JV talks, sort of

[JV1973]

Wow....Just wow. The level of ridiculousness here has risen to a level that few men have seen before.

Let me give you guys a small lesson in PR:

Good PR: Do controlled interview and then be quiet. Don't talk on twitter, don't post on forums, don't publish blood values. Just let the issue die in about 48hrs.

Bad PR: Be truthful in multiple settings and allow yourself to become the center of a debate that lasts months.

I am consciously guilty of bad PR. I was attempting to shed some light on topics that seem to feed on misinformation around here, basically because it bums me out that some of you are so disillusioned and figured that a bit of honesty would do some good.

But this is just ridiculous. I can't begin to try and unravel all the stupidity and misinformation. It is too vast.

The smart teams keep a spiffy image by not engaging in this crap. I need to remember that.

 

[JV1973]

Have you been to Perpignon or Girona?
Have you gone training in either of theses places?
Or are you just making it all up as you go along?

Perpignan is the windiest place in Europe and kind of sucks as a town. Basing a team there would be stupid, as French tax laws are rather dissuasive to anything entrepreneurial, including bike racing teams.

Plane tickets are considerably more expensive out of perpignan, and the average temperature in the winter is quite a bit lower.

The fois gras in perpignan is damn good tho!

 

[ChrisE]

So, why don't you continue the bad PR and give a take on Ashendon's recent article, as well as answering my question from a couple of weeks ago.

If you can win a GT clean nowadays, how come you want funding for testing tripled?

 

[JV1973]

While I expect that this will get lost in a sea of anally retentive trolling and **** waving, I will respond.

If I am misreading what you are saying then I apologise but from what you've said above and previously I take it then that you have not asked any of your riders who have not been sanctioned about doping on their past teams. While you had some idea of how 'in' the ex-USP riders were from your experience on the team, how can you make the same judgement call about riders who were on teams that you were less closely involved in?

Does this not bring us full circle back to the first question I asked you. Namely have unsanctioned dopers been compelled to confess/disclose their doping in the way in which sanctioned dopers have been.

It appears from what you have told us is that while Dekker was forced to undergo a 're-education' programme as a convicted ex-doper, unconvicted ex-dopers within Garmin are not obliged to do the same. It seems a little bit like a two tier process.

A question - if Dekker had not been caught and had just reached the end of his contract, how would you have approached signing him and dealing with your suspicions of past doping?

Don't you think that part of breaking omerta requires a basic level of openness about the past - even if this is conducted internally and not in public. Do you not also think that talking to people about how they avoided testing positive etc would help you in your anti-doping measures?

The problem with a reactive approach such as the one you propose is twofold. Firstly, it depends upon others to act as the triggers for change and reform. You are never instigators, and this leads to the second problem - the danger of being left behind. As you acknowledge, at the moment, things are for cycling moving relatively fast and we truly have little idea what the landscape will look like in 12 months time.

Although you say you are happy with your approach do you not think you can do more and be more assertive and proactive in encouraging riders to break omerta and to come forward about past doping? It is something of a sophist argument to say well because the radicals and reactionaries disagree with me our policy must be right. It could be that the reactionaries are wrong and the radicals are right. I am certainly more aware of voices saying either you are not radical enough, or you are doing fine, but I've never heard anyone complain that you are too radical.

Within your conservative reform framework, while it would be unrealistic to expect you to compel riders to blow the whistle - would you i) encourage (rather than compel) riders to blow the whistle about activities at their former teams, ii) support those riders who choose to blow the whistle?

Do you think that you have done enough to support whistleblowers? How do you feel about how David Millar reacted to Landis' accusations against Armstrong?

I'll tell you how I felt: I called David and told him I felt his comments were wrong. I believe in free speech, but I still expressed my opinion to him.

Don't worry, Floyd is over it. Had drinks with him a few weeks ago. He's doing much better, and I think he's starting back to school...At Yale.

 

[Benotti69]

Wow....Just wow. The level of ridiculousness here has risen to a level that few men have seen before.

Let me give you guys a small lesson in PR:

Good PR: Do controlled interview and then be quiet. Don't talk on twitter, don't post on forums, don't publish blood values. Just let the issue die in about 48hrs.

Bad PR: Be truthful in multiple settings and allow yourself to become the center of a debate that lasts months.

I am consciously guilty of bad PR. I was attempting to shed some light on topics that seem to feed on misinformation around here, basically because it bums me out that some of you are so disillusioned and figured that a bit of honesty would do some good.

But this is just ridiculous. I can't begin to try and unravel all the stupidity and misinformation. It is too vast.

The smart teams keep a spiffy image by not engaging in this crap. I need to remember that.

Which team has a spiffy image?

In my ridicolous opinion none of you have a spiffy clean image, but then I base my ridicolous ideas on the sport being cycling, run by UCI in its current guise with most of the important races under ASO/RCS ownership and plenty of anecdotes of microdoping and a leading blood scientist saying nothing has changed.

If you read the clinic you would see most teams have threads on them.

 

[JV1973]

No you are misrepresenting what is merely being suggested.

What is being suggested is that Girona is in Spain, which has a very lax attitude to doping.

What is being suggested is that yes Girona is close to an airport and that helps riders get to and from races, home and doping doctors(see Tyler).

It can also be centre that is good for training, but then so is just across the border in France, which has a hard line against doping.

Yes, in 1999 you are correct. Welcome to 2012. Spanish sporting fraud laws are just as strict as of 2007.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Perpignan is the windiest place in Europe and kind of sucks as a town. Basing a team there would be stupid, as French tax laws are rather dissuasive to anything entrepreneurial, including bike racing teams.

Plane tickets are considerably more expensive out of perpignan, and the average temperature in the winter is quite a bit lower.

The fois gras in perpignan is damn good tho!

Mr Vaughters, I insist, this deflection policy of only answering questions and responding to accusations talking about doping and various conspiracy theories on this board must end. It is time for you to take responsibility for your actions and face up to the difficult questions. Choose a side and stick to it. No more prevaricating, I need your answer in straight-talking, non-sugar-coated form:

Purple Rain or Sign O The Times?

Please.

 

[Benotti69]

Have you been to Perpignon or Girona?
Have you gone training in either of theses places?
Or are you just making it all up as you go along?

Yes I have been to Perpignan on more than one occasion.

No I didn't train there but then neither did I try and procure EPO there either.

 

[JV1973]

Mr Vaughters, I insist, this deflection policy of only answering questions and responding to accusations talking about doping and various conspiracy theories on this board must end. It is time for you to take responsibility for your actions and face up to the difficult questions. Choose a side and stick to it. No more prevaricating, I need your answer in straight-talking, non-sugar-coated form:

Purple Rain or Sign O The Times?

Please.

Purple Rain. Little Red Corvette, if you'll let me.

 

[benzwire]

Don't worry, Floyd is over it. Had drinks with him a few weeks ago. He's doing much better, and I think he's starting back to school...At Yale.

Yale Community College? I personally think he should go into standup comedy.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Yes I have been to Perpignan on more than one occasion.

No I didn't train there but then neither did I try and procure EPO there either.

In other words - you have not been to Girona.
So, you have no idea what you are on about - thought so.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Purple Rain. Little Red Corvette, if you'll let me.

Little Red Corvette is truly amazing, I shall grant you, but I feel that 1999 is just incomplete as an album (and strangely, a little overlong) compared to Purple Rain and Sign O The Times. Around The World In A Day is highly underrated in his œuvre, I feel, as well.

It is good to get a straight answer though. I have a policy of being inherently suspicious of those that claim not to like Purple Rain as claiming this marks them up as being clearly dishonest.

 

[AcademyCC]

Wow....Just wow. The level of ridiculousness here has risen to a level that few men have seen before.

Let me give you guys a small lesson in PR:

Good PR: Do controlled interview and then be quiet. Don't talk on twitter, don't post on forums, don't publish blood values. Just let the issue die in about 48hrs.

Bad PR: Be truthful in multiple settings and allow yourself to become the center of a debate that lasts months.

I am consciously guilty of bad PR. I was attempting to shed some light on topics that seem to feed on misinformation around here, basically because it bums me out that some of you are so disillusioned and figured that a bit of honesty would do some good.

But this is just ridiculous. I can't begin to try and unravel all the stupidity and misinformation. It is too vast.

The smart teams keep a spiffy image by not engaging in this crap. I need to remember that.

JV your certainly right about the bolded.

You say there is so much misinformation going on. We've been spoon fed the greatest load of lies for..... well forever. What the **** am I to believe or not to believe? Its like trying to put together the most complicated jig zaw ever invented without having a map or half the pieces. Should following a sport really be like that?

Its easy for you to make the 'wow, just wow' comments from inside the sport. It may be different if we were wildly speculating about a clean sport, but looks whats happening around you. Chaos.

 

[ChrisE]

Little Red Corvette is truly amazing, I shall grant you, but I feel that 1999 is just incomplete as an album (and strangely, a little overlong) compared to Purple Rain and Sign O The Times. Around The World In A Day is highly underrated in his œuvre, I feel, as well.

It is good to get a straight answer though. I have a policy of being inherently suspicious of those that claim not to like Purple Rain as claiming this marks them up as being clearly dishonest.

Purple Rain is one of my favorite albums. Appolonia rules in the movie. You have had your fun.

Now, about all of that extra required testing when clean teams rule the Giro? Crickets.

 

[Benotti69]

In other words - you have not been to Girona.
So, you have no idea what you are on about - thought so.

Care to give us the address where you stayed in Girona?

 

[Froome19]

JV your certainly right about the bolded.

You say there is so much misinformation going on. We've been spoon fed the greatest load of lies for..... well forever. What the **** am I to believe or not to believe? Its like trying to put together the most complicated jig zaw ever invented without having a map or half the pieces. Should following a sport really be like that?

Its easy for you to make the 'wow, just wow' comments from inside the sport. It may be different if we were wildly speculating about a clean sport, but looks whats happening around you. Chaos.

Well it would help if people came about with a more receptive attitude towards the fact that just possibly not the whole peloton is riddled with doping, then possibly JV would be able to show you how to put the jigsaw together. If you dont let him and others demonstrate how to put it together, then it will never be complete or even close to complete.

Effectively there is no chance of any doubts being quashed if people on here refuse to be even a minutely bit receptive.

 

[Benotti69]

Well it would help if people came about with a more receptive attitude towards the fact that just possibly not the whole peloton is riddled with doping.

Maybe you missed Ashenden writing the dark era is not gone it has a new guise.

 

[D-Queued]

In other words - you have not been to Girona.
So, you have no idea what you are on about - thought so.

I have been there.

But, that does not qualify or confirm whether I know what I am talking about.

Girona Cathedral - with the second widest church nave, after St. Peters

Dave.

 

[python]

Good job jv ignoring the trolling questions.

 

[JV1973]

JV your certainly right about the bolded.

You say there is so much misinformation going on. We've been spoon fed the greatest load of lies for..... well forever. What the **** am I to believe or not to believe? Its like trying to put together the most complicated jig zaw ever invented without having a map or half the pieces. Should following a sport really be like that?

Its easy for you to make the 'wow, just wow' comments from inside the sport. It may be different if we were wildly speculating about a clean sport, but looks whats happening around you. Chaos.

Yeah, I understand. No doubt there are reasons to be a doubter. But let me ask you this: How many times did the folks that lied to you for years just pop in on a forum to chat?

I'm happy to give the answers you're looking for, but my voice gets overpowered by folks on here that have already made up their mind, no matter what information is given to them. So, the whole thing unravels in stupid arguments over Girona (as an example, as it's one of many)...So, to say that I am currently being dissuaded from trying to give straight answers is an understatement, because no matter what I (or anyone) say or do, it's pointless to argue with people that already have made up their mind.

Arguing with a 'Stop' sign bears little fruit.

 

[The Hitch]

Well it would help if people came about with a more receptive attitude towards the fact that just possibly not the whole peloton is riddled with doping, .

fact or possibility? Which is it?

 

[Froome19]

Well it would help if people came about with a more receptive attitude towards the fact that just possibly not the whole peloton is riddled with doping, then possibly JV would be able to show you how to put the jigsaw together. If you dont let him and others demonstrate how to put it together, then it will never be complete or even close to complete.

Effectively there is no chance of any doubts being quashed if people on here refuse to be even a minutely bit receptive.

Maybe you missed Ashenden writing the dark era is not gone it has a new guise.

Why should I believe Ashenden anymore than I believe JV?

 

[JV1973]

Maybe you missed Ashenden writing the dark era is not gone it has a new guise.

Why on earth would Ashenden have any idea? He's presented with a few anomalous passport cases a year and is asked to render opinion on them. What does this have to do with a dark era continuing or not?

Sorry, but while I respect Michael and our doctors have a good working relationship with him, I don't think he's qualified to make an overarching judgement on professional cycling's current state.

I also think you are focusing on comments of his and creating your own context. Michael is ****ed at the UCI, as many of us are. That's where his venom is aimed. I seriously doubt he would have much negative to say about Garmin if directly asked.

I am arguing with a Stop sign, I know. Need to stop.

 

[the asian]

JV, what is your take on the amnesty proposed to dopers by UCI a few days back?
Have you had any discussions with Pat Macquaid on that issue?

I know you have wanted a Truth & reconciliation commission, Have you discussed with UCI on that? and is their suggestion as a result of any discussions with pro Tour teams.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Care to give us the address where you stayed in Girona?

No.

I have been there.

But, that does not qualify or confirm whether I know what I am talking about.


Girona Cathedral - with the second widest church nave, after St. Peters

Dave.

But you would agree that it is a wonderful little city?

Here is a foto I took recently - you may not recognize the area.... but I think JV would.