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JV talks, sort of

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Aug 17, 2009
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Without Floyd (starting with his positive test, not just his later revelations) none of the current movements towards improving the sport would be possible. That is absolutely true. Without Floyd, the Giro win would not have happened, because the pressure to change and implement things like bio-passport would not have been there. Puerto too. That was a huge impetus as well.

Hog: No, I don't do what's best for JV, I do what's best for the 120 people employed by Slipstream. That happens to coincide exactly with what is best for anti-doping (in my opinion, debatable, I know..) Again, you may not like the way I go about this, but over time, I think you'll find they are very efficacious at moving towards a cleaner sport. And btw - internal anti-doping is still in place, just not with Catlin, thanks.

Zin: You are absolutely spot on on all of your analysis. Sport may not perfectly clean, but it is clean enough that the talented athlete can win.
In the mid-late 1990's that was very rarely true. Your thoughts on pre-o2 vector doping are correct too. There was non-effective doping going on, but was it fundamentally changing race results? No.
Again, bravo on well stated and logically sound arguments that show a great degree of understanding and perhaps very good insider knowledge.
 
Benotti69 said:
Dont remember JV either admitting till t'other day, you name them with a few exceptions, Landis is part of a very large group.

But i guess Hog answered it best. JV wanted the TdF which he wouldn't have got with Landis.

JV looking after JV.

Anti-doping is in fashion at the moment hence confession. It was in fashion in 07 etc. after OP and Rasmussen hence internal team testing (now gone).
 
May 26, 2010
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Zinoviev Letter said:
I personally am shocked, shocked I tell you, to find the head of a business looking after the interests of that business.

(No really, I am. I'm Irish and I'm more used to business people gambling everything on property bubble roulette.)

Well then you will understand that JV is a cute hoor! He would like to pretend he is not but second hand car salesmen in Argyle does spring to mind.

I think he will be offering you a job soon as his press officer or spin doctor whichever you prefer to call it:D
 
May 26, 2010
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JV1973 said:
Without Floyd (starting with his positive test, not just his later revelations) none of the current movements towards improving the sport would be possible. That is absolutely true. Without Floyd, the Giro win would not have happened, because the pressure to change and implement things like bio-passport would not have been there. Puerto too. That was a huge impetus as well.

Hog: No, I don't do what's best for JV, I do what's best for the 120 people employed by Slipstream. That happens to coincide exactly with what is best for anti-doping (in my opinion, debatable, I know..) Again, you may not like the way I go about this, but over time, I think you'll find they are very efficacious at moving towards a cleaner sport. And btw - internal anti-doping is still in place, just not with Catlin, thanks.

Zin: You are absolutely spot on on all of your analysis. Sport may not perfectly clean, but it is clean enough that the talented athlete can win.
In the mid-late 1990's that was very rarely true. Your thoughts on pre-o2 vector doping are correct too. There was non-effective doping going on, but was it fundamentally changing race results? No.
Again, bravo on well stated and logically sound arguments that show a great degree of understanding and perhaps very good insider knowledge.

More JV speak.
 
JV1973 said:
Without Floyd (starting with his positive test, not just his later revelations) none of the current movements towards improving the sport would be possible. That is absolutely true. Without Floyd, the Giro win would not have happened, because the pressure to change and implement things like bio-passport would not have been there. Puerto too. That was a huge impetus as well.

Hog: No, I don't do what's best for JV, I do what's best for the 120 people employed by Slipstream. That happens to coincide exactly with what is best for anti-doping (in my opinion, debatable, I know..) Again, you may not like the way I go about this, but over time, I think you'll find they are very efficacious at moving towards a cleaner sport. And btw - internal anti-doping is still in place, just not with Catlin, thanks.

Zin: You are absolutely spot on on all of your analysis. Sport may not perfectly clean, but it is clean enough that the talented athlete can win.
In the mid-late 1990's that was very rarely true. Your thoughts on pre-o2 vector doping are correct too. There was non-effective doping going on, but was it fundamentally changing race results? No.
Again, bravo on well stated and logically sound arguments that show a great degree of understanding and perhaps very good insider knowledge.

That's silly. You’re being silly.

It was Puerto that busted the whole thing wide open and brought blood doping to the fore. Before then he general public was still believing in high cadence!

Floyd was run down by a good old fashion testy patch.

With OP the public learnt that doping was at a very sophisticated level and the sport was far from clean.

Regardless of hiring Floyd or not when he came out with the full story in 2010 he was left swinging in the wind for a long time before confessing came into fashion in 2012 - without the Federal investigation would your confession ever come?

In regards to the anti-doping movement I think you can hang your hat on a lot of what Landis did rather than what the Slipstream model brought. Not many brave enough as he was to bust it open like he did. That takes balls and there’s no gold medal for doing it. Floyd never had the opportunity to write pieces for the NY Times as you did.

Think about it.
 
Temper, temper.

Vaughters deserves credit for creating a team with the right environment and possibly setting a good example for others. He may not bust it wide open, but the sport needs people like him to maintain the gains, so we don't end up in a relapse like post Festina.
 
Aug 17, 2009
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thehog said:
That's silly. You’re being silly.

It was Puerto that busted the whole thing wide open and brought blood doping to the fore. Before then he general public was still believing in high cadence!

Floyd was run down by a good old fashion testy patch.

With OP the public learnt that doping was at a very sophisticated level and the sport was far from clean.

Regardless of hiring Floyd or not when he came out with the full story in 2010 he was left swinging in the wind for a long time before confessing came into fashion in 2012 - without the Federal investigation would your confession ever come?

In regards to the anti-doping movement I think you can hang your hat on a lot of what Landis did rather than what the Slipstream model brought. Not many brave enough as he was to bust it open like he did. That takes balls and there’s no gold medal for doing it. Floyd never had the opportunity to write pieces for the NY Times as you did.

Think about it.

I don't disagree. At all. That's what I just said.
 
JV1973 said:
I don't disagree. At all. That's what I just said.

I should add. I don’t dismiss what you’re doing with the team etc.

But anti-doping has now become a marketing term and less about a movement.

Reading the UCI’s recent spate of letters is just sad. Makes one feel it’s still 2002.

But there’s still a couple of guys who never had the opportunity you’ve been blessed with to confess in circumstances without retribution.

One suggestion; for internal anti-doping; is to build a website which explains everything you’re doing into layman terms. It’s time the general public understood what is real and what’s not. If things are clean(er) and if that’s a big part of the sport then it’s time to bring it into full view so people can begin to understand watts/power/VAM etc.
 
Benotti69 said:
More JV speak.

This is what's known as making the perfect the enemy of the good. Reducing the effectiveness of doping isn't anyone's end goal. But it is one of the most important advances.

Leave Vaughters and Garmin out of this for a moment. Let's say you start Team Benotti. Let's say that you are sincerely, 100% anti-doping. And let's say you are about to take on a promising, highly talented, neo-pro. Which of these situations is better?

1) If you talk honestly to the kid, you'll have to tell him that even with his ability he's going to be pack fodder at the very best. If he really develops into one of the most talented around, he might even one day finish his career with a single stage victory in the Dauphine Libere. If he doesn't develop very well, he probably won't even be able to hold down a pro contract. Unless of course he gets on the hot sauce.

2) If you talk honestly to the kid, you can tell him that there are still plenty of people out there cheating, but the degree to which they can get away with turbocharging is limited. He will have to be more talented than the dopers to consistently beat them, but if he works hard enough and if he has enough ability he might some day contend for a Grand Tour. And unlike those trying a shortcut, he won't run a better than even chance of taking a very embarrassing two year unpaid holiday.

Option (2) does not mean that doping has been eradicated or that it is on the verge of being eradicated. It doesn't even necessarily mean that it's less common that it was in the 70s or 80s. But like those periods, it means that the clean can compete in a way that they couldn't in more recent periods.
 
thehog said:
But anti-doping has now become a marketing term and less about a movement.

That's why to me at least Garmin is ahead of the game.

They were anti-doping before it was a marketing term, and presumably will be long after the current 'fashion' has faded.

If my daughter ever has aspirations in cycling, she would be lucky to come into the sort of environment.
 
JV1973 said:
Your thoughts on pre-o2 vector doping are correct too. There was non-effective doping going on, but was it fundamentally changing race results? No.

This is actually something I'm curious about. We all now know that oxygen vector doping is the magic bullet in endurance sports. And I think we're all pretty sure that traditional "unscientific" doping methods provide at best limited gains and more likely actual losses.

But what about other scientific doping methods? Surely things like steroids, testosterone etc, some of which were widely used in sports in the 80s and which still seem to be part of modern doping programmes (or at least people keep getting popped for them). What sort of gains do they provide in the absence of anything which messes around with the blood?

(This isn't just a question to JV, by the way.)
 
Aug 15, 2012
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Steroids, etc. can help improve the fraction of body mass that is muscle.

See Pistorius arguments elsewhere. Not specifically about doping, but about the biological cost of having to drag "extra" meat around that contributes little to speed.

By improving strength : weight it is possible to improve power : weight.
 
Aug 17, 2009
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I think it's very hard to quantify the differences things like cortisone and testosterone make. Both were available and used in the 1980's, but yet i don't think were overly effective. Even if they did help, it wasn't to the degree that a clean rider could not win, which is what happens with o2 vector doping.

With both test and cortisone, it probably varies from athlete to athlete. Am athlete with low natural testosterone would probably benefit quite a bit from supplemental. Conversely, someone with high test probably would not. Using it to the point of actually gaining muscle mass is a mixed bag too. More muscle, more weight.

Cortisone, same thing. It's anti-inflammatory properties can help you "feel" fast, but it's a catabolic hormone, and that has big downsides on performance too.

I am over simplifying, but these doping agents are not that effective. It's still cheating and I'm sure there are some performance gains to be had, but it's not game changing, like o2 vector stuff. With this stuff, "just say no" is totally viable, and winning races clean viable as well.

With 15% increases in hemoglobin? forget about it...
 
Catwhoorg said:
That's why to me at least Garmin is ahead of the game.

They were anti-doping before it was a marketing term

Not really. CSC and and other team(s) jumped on the Rasmus Damsgaard internal testing and promotion bandwagon a number of years ago under the guise of anti-doping. Of course, with the individuals involved a reasonable person had to wonder whether the goal was anti-doping or anti-positive-test, but it's not a new concept for pro tour teams.
 
Aug 13, 2009
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thehog said:
Regardless of hiring Floyd or not when he came out with the full story in 2010 he was left swinging in the wind for a long time before confessing came into fashion in 2012 - without the Federal investigation would your confession ever come?

I am not sure if it would have been in the NYT but JV talked to USADA many years before Floyd came out.

I share your disappointment that Floyd was never allowed to come back in a real way. Floyd is very talented and a crazy hard worker. I think he would do very well riding clean in the sport today.
 
Jul 10, 2010
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JV1973 said:
I think it's very hard to quantify the differences things like cortisone and testosterone make. Both were available and used in the 1980's, but yet i don't think were overly effective. Even if they did help, it wasn't to the degree that a clean rider could not win, which is what happens with o2 vector doping.

With both test and cortisone, it probably varies from athlete to athlete. Am athlete with low natural testosterone would probably benefit quite a bit from supplemental. Conversely, someone with high test probably would not. Using it to the point of actually gaining muscle mass is a mixed bag too. More muscle, more weight.

Cortisone, same thing. It's anti-inflammatory properties can help you "feel" fast, but it's a catabolic hormone, and that has big downsides on performance too.

I am over simplifying, but these doping agents are not that effective. It's still cheating and I'm sure there are some performance gains to be had, but it's not game changing, like o2 vector stuff. With this stuff, "just say no" is totally viable, and winning races clean viable as well.

With 15% increases in hemoglobin? forget about it...

We need to post a permanent link to this. A concise view and explanation of the effectiveness of various doping regimes. I'm putting it in my notes for reference in future discussions.
 
Aug 15, 2012
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Actually, FL is entered in a non-sanctioned but serious endurance road race later this year.

No idea what, if anything, he intends to do after that.

The Comeback II?
 
Mbo
Zinoviev Letter said:
This is actually something I'm curious about. We all now know that oxygen vector doping is the magic bullet in endurance sports. And I think we're all pretty sure that traditional "unscientific" doping methods provide at best limited gains and more likely actual losses.

But what about other scientific doping methods? Surely things like steroids, testosterone etc, some of which were widely used in sports in the 80s and which still seem to be part of modern doping programmes (or at least people keep getting popped for them). What sort of gains do they provide in the absence of anything which messes around with the blood?

(This isn't just a question to JV, by the way.)
Steroids will definitely be an advantage, denying this makes anyone look silly. And I'm talking micro dosages - not 1000 mg/w given to anemic patients pre EPO. And there are all those "wonderful" compounds that are easily detectable unless you dodge out of competition tests.

And I still consider corticosteroids the most underrated drugs out there for high volume training, one day classics and also stage races (and dropping weight as well...).

If EPO gives 2% (according to JV), a nice combo of the above will deliver 50% of it.
 
Jul 10, 2010
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Zinoviev Letter said:
I presume that these are rhetorical questions?

Landis would bring hassle to any team (including any squeaky clean team) because he's an out spoken loose cannon who has the undying enmity of just about every powerful figure in the sport and who has been the focus of an unending torrent of media vilification. I am not suggesting that's fair for a second. I'm saying that it's true. And if you are honest, I think you know it's true as well.

Others have probably already rebutted this - but here is another $.02.

Landis became outspoken, but he was not a loose cannon. Floyd proved himself a team player from way back. He must be of an independent mind, to do what he has done in his life. His actions seem somewhat vindictive, but to say he had provocation would be understatement. Outspoken I can buy, a loose cannon I do not. That he has also become a target as the result of bearing unwelcome news, I also buy that. So, I only disagree with that portion of your point. Although, I am skeptical that he has " the undying enmity of just about every powerful figure in the sport". That seems a bit much also.
 
AntiGravityCycling said:
Steroids, etc. can help improve the fraction of body mass that is muscle.

See Pistorius arguments elsewhere. Not specifically about doping, but about the biological cost of having to drag "extra" meat around that contributes little to speed.

By improving strength : weight it is possible to improve power : weight.

Crazy weight loss is the new blood doping.
 
JV1973 said:
I think it's very hard to quantify the differences things like cortisone and testosterone make. Both were available and used in the 1980's, but yet i don't think were overly effective. Even if they did help, it wasn't to the degree that a clean rider could not win, which is what happens with o2 vector doping.

With both test and cortisone, it probably varies from athlete to athlete. Am athlete with low natural testosterone would probably benefit quite a bit from supplemental. Conversely, someone with high test probably would not. Using it to the point of actually gaining muscle mass is a mixed bag too. More muscle, more weight.

Cortisone, same thing. It's anti-inflammatory properties can help you "feel" fast, but it's a catabolic hormone, and that has big downsides on performance too.

I am over simplifying, but these doping agents are not that effective. It's still cheating and I'm sure there are some performance gains to be had, but it's not game changing, like o2 vector stuff. With this stuff, "just say no" is totally viable, and winning races clean viable as well.

With 15% increases in hemoglobin? forget about it...

Thanks for this, it's very interesting.
 
Neil Browne's take on this.

http://www.roadcycling.com/articles/Vaughters-Doping-Confession_005058.shtml

Vaughters has hired riders that have served a suspension for doping, but curiously Landis wasn't included. I asked Floyd and he told me, "I asked JV for a job and he told me he can't hire me."


As long as you are here JV, can we get an explanation for why you could not hire Landis? One of your fundamental tenants for fighting doping is secrecy, apparently to prevent damage to the sport. How much scandal would have been prevented if someone would had given Floyd a job?
 
Race Radio said:
Those 2% were a simplification used by JV himself to give a number for the mass medias readers. Of course power values are different (JV is on top of things appearently). O2 vectors are of course most effective but never ever should anyone "discredit" those oldschool methods as marginal losses.

Unfortunately I cannot back this up atm but even disco drugs such as crystal affect protein synthesis enough to provide measurable "marginal" gains.