, all doped, but totally different riders. Same thing with talent. Look at Andy Schleck's talent (for responding to dope) vs a Lemond with talent in the form of VO2 max. Totally different

Talent, training/adaptation, and doping don't add up like chips on a poker table. They don't even work and interact like levers on a sound mixing table. Compare it to economics: Wheat prices in Australia have some affect on airline tickets from Toronto, but only if its Christmas shopping season (I'm obviously not an economist, my point is its complicated and even the most knowledgeable only barely understand). Some posters on both sides of the Hoy clean/dirty discussion need to understand this.

Sugar cane, my friend, not wheat.
http://qsafi.aibn.uq.edu.au

 

[Fearless Greg Lemond]

At the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games only days
after finishing the Tour de France, McGee caught Wiggo
in the final of the individual pursuit, my friend.

http://www.cqranking.com/men/asp/gen/race.asp?raceid=9005

Brad was a great rider. Nice fella too.

 

[del1962]

ahh, but we forget, the royal we, you forget

gordonstoun, chariots of fire, muscular christianity

Hows the shooting of the Australian tribesmen going, pretty much a national sport for you guys isn't it

 

[del1962]

How can you say being British is a requirement for sceptic to consider someone as a doper when sceptic has accused pretty much every active rider in the peloton of doping

This is a troll race baiting post and doesn't even have any foundation in reality.

Anyone with half a brain knows that the op consistently makes -ve comments about the British and you accuse me of trolling, nice troll attempt though

 

[More Strides than Rides]

The fact that every single gt contender and remotely succesful rider for a period of time beginning at some point in the 1990's and ending at some point in the 2000's was doping in and of itself proves doping a a variable was far greater than all of the other ones you name.

If they weren't you could argue that the effects of doping may be smaller than people think. But the fact that heavy doping is universally acknowledged now as having been an absolute requirement for top level racing proves that the impact of doping is massive and far greater than marginal tyre advantages etc.

Sometimes its not worth complicating things when they are this simple.

I agree. As far as Hoy's career goes, it is simple. My post was not about Hoy's career, but the nature of its discussion.

I agree. The effects of doping are huge, but performance is complicated. I chose those examples because they illustrate that doping, like any other factor, is not a blanket effect.

I was referring to this attitude:

Don't try and take it out of context......the context is track wins contiguous with road failure......... How is road failure suggestive of doping when compared with a few years later it became super success on the road? ..........Did the alleged doping in 04-08 miraculously only work on a fixed gear track bike?

You can't have it both ways, Hitch.

Mark L

The argument that there are two ways around doping: do it and you're a race horse, or don't and you're a donkey is oversimplifying things. That is a misunderstanding of the sport.


Further, an athlete talking about "hard work" is not an indictment. Sometimes they do train harder than others. Some dope and train hard, some train and dope easy, some dope hard and train easy, all with a variety of results. The fact that "hard work" is part of an athlete's vocabulary isn't a variable in the doping/clean equation.

 

[ebandit]

Hitch posited thst winning 6 Olympic track medals was cause for great suspicion......I pointed out that the suspicion would therefore have to be extended to Wiggins 3 Olympic golds 04-08......I then pointed outvthat Wiggins track success was concurrent with mediocre road results.........so if Wiggins doped effectively for the track why not the road......and what is this self- differentiating dope that only works when riding a fixed gear bike on wooden boards....

Mark L

 

[blackcat]

At the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games only days
after finishing the Tour de France, McGee caught Wiggo
in the final of the individual pursuit, my friend.

and Mcgee beat Millar the year after in that prologue at the tdf where millar pulled his foot like Shane Kelly. point is, Mcgee was about 25 and fully matured, with a hitting zone weight, even coming out of 3 weeks in july. Wiggins was about 21, still yet to hit peak potential on the boards. compare them in the hypothetical peak years of their track careers, which obviously overlapped, but were not given a stage because of each having divergent objectives. BW could not win the London prologue on High Road in 2007 v Klodi Hincapie and Spartacus. Spartacus won be a significant amount of time, most of which you could calculate was gained thru the chicane when he went thru them like valentino rossi, but Hincapie, a former pursuiter in the jnrs w/ other track endurance, plus Klodi! plus Klodi! got him that day when Wiggins had targeted for about 20 months.

 

[blackcat]

Hitch posited thst winning 6 Olympic track medals was cause for great suspicion......I pointed out that the suspicion would therefore have to be extended to Wiggins 3 Olympic golds 04-08......I then pointed outvthat Wiggins track success was concurrent with mediocre road results.........so if Wiggins doped effectively for the track why not the road......and what is this self- differentiating dope that only works when riding a fixed gear bike on wooden boards....

Mark L

you do point out the specious tension. Wiggins did attempt to target his races, like Criterium International (I am not sure if it was this individual race, just talking about Jens Voigt hitting zone races. flat, with short chronos. And specific chronos). And Wiggins was not that successful in 06 and 07. P'raps he may have lacked the work ethic (on the roadie scale, cos lets be serious they all work off the charts and off the bell curve), he may have lacked the dangerous level doping, he may have been just too confident in being able to take his contempories on the road in his particular hitting zone, and have/had unfounded confidence to transport that success.

I think the answer i prolly part that, and part unknowable, and more nuanced.

But yes, a superficial appraisal would indicate a paradox.

 

[blackcat]

Not directed at any recent reply, but I've face-palmed myself a few time reading this thread. People think performance is like racing video game. Upgrade your suspension,and your car goes x faster. Upgrade your tires, your car goes y faster.

in the hypothetical assumption one could eliminate doping from influence, i put out the thought experiment that marginal gains, the aggregation of marginal gains could be a negative economy. There are 3-5 prime inputs to performance, and my working thesis would be dial those in to 100% and refine them, and focus on refining them, feedback, refine, feeback refine refine refine dialectic refine

so those 3-5 factors contribute to 95 % of the performance function. Well, the focus should be on refining those, and only those. It is like opportunity cost, the lack of focus and time put on those factors, to tinker and tweak immaterial inputs is bunkum.

apart from the discussion of the paradox of marginal gain, once you utter it in public, it ceases to exist because it is neutralised, if indeed it was a gain gain.
So, one can now say, marginal gains are a fiction, because they cannot be spoken of.

 

[blackcat]

Compare it to economics: Wheat prices in Australia have some affect on airline tickets from Toronto, but only if its Christmas shopping season (I'm obviously not an economist, my point is its complicated and even the most knowledgeable only barely understand). Some posters on both sides of the Hoy clean/dirty discussion need to understand this.

Sugar cane, my friend, not wheat.
http://qsafi.aibn.uq.edu.au

the syllogism is not correct when one invokes geographic factor in a fungible international commodity traded on the Chicago Commodity Exchange for said sugarcane commodity which is used in ethanol and biofuel and enters the substitute chain in fuel supplies, even with aviation fuels which share the overlap in the supply channel.

Even Alby Davis Bundaberg cane industry #free_on_board blackbirding South Sea Islanders

 

[blackcat]

http://www.cqranking.com/men/asp/gen/race.asp?raceid=9005

Brad was a great rider. Nice fella too.

hear hear and here here. wilson cookie mcgee in Nice there was an article about three antipodes in Procycling or Cyclesport mag in around 2001

 

[oldcrank]

http://www.cqranking.com/men/asp/gen/race.asp?raceid=9005

Brad was a great rider. Nice fella too.

I could not agree more, my friend.
He is a great coach as well, doing a
fantastic job as head cycling coach at
the New South Wales Institute of Sport.

 

[Bernie's eyesore]

do I really have to explain this?

1. Professional sport is an environment that promotes doping. Most societies do not promote murdering.

2. The ethical hurdle you have to overcome to cheat in sports is much much smaller than murdering another person.

3. Murdering someone doesnt always come with immediate financial benefits.

4. The likelyhood of getting caught is much bigger and the punishment much more severe if you murder someone.

Conclusion: Only a very small minority of the general population are potential murderers, so it is absurd to accuse a random person of being one.

I believe that proves my point. Thank you, the sceptic.

You really don't understand my point. Your argument is that if one person has denied doing something in the past and found to be lying then anybody else who denies doing the same thing in the future must also be lying. By the same token, you also argue that anyone who has never tested positive must be a doper because some riders guilty of doping never failed a test. The fact that all of these riders were eventually caught always seems to be forgotten. These are the arguments that form the entire basis for your case against Hoy. The arguments apply equally whether it's for murder, doping or for parking on a double yellow line.

 

[TailWindHome]

You really don't understand my point. Your argument is that if one person has denied doing something in the past and found to be lying then anybody else who denies doing the same thing in the future must also be lying. By the same token, you also argue that anyone who has never tested positive must be a doper because some riders guilty of doping never failed a test. The fact that all of these riders were eventually caught always seems to be forgotten. These are the arguments that form the entire basis for your case against Hoy. The arguments apply equally whether it's for murder, doping or for parking on a double yellow line.

That's not actually what he is arguing.
He is arguing that the tests are irrelevant.

 

[Bernie's eyesore]

Hitch posited thst winning 6 Olympic track medals was cause for great suspicion......I pointed out that the suspicion would therefore have to be extended to Wiggins 3 Olympic golds 04-08......I then pointed outvthat Wiggins track success was concurrent with mediocre road results.........so if Wiggins doped effectively for the track why not the road......and what is this self- differentiating dope that only works when riding a fixed gear bike on wooden boards....

Mark L

If Wiggins was doping prior to 2008 he would have been cleaning up in time trials on the road. The fact that he wasn't and that he improved his time trialling immeasurably after he quit the track just goes to show that he probably won those track golds clean. Perhaps some of the experts on track cycling on here can tell us about all the dopers Hoy was beating when he won his golds. It seems a common belief on here that all track cyclists dope, the evidence seems to suggest otherwise.

 

[More Strides than Rides]

If Wiggins was doping prior to 2008 he would have been cleaning up in time trials on the road. The fact that he wasn't and that he improved his time trialling immeasurably after he quit the track just goes to show that he probably won those track golds clean. Perhaps some of the experts on track cycling on here can tell us about all the dopers Hoy was beating when he won his golds. It seems a common belief on here that all track cyclists dope, the evidence seems to suggest otherwise.

Doping is not a magic number of watts to add on to a rider. Wiggans could have been just using steroids, testosterone or HGH and then started epo. Or he was on EPO and then started blood bagging. Or, he was using some varient of EPO, got a new doctor and responded better to a different variant or dosage. Any number of possibilities.

To say that he he is clean early because he got better later doesnt cover the whole map

 

[D-Queued]

If Wiggins was doping prior to 2008 he would have been cleaning up in time trials on the road. The fact that he wasn't and that he improved his time trialling immeasurably after he quit the track just goes to show that he probably won those track golds clean. Perhaps some of the experts on track cycling on here can tell us about all the dopers Hoy was beating when he won his golds. It seems a common belief on here that all track cyclists dope, the evidence seems to suggest otherwise.

If what you mean by evidence is positive tests and bans for doping, then the evidence would also suggest that 99% of the peloton is clean.

If you believe that, then as they say, I have some swampland in Florida for you to buy.

Dave.