Jonathan Tiernan-Locke written to by UCI, asked to explain blood values

Page 79 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Oct 16, 2010
19,912
2
0
hrotha said:
Sad thing is it paid off anyway, even overdoing it so blatantly. He was a nobody before and he got his time on the spotlight. Depending on how much money he burned on his defense, chances are a rider in his same situation would still come out on top financially.
financially, perhaps.
but for guys that get exposed like lance, floyd, ricco, JTL, Rasmussen, Jaksche, I don't see any emotional pay off there.
It's not hard to predict such guys ending up with a depression or two.
For JTL, I don't think the short time in the spotlight will balance out the emotional humiliation of getting caught and banned.

The riders for whom we can say it pays off to dope, both financially and emotionally, are dividable into three categories: those who don't get caught, those with a Garmin factor working for them, and those who got a chance to come clean while throwing Lance under the bus. (indeed, there's some overlap between the categories)

edit: imo
 
This has made my week !

This sport just gives and gives, no wonder we are addicted.

This is just too funny for words, why waste keyboard time ? This guy is going nowhere near to spitting in the soup ! He just put this out there to take the p**s and Sir Dave and Fran thought it would also be a laugh so gave the OK.

6. The explanation put forward by Mr. Tiernan-Locke is that on the evening of 20 September 2012, .............. he went on an alcoholic binge. He then did not eat or drink on the following day, save for a few sips of water when he took painkillers. It is argued ......

Look at his profile -

The guy spent three years doing a degree and didn't qualify. The profile of a successful athlete, every single one I have known, is that they can concentrate. Some might not be that bright, but sure as hell they can focus. No one with a the personality to become a high performing athlete is going to spend three years of their life and then can it. OK I can buy the guy bailing out if he had a bigger opportunity elsewhere but he bails out of his degree to go and work in a bike shop. Come on - get real.

2010 - Rapha Condor - John Herety - red lights and sirens wailing - dramatic change in form means only one thing, with "uncle John" as your mentor.

That he was predisposed to the "advice" of dearest john, is exhibited in those 10 podiums in 10 races in France earlier on. This is a guy who wanted to win at any cost and any cost did not mean doing the "hard yards". Success means treading on everyone else.

Now, he knows that Sky are going to announce his signing a £400,000 a year contract in early Oct and at the Worlds he is team leader for GB/Sky, so he wants us to believe that on Thursday night he gets blind drunk and can't eat all Friday but rides a stormer on Sunday finishing 19th ! Hilarious, it is like "all that EPO was for my dog", or "that van load of dope was for my mother in law".

There is going to be no exposure - the deal may have been along these lines - "You w****r ! We know that we told you that you run your own program, but you keep it quiet and don't tell any other riders, but we had around you all the checks and stuff to make sure you kept under. Just don't kick the ar*e out of it. But NO, before you even sign for it, you couldn't help wanting to become the greatest ever. Why didn't you use the tests to see where you were ?
So now all of us look sick. Brad's wins, Froomes wins, my mangement, the whole Sky project is at risk because you took too big a bite. Now, we can spit you out, no salary, no support, trash you in the press and feed you to the dogs, so that you won't even get a gig in a bike shop. Or, you play ball, you keep quiet. We pay you £400,000 a year until this all plays out which will put what, the best part of £300,000 in your pocket, after tax. Now for that you do as we tell you. Afterwards, you will serve your ban, without doing anything dumb and afterwards, as you know, there are plenty of teams that will employ a "quiet rider". Fran will get Dave to make introductions for you and get you a contract, but that only happens if you get to the end of your ban without saying anything dumb. "

Locke might have to pay off a couple of other people to keep quiet but this is going to be all "happy families".

Loved his earlier excuseas well - and just look who pops up ! Such a cozy family sport "Andrew McQuaid, told Telegraph Sport: “We are currently planning to answer the questions raised by the UCI and we’re extremely confident that, once we present our answers, the case won’t go any further."

And that "watertight case" was - I got tanked 2 days before the Worlds.

Perhaps St David will train him to take on his mantle, oops, forgetting Locke is still protesting "it wuz not me guv", not moved onto the next stage yet !

That it is a copy of Floyd excuse No 1 is just to remind everyone that Lance would now be beatified by the Pope if Floyd had been allowed a minor domestique role after serving his ban and spending all that money of the Floyd Fairness Fund protesting his innocence.

So JTL can look forward to many happy years. Everyone, but everyone knows exactly what went on and this was a sign to all in the sport that nobody, no team, no manager is going to make the dumb mistakes Lance did, that way, we all look good.

The Omerta is paramount.
 
the sceptic said:
never forget...

Yes, lest we forget....

Sky's April 2012 training camp

Despite having been ill after the Settimana Coppi e Bartali, the capabilities Tiernan-Locke displayed at Sky's Tenerife training camp in April were instrumental in orchestrating his move for 2013.

"I had an SRM on and we were doing all these timed efforts and tests. Tim Kerrison was there analysing all that data, doing all the blood lactate checks and all that.

"I hadn't used power in a while and it surprised me. We set off at different intervals for an hour-long climbing test. It was half of their Tour de France team and me, and although we couldn't see each other because we set off at different times, I was right up there.

"Ever since that training camp I've changed a few things; my position has changed a bit and I'm not pushing such a big gear."
 
Aug 13, 2009
12,854
2
0
One case that the biological passport did get right was Jonathan Tiernan-Locke. When he popped back into the scene I just took one look at the way he was riding and I knew 100% that he was loaded up to the eyeballs. He had basically been off the bike for five years and had a reputation for bouncing off the walls of the nightclubs during that time.

Then he comes back on a sh*thouse team and is riding off the front against the best riders in the world, and putting minutes into them. Had he ever done that before? I didn’t need to look at any bio passport when he came back — I just knew because of the way he was annihilating everyone else in the races that he was up to his eyeballs on EPO.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2014/08/the-secret-pro-transfer-season/

If it was so obvious why did SKY not test him? Odd
 
Got to share with you my experience on the run up to Valkenburg. A friend was going out to the Worlds. He cycles and has an amusing interest in the drug scandals and the soap opera but is going there to socialise and meet other old friends. He does not follow the sport week-in, week-out. He knows my views on the sport.

"So tell me about this JTL fellow - whipped all the pro's in the Tour of Britain, come out of nowhere - goes like stink."
(Listens to my drivel of a response.)
"He must have found the elixir of life, Brailsford needs to sign him up quick, before anyone else does, he could teach Brad and Froome a trick or two, he has obviously sorted out some new heart rate training system like Keen did with Boardman, or some special Chinese herbal remedy."

Only then did the penny drop - even to the semi informed aficionado in 2012, it was obvious that JTL was juiced-2-the-MAX. We just needed to pull up a chair, crack open a beer, sit back, and wait. JTL was going to fall off the roof sometime soon.

I only wish I could have been half as witty as my mate.
 
Race Radio said:

Wow with all that hindsight and UK centric inside info, that "Secret Pro" sure sounds like St David's alter ego, making a pitch for a job.

Sir David was so busy doing press calls answering all those questions about how could be be the greatest ever manager/coach in the whole of the Universe, TdF, London 2012. Also breaking was the reasoned decision and he knew Barry was about to be exposed. Worried about whether that domino would knock any others.

Julrich, Leinders, Yates, Sutton, de Jong, the press were sniffing.

His eye, never one to look too closely anyway, was off the ball.
 

stutue

BANNED
Apr 22, 2014
875
0
0
If Sky doped JTL, as per Hog claim, they were astonishingly unsuccessful......especially if they are doping team who evade detection. Doesn't make sense.

What does beg questions is why they signed a rider who had made such sudden improvement. At best, it makes them incredibly naieve. At worst, unlucky.
 
stutue said:
If Sky doped JTL, as per Hog claim, they were astonishingly unsuccessful......especially if they are doping team who evade detection. Doesn't make sense.

What does beg questions is why they signed a rider who had made such sudden improvement. At best, it makes them incredibly naieve. At worst, unlucky.

Personally I don't believe in team wide doping. I do think that they may be turning a blind eye or not asking questions they should be at times though...
 
stutue said:
Same can't be said of Froome.

Froome progressed whilst with Sky. JTL bombed.

I think it's more the rapid rise than timing in this case.

It does raise an interesting question though. If JTL was removed from the dope, and that seems possible considering he bombed, why was Froome kept on it?

Personal opinion:

There's no team wide programme.

Froome is better than JTL, he does not need such a ridiculous programme and can manage himself better to stay within the confines of the passport and still perform.

JTL had to dope to get the contract, then had to cut back and that's why he bombed.
 
Jun 13, 2012
204
0
0
King Boonen said:
Personally I don't believe in team wide doping. I do think that they may be turning a blind eye or not asking questions they should be at times though...

I don't believe in aliens but people claim to have seen them! Come on Sir when the coach at the college level say you better find some steroids or your scholarship is gone!! He's not handing them to you but he's supporting it! At least the same here!!
 
King Boonen said:
Personally I don't believe in team wide doping. I do think that they may be turning a blind eye or not asking questions they should be at times though...
+1
I think you will find they have an internal testing program which is mandatory. Riders can have additional tests if they want to.
the legal imperative is that BC process formal positives from UKAD, like they have to. Anything else is like Tramadol. If it ain't illegal, it ain't cheating.
 
May 26, 2009
4,114
0
0
I don't follow any British/Sky riders on twitter but I'm guessing they've really given JTL a kicking on twitter. Along the same lines that Cavendish said about Ricco etc.
 
Jun 13, 2012
204
0
0
So not supplying but encouraging we're is the diffrence?? They hint after that were to go to get stronger this way university is clean but they have a program behind the scenes so they have their scapegoat if all fails
 
senatorrick said:
I don't believe in aliens but people claim to have seen them! Come on Sir when the coach at the college level say you better find some steroids or your scholarship is gone!! He's not handing them to you but he's supporting it! At least the same here!!

Quit the hyperbole, I've had enough of that with Alex Salmond...

I don't believe Sky are pushing drugs on anyone. They're not stupid and they've seen what has happened in the past to teams that organise large doping programmes or force riders into it. You end up with too many loose ends. That's not to say they aren't turning a blind eye or telling riders to cut back when they know they are doping. That method keeps the circle much smaller and is limited to people who have as much to lose as each other.
 
Dec 13, 2012
1,859
0
0
'Jonthn Tiernan-Locke ‏@J_T_Locke 18 Jan 2013
Lance, er...thanks for sharing. Guess those books belong in the fiction section now'

Having a go at Lance, when he was on Edgar himself - what a guy.
 

stutue

BANNED
Apr 22, 2014
875
0
0
I don't know what they are doing or not doing but I do think that they can't afford a positive test and survive... which is why I struggle to accept that if there is any doping going on that it is unsupervised.
 
King Boonen said:
I think it's more the rapid rise than timing in this case.

It does raise an interesting question though. If JTL was removed from the dope, and that seems possible considering he bombed, why was Froome kept on it?

Personal opinion:

There's no team wide programme.

Froome is better than JTL, he does not need such a ridiculous programme and can manage himself better to stay within the confines of the passport and still perform.

JTL had to dope to get the contract, then had to cut back and that's why he bombed.

The point missed was he took a massive step in terms of races between 2012 and 2013.

Distance and competition wise was much longer and stronger. His Worlds performance was by far his best by a long way. A long long way.

You can't compare say Paris-Nice to 88km stages in January 2012. Not even in the same ballpark.
 
Jun 13, 2012
204
0
0
Freddythefrog said:
+1
I think you will find they have an internal testing program which is mandatory. Riders can have additional tests if they want to.
the legal imperative is that BC process formal positives from UKAD, like they have to. Anything else is like Tramadol. If it ain't illegal, it ain't cheating.

Yep the same way American college athletes pass classes that they never attend but there's testing for dope at that level which is financially as successful as cycling team if not more, in plain English yes we do internal testing athletes get the grades it's all swept under the bridge for the millions! get over it A lot of you guys think Travis he's a hero why doesn't he turn that **** towards the NFL oh because he's not allowed easy to go after one man one *******! It's never going to change! People are doing more Ped's now than they did in the 90s.
 

stutue

BANNED
Apr 22, 2014
875
0
0
SundayRider said:
'Jonthn Tiernan-Locke ‏@J_T_Locke 18 Jan 2013
Lance, er...thanks for sharing. Guess those books belong in the fiction section now'

Having a go at Lance, when he was on Edgar himself - what a guy.

Don't be surprised or outraged. Its standard practice.

At least Vino wasn't a hypocrit.
 
Jun 13, 2012
204
0
0
King Boonen said:
Quit the hyperbole, I've had enough of that with Alex Salmond...

I don't believe Sky are pushing drugs on anyone. They're not stupid and they've seen what has happened in the past to teams that organise large doping programmes or force riders into it. You end up with too many loose ends. That's not to say they aren't turning a blind eye or telling riders to cut back when they know they are doping. That method keeps the circle much smaller and is limited to people who have as much to lose as each

I'm sorry I did not know you I'm not attacking you I just don't think you may have ever been around athletics the make money.