David Millar Velocitynation

[Slayer]

The placebo factor to doping is interesting. The fact that you know you have an edge must play apart in improving your performance. Just as knowing you don't have the edge can end up making you even worse, like the end of LeMond's career. So much of sport is about believing in your abilities.

 

[Jukebox]

Don't get me started...

The benefits Millar saw with my eyeballs swimming to the gills in EPO;

2000 TDF: 62nd Place
2001 TDF: Abandoned after Stage 10
2002 TDF: 68th Place
2003 TDF: 55th Place

I do disagree, now theres a suprise. His results in the Tour tell you everything about its benefits. I don't need to tell you anything. Did Millar see a continuation of success in the Tours & classics after EPO???.

2006
1st Individual pursuit, British National Track Championships
1st Stage 14, Vuelta a España
2007
1st British National Road Race Championships
1st British National Time Trial Championships
1st Prologue, Paris-Nice
2008
1st Stage 1 TTT Giro d'Italia
2nd Overall Tour of California
2009
1st Stage 20 Vuelta a España
1st Edinburgh Nocturne
Combativity award Stage 6, Tour de France

Again, I disagree. In fact, it can be argued he saw more success post EPO, as opposed to when he was swimming to the gills.

Millar was to ingonarant to know that increasing the oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood was only one limited factor to increasing cycling performance. He had another 8 or so legal factors to take advantage of but decided not to, EPO was better than dedicating his life to cycling & looking at other ways of increasing cycling performance.

You're quoting his final GC standings in the Tour vs his overall palmares, thats just idiotic. In your post EPO list the only TDF result is a combativity award, compare that with Malliot Jaunes and stage wins while on EPO. So, by your TDF-centric view EPO helped A LOT.

Edit: He finished 85th this year, a bit lower than 55, eh?

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

Good God people. I walk away for a half-day and the place turns into a food fight. My inbox fills with complaints, even direct e-mails, and threads are filled with nothing but post after post of bickering, antagonizing, nonsense.

What the hell happened to this place?

I'm starting to think this should be my avatar:

No, that wasn't meant as a joke.

 

[Ferminal]

The placebo factor to doping is interesting. The fact that you know you have an edge must play apart in improving your performance. Just as knowing you don't have the edge can end up making you even worse, like the end of LeMond's career. So much of sport is about believing in your abilities.

How would you know you have an edge if you know EPO doesn't work?

 

[Slayer]

How would you know you have an edge if you know EPO doesn't work?

They know it will have an effect. That knowledge will have a placebo effect that is positive in itself, on top of the drugs. A better example than EPO would probably be the tiny amounts of testosterone some take for recovery therapy. How much that actually helps them recover is more questionable than the benefits of EPO, yet the feeling that they're taking something that's helping them get the best recovery possible will play a positive psychological role.

It's obviously an area that is difficult to quantify, but there is no doubt 'belief' is someone absolutely vital to success.