JV talks, sort of

[sniper]

In addition to the previous post, can JV or any of his sweet talkers (as opposed to the 5 or 6 loons to which I suppose I belong) chime in and explain what "this, that and the other" means?

Says Vaughters: “People today look at the sport and say, ‘There could still be doping.’ And yes, there could be. And is the biological passport flawless? No, it’s not. But what it does effectively do is tie things down so that the gains that can be made doping today are so small that you can overcome it with marginal gains—with better skinsuits and nutrition and this, that, and the other.

 

[the big ring]

In addition to the previous post, can JV or any of his sweet talkers (as opposed to the 5 or 6 loons to which I suppose I belong) chime in and explain what "this, that and the other" means?

Facts should never get in the way of a good story.

We have been open about the process, and we invite everyone to look at the method behind what we do. We’d be losing our competitive advantage if we gave away all the details of that method, but the actual process behind it, we’ve been very open about.

Kerrison says there are no secrets, and that it is quite simple. Even something as apparently simple as the warm-downs offer a clue. “I think everyone can see,” says Kerrison, “that we’re prepared to do things that other teams aren’t prepared to do.”

http://www.cyclesportmag.com/features/tim-kerrison-the-man-behind-bradley-wiggins’-tour/

 

[Jeremiah]

I haven't been following the thread closely.

I did read the NY Times opinion piece JV wrote. I also skimmed the Bicycling piece fairly quickly.

I'm sympathetic to JV however the narrative is no longer his.

If he's allocuted to the authorities, which I believe he's done; great.

IMHO, he should give a detailed allocution of all his doping without the commentary or justifications for his pre USPS and post USPS careers, assuming he's given USPS details to USADA, UCI, and/or WADA with the understanding all the details would be released to the public.

He should have done this at the time of SCA when Frankie and Betsy testified. He would have spared us the Armstrong return and all of the ensuing bs.

Major fail for not coming clean then.

 

[Jeremiah]

Hedging by jv

In addition to the previous post, can JV or any of his sweet talkers (as opposed to the 5 or 6 loons to which I suppose I belong) chime in and explain what "this, that and the other" means?

You've just made two very good posts.


I'm really tired of JV's song and dance routine.

He's been managing it quite well the past 6 years or so.

Everybody has their day of reckoning and he's held back his for quite a long time.

I'm starting to realize that some of the arguments in support of JV are similiar to the tack Armstrong has taken, ie, 'the good he does outweighs the lack of complete transparency.'

Complete transparency without seeking to control the narrative would be much better.

You can't have it both ways although JV made a heck of an effort.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

I haven't been following the thread closely.

I did read the NY Times opinion piece JV wrote. I also skimmed the Bicycling piece fairly quickly.

I'm sympathetic to JV however the narrative is no longer his.

If he's allocuted to the authorities, which I believe he's done; great.

IMHO, he should give a detailed allocution of all his doping without the commentary or justifications for his pre USPS and post USPS careers, assuming he's given USPS details to USADA, UCI, and/or WADA with the understanding all the details would be released to the public.

He should have done this at the time of SCA when Frankie and Betsy testified. He would have spared us the Armstrong return and all of the ensuing bs.

Major fail for not coming clean then.

Both your posts are based on one flawed point - that JV witnessed directly that LA doped.

To the highlighted - I would be very sure that he has done detailed all he knows to USADA. However, it is not for him to seek that all information be released publicly.

To the blue - done what? Why would saying he doped have any effect on the SCA case (even if it was about doping in USPS, which ultimately, it wasn't)

And suggesting he tell all to the UCI ....

 

[the big ring]

I wonder if we will ever have any corroboration on the claims JV has made, the things he has said. There's no mention, but I am assuming here he was not doping solo.

 

[Fatclimber]

I wonder if we will ever have any corroboration on the claims JV has made, the things he has said. There's no mention, but I am assuming here he was not doping solo.

The recent article is more revealing with more specifics. On his first team his director, Nunez, implemented a doping program. He said his doping at C-A was all himself.

We can speculate till the cows come home on JV's true intentions for coming out: PR, damage control, seeking attention… Heck, the thought even crossed my mind that he's a cat-hater and just wanted BroDeal to change his avatar. Too bad it only worked for a couple days. Perhaps seeing the kitty back is why he opened up a little more to Bicycling. Whaddya think Bro, how much more is it gonna take?

Generally people with something to hide run their mouth as little as possible wrt the issue at hand. Vaughters appearance on this forum opening up like he has been is a good indicator as to the opposite to me. Does that mean people should automatically believe he's being honest and Garmin is clean? No. But it does make me a little less sick to my stomach about pro cycling. Thanks JV, keep it up.

 

[Jeremiah]

Both your posts are based on one flawed point - that JV witnessed directly that LA doped..

Ah, no. It doesn't matter whether he's seen LA dope or not.

To the highlighted - I would be very sure that he has done detailed all he knows to USADA. However, it is not for him to seek that all information be released publicly.

If he wanted it to be released publicly it would have been.

To the blue - done what?

You really believe LA's comeback would have followed full disclosure by JV? I think I answered your question in my post anyway.

Why would saying he doped have any effect on the SCA case (even if it was about doping in USPS, which ultimately, it wasn't)

I didn't say that it would have, did I? I think if JV would've spoken the truth at the time of SCA Armstrong would not have come back no matter the outcome of it.

And suggesting he tell all to the UCI ....

Wow, I'm reading my post below and you really like to twist stuff.

I'm suggesting he should've told the truth, the whole truth.....

Dude, you see the title of the thread. Kind of explains everything wrt JV.

He talked, sort of and he's been sort of talking for years. A lot of the current Armstrong bs could have been averted if JV was more forthcoming over the years. IMHO of course.

I haven't been following the thread closely.

I did read the NY Times opinion piece JV wrote. I also skimmed the Bicycling piece fairly quickly.

I'm sympathetic to JV however the narrative is no longer his.

If he's allocuted to the authorities, which I believe he's done; great.

IMHO, he should give a detailed allocution of all his doping without the commentary or justifications for his pre USPS and post USPS careers, assuming he's given USPS details to USADA, UCI, and/or WADA with the understanding all the details would be released to the public.

He should have done this at the time of SCA when Frankie and Betsy testified. He would have spared us the Armstrong return and all of the ensuing bs.

Major fail for not coming clean then.

 

[sittingbison]

...He talked, sort of and he's been sort of talking for years. A lot of the current Armstrong bs could have been averted if JV was more forthcoming over the years. IMHO of course.

hmmmm not so sure you have it right Jeremiah. JV has been VERY clear that he has been in open and frank discussions for many years with USADA. He has also been very clear that he has been entirely open to those important in his life. Do you think that USADA would only listen to half truths and innuendo from him? Of course not, the moment he or anyone else talks to them, its all on the table. Spanish Inquisition time.

Sure he is mysterious, obtuse etc when 'talking' on internet forums, but I think that's just his style. And being completely open on an internet forum would not have affected Lance or UCI in the slightest, apart from getting embroiled in a dozen law suits, blacklisted from the sport and sent to Coventry.

 

[BroDeal]

The recent article is more revealing with more specifics. On his first team his director, Nunez, implemented a doping program. He said his doping at C-A was all himself.

Did I miss something? I thought JV was not doping at CA.

We can speculate till the cows come home on JV's true intentions for coming out: PR, damage control, seeking attention… Heck, the thought even crossed my mind that he's a cat-hater and just wanted BroDeal to change his avatar. Too bad it only worked for a couple days. Perhaps seeing the kitty back is why he opened up a little more to Bicycling. Whaddya think Bro, how much more is it gonna take?

I just want to hear the details about Postal. It does not look like that will happen. We can hope that information comes out of the USADA process, but it will not be too surprising if that is light on details as well. This is the guy who told Landis not to name names.

It don't rate the admission very highly because JV in just about every way but explicitly saying it had already communicated that he doped . Continuing to maintain a non-admission admission was ridiculous. It was damaging to his credibility. The reaction of the cycling world to his admission was a collective shrug. That shows that he could have been open much earlier.

If I have to change my avatar to get JV to talk then I am game. It is not quite the third degree but, hey, whatever works.

 

[Fatclimber]

Did I miss something? I thought JV was not doping at CA.....

From the aforementioned article:

“I quit because I was just so tormented I couldn’t deal with it,” he says. “That doesn’t mean I have a halo. It finally got to the point that the tension and pressure of trying to create a new career from nothing, with no college degree, of saying, ‘I have no skills, but somehow I’ll figure out how to make a living and support my family’ was less than having a secure job paying hundreds of thousands of dollars but this weird torment of the decision hanging over you. I quit because of that decision.”

But not before doping one last time.

In spring of 2002, Vaughters began to use EPO again—on his own, without the aid of a doctor in or outside of the team. He told no one, and was terrified. He knew that injecting intravenously caused it to clear faster than the old subcutaneous method, but the doses used in cycling are so tiny that if you missed a vein “you wouldn’t even know, until boom (positive test). Oh ****.”

He got a quarter of the way into his pre-Tour doping regimen and stopped.

 

[BroDeal]

From the aforementioned article:

“I quit because I was just so tormented I couldn’t deal with it,” he says. “That doesn’t mean I have a halo. It finally got to the point that the tension and pressure of trying to create a new career from nothing, with no college degree, of saying, ‘I have no skills, but somehow I’ll figure out how to make a living and support my family’ was less than having a secure job paying hundreds of thousands of dollars but this weird torment of the decision hanging over you. I quit because of that decision.”

But not before doping one last time.

In spring of 2002, Vaughters began to use EPO again—on his own, without the aid of a doctor in or outside of the team. He told no one, and was terrified. He knew that injecting intravenously caused it to clear faster than the old subcutaneous method, but the doses used in cycling are so tiny that if you missed a vein “you wouldn’t even know, until boom (positive test). Oh ****.”

He got a quarter of the way into his pre-Tour doping regimen and stopped.

Aww, interesting. From the Bicycling article I assume. I have not read that yet.

EDIT: Thanks. Who knew that Bicycling had decent content occasionally. Much more informative than the NYT article.

 

[hrotha]

The recent article is more revealing with more specifics. On his first team his director, Nunez, implemented a doping program.

That's not what it says. The article says Núñez was big on clean cycling, but eventually gave JV (and, as far as I know, only JV) some EPO to bring up his blood values to their normal levels after hard training/racing. That's far from being a doping program implemented on his first team.

 

[sniper]

I haven't been following the thread closely.

I did read the NY Times opinion piece JV wrote. I also skimmed the Bicycling piece fairly quickly.

I'm sympathetic to JV however the narrative is no longer his.

If he's allocuted to the authorities, which I believe he's done; great.

IMHO, he should give a detailed allocution of all his doping without the commentary or justifications for his pre USPS and post USPS careers, assuming he's given USPS details to USADA, UCI, and/or WADA with the understanding all the details would be released to the public.

He should have done this at the time of SCA when Frankie and Betsy testified. He would have spared us the Armstrong return and all of the ensuing bs.

Major fail for not coming clean then.

interesting point.
though the well-known irony is that LA would never have been exposed the way he is now if it weren't for his comeback, so we should be at least half pleased that JV did not open his mouth yet back then.
also, i think JV is shady in many ways, but he did make pretty clear why he didn't come clean back in those days. there was obviously too much external pressure as LA was still pulling too many strings in JV's environment.

 

[the big ring]

I grabbed this quickly from a Tweet yesterday, and found it very interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence

The spiral of silence is a political science and mass communication theory propounded by the German political scientist Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann. Spiral of silence theory describes the process by which one opinion becomes dominant as those who perceive their opinion to be in the minority do not speak up because they fear isolation from society.

 

[Cerberus]

interesting point.
though the well-known irony is that LA would never have been exposed the way he is now if it weren't for his comeback, so we should be at least half pleased that JV did not open his mouth yet back then.

Is that really the case? It seems to me that what started the ball rolling was Landis' confession and that would probably have happened comeback or no comeback. I'll grant it's possible that a retired Armstrong would have been less interesting and so it's possible the case wouldn't have been raised, but I don't see how that's a certain thing. Am I missing something?

 

[sniper]

Is that really the case? It seems to me that what started the ball rolling was Landis' confession and that would probably have happened comeback or no comeback. I'll grant it's possible that a retired Armstrong would have been less interesting and so it's possible the case wouldn't have been raised, but I don't see how that's a certain thing. Am I missing something?

you said it: he would have been waaaay less interesting and it would have been darn difficult to justify any federal or USADA investigation into his past. Furthermore, afaik the USADA are drawing on passport data from 2009/2010 to strengthen their case (viz. to strengthen witness reports).

 

[Jeremiah]

JV talks, sort of....

hmmmm not so sure you have it right Jeremiah. JV has been VERY clear that he has been in open and frank discussions for many years with USADA. He has also been very clear that he has been entirely open to those important in his life. Do you think that USADA would only listen to half truths and innuendo from him? Of course not, the moment he or anyone else talks to them, its all on the table. Spanish Inquisition time.

Sure he is mysterious, obtuse etc when 'talking' on internet forums, but I think that's just his style. And being completely open on an internet forum would not have affected Lance or UCI in the slightest, apart from getting embroiled in a dozen law suits, blacklisted from the sport and sent to Coventry.

How do you define, many years? If it's that clear, we'll have an approximate number of years.

Embroiled in law suits? You do understand U.S. libel law? Who would be suing JV? You realize that these kinds of lawsuits would open up the UCI and Armstrong to even more jeopardy than they face with Armstrong's idiotic comeback?


I don't believe meaningful change can come from the inside of corrupt organizations. People may say there's been positive change in cycling but look at the clouds hanging over Sky and Vino.

We're back to 2004 with LA dominating the Tour and Hamilton/Ekimov winning the TT.

Cycling is "cleaner" in that the doping is not all out and now just recovery doping.

interesting point.
though the well-known irony is that LA would never have been exposed the way he is now if it weren't for his comeback, so we should be at least half pleased that JV did not open his mouth yet back then.
also, i think JV is shady in many ways, but he did make pretty clear why he didn't come clean back in those days. there was obviously too much external pressure as LA was still pulling too many strings in JV's environment.

Listen, everybody can find justifications for keeping their mouths shut and going with the flow.

Obviously LA is a powerful scumbag. Here's the thing. You always do the right thing despite the consequences. Nobody said it was going to be easy. I understand why JV held back, but that is also why he finds himself in the situation he's in now.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Ah, no. It doesn't matter whether he's seen LA dope or not.



If he wanted it to be released publicly it would have been.



You really believe LA's comeback would have followed full disclosure by JV? I think I answered your question in my post anyway.




I didn't say that it would have, did I? I think if JV would've spoken the truth at the time of SCA Armstrong would not have come back no matter the outcome of it.

The first paragraph seems to suggest this (JV talking/not talking) is not about Armstrong.
I am not flaming here - but the rest appears to be contradict that.


Armstrong came back despite SCA, despite having 6 EPO samples from 99, despite ASO's concerns- so anything JV would have said (if he even knew much) would not have mattered.

Wow, I'm reading my post below and you really like to twist stuff.

I'm suggesting he should've told the truth, the whole truth.....

Dude, you see the title of the thread. Kind of explains everything wrt JV.

He talked, sort of and he's been sort of talking for years. A lot of the current Armstrong bs could have been averted if JV was more forthcoming over the years. IMHO of course.

I didn't twist anything - you wrote the UCI, how would telling stuff to the UCI change anything - did you read Pats letters in support of LA?

As for the title of the thread - the thread was started before JVs piece in the NYT and subsequent interview in Bicycling.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

How do you define, many years? If it's that clear, we'll have an approximate number of years.

Embroiled in law suits? You do understand U.S. libel law? Who would be suing JV? You realize that these kinds of lawsuits would open up the UCI and Armstrong to even more jeopardy than they face with Armstrong's idiotic comeback?


I don't believe meaningful change can come from the inside of corrupt organizations. People may say there's been positive change in cycling but look at the clouds hanging over Sky and Vino.

We're back to 2004 with LA dominating the Tour and Hamilton/Ekimov winning the TT.

Cycling is "cleaner" in that the doping is not all out and now just recovery doping.


Listen, everybody can find justifications for keeping their mouths shut and going with the flow.

Obviously LA is a powerful scumbag. Here's the thing. You always do the right thing despite the consequences. Nobody said it was going to be easy. I understand why JV held back, but that is also why he finds himself in the situation he's in now.

But surely, in the Utopian existence one would not dope in the first place?

 

[Fatclimber]

That's not what it says. The article says Núñez was big on clean cycling, but eventually gave JV (and, as far as I know, only JV) some EPO to bring up his blood values to their normal levels after hard training/racing. That's far from being a doping program implemented on his first team.

From the article:

“Jose Luis Nunez had the same damn dream and the same damn conviction I did. But his timing was incredibly bad. He held out for 30 months of his dream and then he cracked. And the athletes, once he cracked, the dam broke.”

Interpret that however you like. I don't want to argue semantics, but I don't see how approaching a rider to give permission to use EPO and provide it to a rider can't be labeled as "implementing a doping program." Call it what you like and interpret it how you like, but to me that last statement means it was a teamwide practice.

 

[hrotha]

From the article:

“Jose Luis Nunez had the same damn dream and the same damn conviction I did. But his timing was incredibly bad. He held out for 30 months of his dream and then he cracked. And the athletes, once he cracked, the dam broke.”

Interpret that however you like. I don't want to argue semantics, but I don't see how approaching a rider to give permission to use EPO and provide it to a rider can't be labeled as "implementing a doping program." Call it what you like and interpret it how you like, but to me that last statement means it was a teamwide practice.

I take that last bit, "[a]nd the athletes, once he cracked, the dam broke", to mean other riders also got on EPO when they saw it wasn't absolutely prohibited anymore, not necessarily because Núñez got them on it. It would be interesting to have that point clarified for the sake of history - someone could track down Núñez and ask him, because his sounds like a very important story that should be told.

 

[Jeremiah]

But surely, in the Utopian existence one would not dope in the first place?

Jeez, I guess there were no Pro's who did the right thing or failing that didn't drag out a "managed" response for years while they played both sides.

Maybe telling the truth is a utopia for you. Way to set the bar high!

 

[JMBeaushrimp]

But surely, in the Utopian existence one would not dope in the first place?

Well, of course. If you want to talk Utopian.

I've pounded JV's *** full of sand on many occassion, but for me it comes down to picking your fights.

JV has no problem stating his goals (albeit with some problems of their being ennacted), but at least it's a voice crying out in the right direction.

The other managers and DSs should be called out. What have they done?

Why are we not (as diciples of the glorious 12) holding others' feet to the fire?

JV's an easy target because he's actually here. He actually answers questions. It's easy for him to become the ProCycling pinata.

Forget bagging on him, or coming up with obtuse questions, we should all be stoked that he's actually interacting with our little band of lunatics.

Isn't that what we're all asking for?

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Well, of course. If you want to talk Utopian.

I've pounded JV's *** full of sand on many occassion, but for me it comes down to picking your fights.

JV has no problem stating his goals (albeit with some problems of their being ennacted), but at least it's a voice crying out in the right direction.

The other managers and DSs should be called out. What have they done?

Why are we not (as diciples of the glorious 12) holding others' feet to the fire?

JV's an easy target because he's actually here. He actually answers questions. It's easy for him to become the ProCycling pinata.

Forget bagging on him, or coming up with obtuse questions, we should all be stoked that he's actually interacting with our little band of lunatics.

Isn't that what we're all asking for?

Oh, completely agree - mine was more a rhetorical point wondering how one can be so critical when there is a confession.

I don't look at doping as a moral issue. (although I can see how others might)
To me it is something that no-one should have to encounter, let alone be placed in to a situation where you have to make choices.