Dual subject : Vino and other relatively clean/dirty 2010 TdF riders

[sars1981]

I like Vino. Could have two stage wins by now if Alberto didn't steal his glory earlier.

 

[Barrus]

I just saw it again.
14s Vino had with over 3km of flat, headwind to go. He held it, with reserve to spare.
Were the sprinting teams THAT tired from the climb? More so than Vino, apparently. Not one guy would go in the lead and match Vino's speed.
No dope in the world makes that happen for Vino. Just all at once, the sprint teams that had been preparing for hours to bring their men into position, didn't want to win anymore. At least not badly enough.
I see it, but can hardly believe it.
So many cycling wins are bought, perhaps more even that frauded through dope, certainly at lower level.
I don't always go for conspiracies, but this is just odd.

To be clear there was really only one person working in the peloton, a guy from Milram, the rest of the sprinters teams did not really seem that interested in getting Vino back, also Alberto did good work by disorganizing the chase

 

[Pedaaldanser]

Can someone refresh my memory on the details of what happened in 2007? Was everything 100% certain or was a bit of it shrouded in mystery? I only remember him saying 'if it was my father's blood I'd have tested positive for vodka'

 

[oncehadhair]

Vino has character and he's unpredictable. He makes the race exciting. He's served suspension for doping, unlike the other 85% of the peloton who have not missed a race but still doped.

I'm not a supporter of doping in any way - in fact believe everything should be done to eradicate it but if the rest of the peloton are not testing positive yet their performances point to it, and they are still racing, why pick on Vino.

He won in an honourable way yesterday. Good luck to him.

 

[Cloxxki]

I still can't grasp it. One Milram guy chasing Vino, and Contador doing his disruptions, a barely 60kg guy disrupting the sprint teams, yeah right.
So they race like hell to get the 3 (really super fast) guys back from their escape, and then lose interest.

Vino was indeed almost caught back by the peloton, when he went again. He'd not done much leading, but at least he'd accelerated before on the same climb.
Certainly the climbing we've seen from Schleck and Contador have been more explosive, the way they made up ground on Sanchez...but at least then, volunteers could be found to chase them for the win.

After the info reaching us the past months, I now consider Vino the guy that messed up with a sub-par blood program. It could be that now it's on the good program, and the leaders of the other teams have met him there. You don't chase a "blood brother" who might not be as tight-lipped next time around.
Anyway, Vino was not the bad boy of 2007, he was he stupid boy, for getting caught. We were all looking out for the latest EPO flavor, when these guys were just recycling blood like it was rainwater to flush the toilet. Vino ran out of his own, and borowed some, stupid him.
As arrogant as he presents himself, the crown prince of Kazakhstan, riders seem to let him be. Don't want to get him angry too much. Perhaps he did what Landis tried. Threaten with some info, if they wouldn't let him just do his thing, like the others. Even without implicating anyone, Vino with his name could have done real damage to cycling. Like saying his privately funded program wasn't like the other teams had, and he'd mess up with th logistics, asking a brother or cousin whether he could bother him for a bag or 2.

If these riders are appearing to be pedaling fewer watts, and still are spposed to try to win, then it seems they would ride cleaner now. Pure talents, who recover quickly, even during a climb, get lots better card hands all at once. I know a rider who is not the fastest, quite low VO2max even for someone who wins national jerseys, but can "go" more often than others. He'll keep on attacking, until finally the chasers give in and let him go.
Some of the young talents, I want to believe they are clean. And if they're not, I hope to come to that conclusion before their 7th Tour win this time around.

 

[Mellow Velo]

I just saw it again.
14s Vino had with over 3km of flat, headwind to go. He held it, with reserve to spare.
Were the sprinting teams THAT tired from the climb? More so than Vino, apparently. Not one guy would go in the lead and match Vino's speed.
No dope in the world makes that happen for Vino. Just all at once, the sprint teams that had been preparing for hours to bring their men into position, didn't want to win anymore. At least not badly enough.
I see it, but can hardly believe it.
So many cycling wins are bought, perhaps more even that frauded through dope, certainly at lower level.
I don't always go for conspiracies, but this is just odd.

Then watch it again and you will see that the group was being pulled by a single Milram rider, for much of the chase. The chase was totally disorganised after the climb. That's how attacks off this type of final climb works.
It's not the numbers sitting behind that count, but the number of riders on the front.

The truth is, Columbia used up all their men controlling the break and had no one left, when it counted.

 

[Mellow Velo]

I still can't grasp it. One Milram guy chasing Vino, and Contador doing his disruptions, a barely 60kg guy disrupting the sprint teams, yeah right.
So they race like hell to get the 3 (really super fast) guys back from their escape, and then lose interest.

Then don't blame Vino, blame Columbia.
Big tactical error in taking up the chase of the breakaway, far too early.
They could have played the "Renshaw bluff", but didn't.

They used up all their engines before the final climb and had no one left to chase down the break that counted.

No way was a single Milram rider pulling Vino back. The fact that Contador could get onto the head to disrupt, shows both the speed and level of disorganisation, within the group.

 

[M Sport]

Van Den Broeck? Seems a little ahead of where he should be in my opinion.

 

[sportzchick]

The difference between the three is Vino is liked and Basso/Millar isnt isnt....

Liked or not makes no difference once done for doping you shouldnt come back

 

[smaryka]

Watching Gerdemann going out the back door at the start of the climb today made me remember that he volunteered to make all his numbers and tests public.

So I'm pretty sure he's clean.

 

[scribe]

How exacty is Vino turning himself inside out, day in and day out? He must REALLY be amazing with the right blood inserted.

 

[altark123]

How exacty is Vino turning himself inside out, day in and day out? He must REALLY be amazing with the right blood inserted.

If he is truly clean he is on incredible form, should have worked for a podium spot IMO. But, he is playing selfless teammate and riding great.

 

[La Pandera]

I missed Balan's other action, can't get much TV time in al days.

The Vino performances are just adding up. He seems no less a rider than when caught for blood doping.

Others who did not get caught, are performing below expectations.

I think you are forgetting Vino's circumstances at the Tour when he was caught. It was, as he stated to the media, his last chance at winning the Tour. He suffered a pretty damaging crash that really limited his ability to pedal and thus threatened what he thought was his final opportunity to obtain his dream. Desparate people do desparate and stupid things. How he thought he would get away with it is beyond me but ultimately his riding style hasn't changed. He's still getting dropped by the best climbers, he's still attacking relentlessly whether he's tired or not so if he's doping now, was doping then and the general consensus in this subforum is that most of the successful Tour riders are on the juice what is the point of this thread?

 

[La Pandera]

Personally everybody makes mistakes and deserves a second chance"
But just a question.Why did Vino and Basso(just examples)dope in the first place?There results seem to be better/on par with their past,so why do it?Obviously these talented riders dont need to dope to win?or do they?Confused!

Basso was trying to become a part of history by doing the Giro/Tour double and to beat the reigning 6 time Tour champion all at once. I think he knew that he would need that boost to recover from the Giro, regardless of how much he dominated the event (he won by 9 minutes I believe). He likely was already juiced coming from the Giro and with the results of his enhanced performance being what they were he couldn't resist keeping the ball rolling.

I stated my opinion on Vino's motivations in a previous post.

 

[La Pandera]

I thought I saw Vino just being so mutant strong that Ballan could not hold the wheel.

By the time Vino reached Ballan, Ballan had been virtually sprinting out of the saddle for 2 km's uphill. I remember wondering how he (Ballan) could sustain that pace and level of effort without blowing up. He's not a little climber but a cobbled classics specialist. If what Vino did was out of the norm for him, I could accept the doubts, but this is what he does and always has. Even Vandevelde said he can't question Vino's performances since his return because they trained in the same place on the mountains in the early season and he saw how hard Vino was working, admittedly much, much harder than himself, and how he was continually attacking his teammates in the mountains.

I can't help but remember the year at the Tour, Champs Elyssee, Vino trailing Leipheimer by seconds for I believe 5th place. Not only did he take the sprint bonus time while battling Leipheimer and 2 of his Gerolsteiner teammates, he also won the final sprint and thus pimp slapped Leipheimer and snatched his cookies, those being his position in the gc. An indomitable spirit from the first time I noticed him in the sport back when he was winning back to back Paris-Nice's.

 

[skidmark]

The difference between the three is Vino is liked and Basso/Millar isnt isnt....

Liked or not makes no difference once done for doping you shouldnt come back

Liked by whom? The peloton? General fandom? This forum? Whichever one you're saying, I would disagree that Basso and Millar are disliked. With regards to this forum (as I admittedly can draw few conclusions about the other 2 groups with any confidence), I don't think Basso and Millar are disliked so much as Vino's panache and attacking style are admired by cycling fans, as they create a good amount of suspense and spectacle and make the bike race that much more interesting to watch. Basso, in winning the Giro, was impressive, but it was much less exciting to watch him ride everyone off his wheel than it is to see someone like Vinokourov do an unexpected attack and watch on the edge of your seat to see if he holds it to the line. Millar is hard to gauge as an exciting rider because he's in the peloton mostly, although anyone paying attention to bike racing would see that he's doing a brave ride injured in the Tour this year, often does good selfless work for his teammates on the front, and did an admirable ride in Paris-Roubaix this year. All of these riders have different admirable qualities (this is entirely aside from anything you may think about them off the bike, ie. personality, doping history, etc), but Vino's style tends to elicit bursts of joy on internet message boards while the qualities of the other riders named are less obvious and immediate, and so don't receive as much comment.

As for your comment on doping, fair enough if you have that opinion but that is not the way it is. There are not lifetime bans for first offenders. And while riders are allowed to/are riding in bike races, I personally think it's fine to cheer for them. Frankly, I think that if you only want to cheer for riders who don't dope, you should maybe not watch cycling because I suspect that there are many, many riders who have not been caught/sanctioned that did/do dope.

As for the OP, I think that, based on performances in this Tour, I'm pretty sure that Rogers and Wigans are riding pretty clean, and I have very little doubt that Gerdemann is riding entirely clean.

 

[scribe]

I thought I saw Vino just being so mutant strong that Ballan could not hold the wheel.

What does it add up to when you see what Vino did the day prior to that, and particularly the work he did the day after that performance? Menchov and Sanchez must be thanking their lucky fortunes he isn't shooting for a podium spot.

 

[Moose McKnuckles]

How exacty is Vino turning himself inside out, day in and day out? He must REALLY be amazing with the right blood inserted.

Almost as amazing as Lance.

 

[Bennyl]

firstly, in 5 years I have never come to the clinic to read any comments as I'd rather try and enjoy the racing.

But watching Vino over the last few days..... oh my gosh!

Now he rode the Giro, and rode it HARD. (sorry about the caps). He attacked on any flat and medium stage and worked his guts out for the win in the mountains but couldn't hold on.

Then here in France (in a higher speed race), he has put in numerous attacks. He attacks on stage 12 over a very steep climb. All the other riders mention how tough the stage was on everybody.

Then the next day without any recovery needed, he waltzes off for a stage win ahead of the sprinter teams.

Then yesterday, he plays a major part in the stage, setting the pace and pulling up the climb over a non-categorised but still comes in only 2 minutes behind and he currently sits only 7 minutes behind the leaders, 4 and 1/2 minutes behind 3rd. All this after trying to win on stage 12, winning stage 13 and spending himself in support of AC.

I admit, I know nothing about doping, but isn't recovery the major advantage?

On his form, Vino shouldn't be wasting his energy supporting AC, AC should be supporting him!!!

I am speechless, its got me stumped. Does anyone have any reasonable explanation cause, i'd love to hear one, no matter how far fetched.

 

[roundabout]

Basso seems very human in this Tour.

 

[doublestandard]

Watching the daily TDF replay on TV5Monde, which is the only channel in the US I don't have to mute, and OMG -- HUGE HUGE props to Vino!!

I didn't realize that he dragged his group up to the lead group and then still was the one to go after Schleck!! Simply amazing!!

 

[smaryka]

Roche. How can he possibly be clean? What kind of clean rider says openly after getting screwed by a teammate and losing time, "I can hang in there on the climbs and hope some of the guys in front of me blow up like they did today, or I can get in an early move and try to stay away to the finish, taking back a bit of time."?

What kind of clean rider even thinks they have the option open to them and assumes a good day is a given?

 

[Hotbrakes]

Another stage and Vino is in another breakaway. That guy is a dirty cheat. If he is riding clean, then he is a Russian experiment and may be a robot.

 

[Franklin]

miraculous, isn't it ? i've never seen anyone perform as well after a two-year ban.

ed rader

Indeed. Mr-favorite-son-in-law Ivan Basso is obviously something completely different. Considering becoming 4th in the Giro and the Vuelta then the year after winning the Giro isn't suspicious at all.

 

[Franklin]

Basso was trying to become a part of history by doing the Giro/Tour double and to beat the reigning 6 time Tour champion all at once.

Lance already retired.