Clean Era was a myth..........

[IzzyStradlin]

The silence from the pro peloton is still deafening.

Nobody wants to sh!t-talk the team that pays the big $$$.

 

[Benotti69]

Nobody wants to sh!t-talk the team that pays the big $$$.

Nobody wants to kill the opportunity to work with Ferrari.....

 

[sniper]

“The problems in this team are also in many others. I don’t think our team is the worst because in other teams there are worse people than there are here, I won’t name names,” Nibali said

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/other-teams-have-same-problems-as-astana-says-nibali

 

[Benotti69]

“The problems in this team are also in many others. I don’t think our team is the worst because in other teams there are worse people than there are here, I won’t name names,” Nibali said

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/other-teams-have-same-problems-as-astana-says-nibali

Wonder who is worse than Ferrari? Ibauguren? Och? Riis? Oleg?

 

[blackcat]

Clean Era was a myth..........

So Ferrari was working for 20 teams from '08 - '11 and this was when guys like JV told us that doping was no longer cool, new generation dont dope, margianl gains......********!

Also guys like Kittel winning with ease and clean! Ha more lies. Kittel happy to call out nobodies in Turkey or doping but ignore big time juicers.

Sport is still a cesspit. But then we have been told that by Ashenden and Benedetto Roberti, yet people still argue that clean riders can beat dopers!

Not in GTs and Monuments.

The various police forces have done more for anti doping than the UCI in its whole history.

Let us hear from these so called clean riders and clean teams slamming the peloton, no doubt the silence will be deafening.

any chance Kittel got a silent ban this year for World Tour rides besides Poland?

actually, think TDU, Qatar, Llouay and Hamburg are all WT also.
http://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/Marcel_Kittel

 

[jmdirt]

Wait, I thought that only Froome doped?!

 

[dacooley]

has clean era ever started? well, the subforum never ceazes to surprise me. on one hand, many regular speakers appear to believe in their ideals of honesty, fairness, in doping free cycling, in a level playing clean field bla-bla-bla, on the other hand the same lads easily destroy 99% of the people at disdain, conspiracy theories and throwing shiit at riders. i'd really love to know, if contador, froome, wiggins or anyone else are clearly devil incarnates, who are their haters then? so congratz to you guys, dirrty cycling is on, thus you'll have pretty much to discuss for many many years. you'll always find way to entertain yourself.

 

[blackcat]

Re:

has clean era ever started? well, the subforum never ceazes to surprise me. on one hand, many regular speakers appear to believe in their ideals of honesty, fairness, in doping free cycling, in a level playing clean field bla-bla-bla, on the other hand the same lads easily destroy 99% of the people at disdain, conspiracy theories and throwing shiit at riders. i'd really love to know, if contador, froome, wiggins or anyone else are clearly devil incarnates, who are their haters then? so congratz to you guys, dirrty cycling is on, thus you'll have pretty much to discuss for many many years. you'll always find way to entertain yourself.

lots accept the doping, they dont accept feeling like shills being told that the peloton is clean. people dont like feeling like idiots for believing. I handle this indignance by seeking a more comprehensive understanding of the respective parties and individual actors.

the devil's advocate "for the case" of the players/riders/athletes, is they HAVE to maintain this duplicity. Or, they can just dispense with their dream and ambition to be a professional rider/athlete and work in a normal society, whatever this definition of a normal society is.

They cannot speak the truth, for with the truth there fails to be their sport. (*absurd argument? no, bear with me)

They are just cogs in a mature system, that existed and provided them an opportunity to be a pro, by the pro's rules of the sport. The Insider rules v The Outsider rules. Some, like Lance, might be enabled by fans and a horde of self-interested "handlers".

So who is evil? Well, no one. It is the system and the organising model that the cyclists engage in to perform their sport. Like everyother mature professional sport. There is no, and are no, evil actors. It is value neutral imo.

But your vituperation dacooley, could as easily be leveled at these professionals you speak of, like Froome and Wiggins and Brailsford. And them dismissing The Clinic 12 definite article proper noun. It is the title of Tarantino's next feature.

Even Betsy Andreu who I love, she fits into this model of the peloton of actors. She is just one more. Read some of Helmut Roole's posts (search this forum, for poster "HelmutRoole") and it will help fill out your understanding peeps...

 

[Scarponi]

2007 clean? Wasn't that the year Contador and Rasmussan were sprinting non stop and even follower Evans was sprinting out of the saddle for 15 seconds to keep up.

And then the next year we are meant to believe they went into a truce

 

[Ferminal]

Re:

2007 clean? Wasn't that the year Contador and Rasmussan were sprinting non stop and even follower Evans was sprinting out of the saddle for 15 seconds to keep up.

And then the next year we are meant to believe they went into a truce

https://youtu.be/gNl1ci4K4Ng?t=458

Forever one of my favourites... love the race against the moto. Incredible (or stupid) that Evans managed to bridge and hold for a minute. That was peak Evans imo, it split in the valley and he was in the second chase group IIRC, but caught back on and second only to Valverde in the Briancon drag. Of course PdB was good later, Peyresourde not fast given the way they raced it, but spectacular. Aubisque though... Given the difficulty of the race to date and the stage, Rasmussen's performance there is one of the most devastating of the decade.

I think had history gone another way in 2006 the Tour would have been the most outrageous GT... 2007 went a fair way to making up for it. The Giro and Vuelta though were a bit of a let down, Andy Schleck notwithstanding.

More to the point at hand, I firmly believe that 2008 was "cleaner". Yes there was the CERA use which it's fair to assume went well beyond the dozen or so positives. There simply wasn't the depth at the top-end there (i.e. the GT bloodbagging). Contador and Evans clearly declined... there was no Rasmussen. Di Luca yes, Schleck, his Tour was a bit strange. Leipheimer and Sastre probably held the same though.

Why? It could have just been part of the natural cycle, pretty much every rider has up and down years due to the magnitude of their doping. I think it may have been the passport but people say it was not effectively operating until 2009, if that is the case what a joke it is. The threat is more important as a deterrent than the fact though.

If anything the "clean era" at the top-end of GT climbing ran from the 2010 Giro through to the end of 2012. Yes there were a few standout performances but the depth wasn't there until Nibali, Froome, Porte, Quintana hit career bests. I'd also argue that the racing was different 2006-2012 where you had leaders or co-leaders with limited support other than themselves, competing on each day, as opposed to the blow them away approach of Sky or the dominance of Astana, though that isn't necessarily related to doping.

And of course if we are talking more broadly... you'd want to ignore Gilbert/OPL and Boonen/OPQS.

 

[blackcat]

Re: Re:

More to the point at hand, I firmly believe that 2008 was "cleaner". Yes there was the CERA use which it's fair to assume went well beyond the dozen or so positives.

there was thirty positives and they managed to keep them under the rug.

It was not merely Piepoli Ricco and Cobo.

supposedly about 7 of the CSC startlist were testing positive... so assume the other two just never breached the threshold... Then those performances by Schumacher, Van de Velde, Kim Kirchen...

funny, there is not much or anything on the internet about this... the most you can find is discussions on fora...

 

[jens_attacks]

Re: Re:

2007 clean? Wasn't that the year Contador and Rasmussan were sprinting non stop and even follower Evans was sprinting out of the saddle for 15 seconds to keep up.

And then the next year we are meant to believe they went into a truce

https://youtu.be/gNl1ci4K4Ng?t=458

Forever one of my favourites... love the race against the moto. Incredible (or stupid) that Evans managed to bridge and hold for a minute. That was peak Evans imo, it split in the valley and he was in the second chase group IIRC, but caught back on and second only to Valverde in the Briancon drag. Of course PdB was good later, Peyresourde not fast given the way they raced it, but spectacular. Aubisque though... Given the difficulty of the race to date and the stage, Rasmussen's performance there is one of the most devastating of the decade.

I think had history gone another way in 2006 the Tour would have been the most outrageous GT... 2007 went a fair way to making up for it. The Giro and Vuelta though were a bit of a let down, Andy Schleck notwithstanding.

More to the point at hand, I firmly believe that 2008 was "cleaner". Yes there was the CERA use which it's fair to assume went well beyond the dozen or so positives. There simply wasn't the depth at the top-end there (i.e. the GT bloodbagging). Contador and Evans clearly declined... there was no Rasmussen. Di Luca yes, Schleck, his Tour was a bit strange. Leipheimer and Sastre probably held the same though.

Why? It could have just been part of the natural cycle, pretty much every rider has up and down years due to the magnitude of their doping. I think it may have been the passport but people say it was not effectively operating until 2009, if that is the case what a joke it is. The threat is more important as a deterrent than the fact though.

If anything the "clean era" at the top-end of GT climbing ran from the 2010 Giro through to the end of 2012. Yes there were a few standout performances but the depth wasn't there until Nibali, Froome, Porte, Quintana hit career bests. I'd also argue that the racing was different 2006-2012 where you had leaders or co-leaders with limited support other than themselves, competing on each day, as opposed to the blow them away approach of Sky or the dominance of Astana, though that isn't necessarily related to doping.

And of course if we are talking more broadly... you'd want to ignore Gilbert/OPL and Boonen/OPQS.

there was a big drop in climbing speeds after 2006. no doubt. and yes already in 2007 and much more in 2008
so the alleged truce is not a myth because there was no passport in 2007. remember that people (except lance) were going slow in tdf 2000,2001,2002 too.


for me the slowest period after 2006 it's 2008-2011. and in my opinion it was phil and europcar who made them start the arms race again. thanks guys

 

[The Hitch]

Re:

Wait, I thought that only Froome doped?!

No one has ever claimed only Froome dopes.

On the contrary, SKy are the ones saying its ALL clean and the sceptics are the ones saying its still doped.

 

[42x16ss]

Re: Re:

2007 clean? Wasn't that the year Contador and Rasmussan were sprinting non stop and even follower Evans was sprinting out of the saddle for 15 seconds to keep up.

And then the next year we are meant to believe they went into a truce

https://youtu.be/gNl1ci4K4Ng?t=458

Forever one of my favourites... love the race against the moto. Incredible (or stupid) that Evans managed to bridge and hold for a minute. That was peak Evans imo, it split in the valley and he was in the second chase group IIRC, but caught back on and second only to Valverde in the Briancon drag. Of course PdB was good later, Peyresourde not fast given the way they raced it, but spectacular. Aubisque though... Given the difficulty of the race to date and the stage, Rasmussen's performance there is one of the most devastating of the decade.

I think had history gone another way in 2006 the Tour would have been the most outrageous GT... 2007 went a fair way to making up for it. The Giro and Vuelta though were a bit of a let down, Andy Schleck notwithstanding.

More to the point at hand, I firmly believe that 2008 was "cleaner". Yes there was the CERA use which it's fair to assume went well beyond the dozen or so positives. There simply wasn't the depth at the top-end there (i.e. the GT bloodbagging). Contador and Evans clearly declined... there was no Rasmussen. Di Luca yes, Schleck, his Tour was a bit strange. Leipheimer and Sastre probably held the same though.

Why? It could have just been part of the natural cycle, pretty much every rider has up and down years due to the magnitude of their doping. I think it may have been the passport but people say it was not effectively operating until 2009, if that is the case what a joke it is. The threat is more important as a deterrent than the fact though.

If anything the "clean era" at the top-end of GT climbing ran from the 2010 Giro through to the end of 2012. Yes there were a few standout performances but the depth wasn't there until Nibali, Froome, Porte, Quintana hit career bests. I'd also argue that the racing was different 2006-2012 where you had leaders or co-leaders with limited support other than themselves, competing on each day, as opposed to the blow them away approach of Sky or the dominance of Astana, though that isn't necessarily related to doping.

And of course if we are talking more broadly... you'd want to ignore Gilbert/OPL and Boonen/OPQS.

there was a big drop in climbing speeds after 2006. no doubt. and yes already in 2007 and much more in 2008
so the alleged truce is not a myth because there was no passport in 2007. remember that people (except lance) were going slow in tdf 2000,2001,2002 too.


for me the slowest period after 2006 it's 2008-2011. and in my opinion it was phil and europcar who made them start the arms race again. thanks guys

Huh? 2007 season - especially TDF - was insane, Rasmussen and Contador were climbing fast enough to raise even Armstrong's eyebrows while Evans TT'd like a freight train. Then there was Vino's cameo and Leipheimer in the final TT.

2008 still had ridiculous showings from Ricco, Sella, Piepoli, Schumacher, Kohl, Cancellara and Boonen along with others. The Giro in particular was hilarious.

Pretty much the entire 2009 season was nuts but the TDF was ballistic

 

[vedrafjord]

Re: Re:

there was a big drop in climbing speeds after 2006. no doubt. and yes already in 2007 and much more in 2008
so the alleged truce is not a myth because there was no passport in 2007. remember that people (except lance) were going slow in tdf 2000,2001,2002 too.


for me the slowest period after 2006 it's 2008-2011. and in my opinion it was phil and europcar who made them start the arms race again. thanks guys

Huh? 2007 season - especially TDF - was insane, Rasmussen and Contador were climbing fast enough to raise even Armstrong's eyebrows while Evans TT'd like a freight train. Then there was Vino's cameo and Leipheimer in the final TT.

2008 still had ridiculous showings from Ricco, Sella, Piepoli, Schumacher, Kohl, Cancellara and Boonen along with others. The Giro in particular was hilarious.

Pretty much the entire 2009 season was nuts but the TDF was ballistic

Time to post this again...

My take on 'clean era' isn't absolutist - obviously there was a ton of doping - to me it means something more like "could someone with great genetics who would win a hypothetical clean GT be able to podium/win mountain stages/etc in those years without EPO/BBs/hi octane". Obviously between Armstrong retiring and Puerto catching a raft of people the standard in 2006-2008 was lower, and I think AFLD being in charge in 2008 scared a lot of riders to at least tone it down. But what happened in 2010-2011?

Note that I'm only talking about the Tour here. Giro and Vuelta were always pretty comical.

 

[vedrafjord]

That reminds me to update that graph for last year, and figure out a way to split out the averages without making it even harder to read.

 

[Ferminal]

Pointless data.

Edit: for anything other than several year trends (enough to washout the unaccounted for variables, kinda).

Edit2: I guess none of that is helpful. But 2010, qualitatively, it was a bit of a nothing race. Morzine was a sprint, Madeleine hard to assess given its position (but a good speed no doubt), Bonascre had trackstands and Bales was chaingated. As a result Tourmalet is pretty much the only climb ever analysed which was of course a great performance by both but it comes back to the amount of faith put in one data point, and whether or not the lack of pace in the previous two weeks contributed. 2011 is equally difficult with generally long/hard climbs no Verbiers to boost the average unless you're counting Manse/Pramartino. The Telegraphe-Galiber/Alpe d'Huez performance from Contador and Andy/Evans/Samu is without rival in terms of three hour efforts, yet Alpe d'Huez gets counted as a mediocre W/kg.

I realise that kind of contradicts what I may have said earlier but I think these are more reasons to be cautious about how slow we think things were rather than suggesting they are on par with other years. On the whole, the Giri and Vueltas support this (without pointing out individual breakouts like Scarponi/Anton/Froome).

 

[jens_attacks]

Re: Re:

2007 clean? Wasn't that the year Contador and Rasmussan were sprinting non stop and even follower Evans was sprinting out of the saddle for 15 seconds to keep up.

And then the next year we are meant to believe they went into a truce

https://youtu.be/gNl1ci4K4Ng?t=458

Forever one of my favourites... love the race against the moto. Incredible (or stupid) that Evans managed to bridge and hold for a minute. That was peak Evans imo, it split in the valley and he was in the second chase group IIRC, but caught back on and second only to Valverde in the Briancon drag. Of course PdB was good later, Peyresourde not fast given the way they raced it, but spectacular. Aubisque though... Given the difficulty of the race to date and the stage, Rasmussen's performance there is one of the most devastating of the decade.

I think had history gone another way in 2006 the Tour would have been the most outrageous GT... 2007 went a fair way to making up for it. The Giro and Vuelta though were a bit of a let down, Andy Schleck notwithstanding.

More to the point at hand, I firmly believe that 2008 was "cleaner". Yes there was the CERA use which it's fair to assume went well beyond the dozen or so positives. There simply wasn't the depth at the top-end there (i.e. the GT bloodbagging). Contador and Evans clearly declined... there was no Rasmussen. Di Luca yes, Schleck, his Tour was a bit strange. Leipheimer and Sastre probably held the same though.

Why? It could have just been part of the natural cycle, pretty much every rider has up and down years due to the magnitude of their doping. I think it may have been the passport but people say it was not effectively operating until 2009, if that is the case what a joke it is. The threat is more important as a deterrent than the fact though.

If anything the "clean era" at the top-end of GT climbing ran from the 2010 Giro through to the end of 2012. Yes there were a few standout performances but the depth wasn't there until Nibali, Froome, Porte, Quintana hit career bests. I'd also argue that the racing was different 2006-2012 where you had leaders or co-leaders with limited support other than themselves, competing on each day, as opposed to the blow them away approach of Sky or the dominance of Astana, though that isn't necessarily related to doping.

And of course if we are talking more broadly... you'd want to ignore Gilbert/OPL and Boonen/OPQS.

there was a big drop in climbing speeds after 2006. no doubt. and yes already in 2007 and much more in 2008
so the alleged truce is not a myth because there was no passport in 2007. remember that people (except lance) were going slow in tdf 2000,2001,2002 too.


for me the slowest period after 2006 it's 2008-2011. and in my opinion it was phil and europcar who made them start the arms race again. thanks guys

Huh? 2007 season - especially TDF - was insane, Rasmussen and Contador were climbing fast enough to raise even Armstrong's eyebrows while Evans TT'd like a freight train. Then there was Vino's cameo and Leipheimer in the final TT.

2008 still had ridiculous showings from Ricco, Sella, Piepoli, Schumacher, Kohl, Cancellara and Boonen along with others. The Giro in particular was hilarious.

Pretty much the entire 2009 season was nuts but the TDF was ballistic

2007 was fast but not fast like grand tours before puerto. definitely not. that's what i was saying

and no, the 2008 giro was pretty slow. one of the reasons why sella and navigare team was so obvious. klodi (and we're talking here not about a saint) was close to punch them. he even complain in the press about them...

2009 was the fastest year since 2006, i agree. lance's return had a lot to do with that, in my opinion

 

[jens_attacks]

also counting the speeds only on mountain top finishes like on that graph is absolutely wrong and shouldn't be taken seriously. sorry.
on a multi mountain stage, you have to check every ascent.

 

[vedrafjord]

Re:

Pointless data.

Edit: for anything other than several year trends (enough to washout the unaccounted for variables, kinda).

Edit2: I guess none of that is helpful. But 2010, qualitatively, it was a bit of a nothing race. Morzine was a sprint, Madeleine hard to assess given its position (but a good speed no doubt), Bonascre had trackstands and Bales was chaingated. As a result Tourmalet is pretty much the only climb ever analysed which was of course a great performance by both but it comes back to the amount of faith put in one data point, and whether or not the lack of pace in the previous two weeks contributed. 2011 is equally difficult with generally long/hard climbs no Verbiers to boost the average unless you're counting Manse/Pramartino. The Telegraphe-Galiber/Alpe d'Huez performance from Contador and Andy/Evans/Samu is without rival in terms of three hour efforts, yet Alpe d'Huez gets counted as a mediocre W/kg.

I realise that kind of contradicts what I may have said earlier but I think these are more reasons to be cautious about how slow we think things were rather than suggesting they are on par with other years. On the whole, the Giri and Vueltas support this (without pointing out individual breakouts like Scarponi/Anton/Froome).

Thanks for clarifying because I was going to go off on one based on your initial dismissal. I was looking only at overall multi year trends - averages of averages - which tell us something assuming as you say that the noise isn't skewed.

I have some reservations with ammattipyöräily's approach - chiefly the presentation of W/kg figures without accompanying durations in many cases - but it thought it would be fun to graph some of the figures as they don't seem to have any inclination to do it themselves. What annoys me is when people ignore the very wide middle ground between completely perfect and completely useless.

This is the quietest time of the year for me in work (I work in reinsurance running simulations to model the frequency and cost of hypothetical hurricanes, earthquakes etc., so I'm used to trying to do my best with limited data) so I might have a think about how to present the considerable amount of estimated W/kg here https://twitter.com/ammattipyoraily in a way that allows meaningful patterns to be seen. This will have to incorporate climb duration in some way of course.

2007 was fast but not fast like grand tours before puerto. definitely not. that's what i was saying

and no, the 2008 giro was pretty slow. one of the reasons why sella and navigare team was so obvious. klodi (and we're talking here not about a saint) was close to punch them. he even complain in the press about them...

2009 was the fastest year since 2006, i agree. lance's return had a lot to do with that, in my opinion

Agreed, the field in 2007 was definitely weaker due to Puerto, Armstrong gone, Hamilton & Landis caught etc. Have said it before but I'm sure Lance was tempted into a comeback when he looked at the numbers for 2007/2008 and thought he still had a chance of crushing them (especially poor Sastre who he seemed to have contempt for). What happens then? TdF antidoping taken away from AFLD again and the fear factor goes, AICAR appears (allegedly), things get silly.

also counting the speeds only on mountain top finishes like on that graph is absolutely wrong and shouldn't be taken seriously. sorry.
on a multi mountain stage, you have to check every ascent.

They're not MTF only - they're generally the last big climb whether it's followed by a cliched descent into Gap or a descent and a small wall at the finish or whatever. Not sure what previous climbs on a multi stage add as they'll always be raced slower than the last one. Just look at the double Alpe stage a couple of years ago - the second ascent was a fair bit faster.

 

[jens_attacks]

of course the last one will be the fastest of the day. but the speed on it will be highly influenced by the tempo set on the previous climbs.
those calculations work only if the stages have one climb, otherwise it's useless

of course landis will climb slowish on toussuire after rocking the watts on saisies,aravis and colombiere. of course contador will tire on alpe d'huez after setting record on telegraphe and galibier, you get my point.