Kloden linked to blood doping in 2006

[franciep10]

I don't know about you guys but this was kind of obvious, I mean he was with TMobile with Ullrich, Vino and all the other bad seeds and then went to astana im talking about pre JB astana, I mean he was on the podium in 2 tour's and know he's a great TT and a good support climber but that's it

 

[BroDeal]

I don't know about you guys but this was kind of obvious, I mean he was with TMobile with Ullrich, Vino and all the other bad seeds and then went to astana im talking about pre JB astana, I mean he was on the podium in 2 tour's and know he's a great TT and a good support climber but that's it

I refuse to belive it. He never tested positive. He has undergone hundreds of tests and passed every one with flying colors. There is no possible way he could have doped. You cannot trust the germans. They hate--err..uh--other germans. Yeah, that's it. That's the ticket. I hear his performance is due to a high cadence and an iron will powered by hope and the belief in miracles. When will you guys stop tearing down the sport with these wild allegations.

 

[clydesdale]

I refuse to belive it. He never tested positive. He has undergone hundreds of tests and passed every one with flying colors. There is no possible way he could have doped. You cannot trust the germans. They hate--err..uh--other germans. Yeah, that's it. That's the ticket. I hear his performance is due to a high cadence and an iron will powered by hope and the belief in miracles. When will you guys stop tearing down the sport with these wild allegations.

That sounds like an arguement I've heard before but I can't quite place it.

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

Sigh.

To be completely candid here, I think pretty much everyone who has followed the sport closely enough could read into Jorg Jasche comments and realized that T-Mobile had a team implemented and physician monitored doping program for some time (like a lot of other teams) during those years. It's sad, but not surprising to read.

I will again call for a few connected things. The first is amnesty. We really need to try to move forward and accept our past. And this includes Kloden's case, and even Operation Puerto. I favor the idea of letting riders admit all they did in exchange for a fine and relatively short suspension, in an effort to move forward with continuing to clean up the sport and help break and eliminate the omerta. The other is for team commitment, from the sponsors to the team management, in being held accountable for doping infractions and accept heavy fines and banishment if violated, along with punishing the rider involved. If they're not going to go for amnesty, they may as well start using the UCI's anti-doping charter and fining guity riders a year's salary like they said they would.

 

[180mmCrank]

Forgive, forget and move on...

If it's the case that pretty much everyone was using PEDs then an amnesty along the lines you suggest would make a lot of sense. Frankly it might make sense anyway.

The only challenge I can see is if you were a clean rider and believe you were robbed of a particular opportunity. If any of us had ridden clean in any of these races it might be a stretch for us to just simply forgive and forget.

I was involved at a high level in another sport, where Eastern Bloc countries dominated for a number of years because of 'better science' - when you got beaten by a Romanian, E German, Bulgarian etc it P!ssed you off - because you know they were not racing clean - and at the time they were unlikely to get caught (in fact they never did until the late 90's). They didn't get caught because the same scientists that were on the doping commissions developing the tests were the ones running the doping programs for the federations.

I have some colleagues are still bitter about this - me not so much. I am all for the forgive, forget and move on myself. But that's just me.

 

[peloton]

Sigh.

To be completely candid here, I think pretty much everyone who has followed the sport closely enough could read into Jorg Jasche comments and realized that T-Mobile had a team implemented and physician monitored doping program for some time (like a lot of other teams) during those years. It's sad, but not surprising to read.

I will again call for a few connected things. The first is amnesty. We really need to try to move forward and accept our past. And this includes Kloden's case, and even Operation Puerto. I favor the idea of letting riders admit all they did in exchange for a fine and relatively short suspension, in an effort to move forward with continuing to clean up the sport and help break and eliminate the omerta. The other is for team commitment, from the sponsors to the team management, in being held accountable for doping infractions and accept heavy fines and banishment if violated, along with punishing the rider involved. If they're not going to go for amnesty, they may as well start using the UCI's anti-doping charter and fining guity riders a year's salary like they said they would.

as long as there is money on the line, never gonna happen... l like your idea though.

 

[benpounder]

My fear is that ASO will use a charge against Kloden of Team Columbia-formerly known as T-Mobile to exclude Astana from the this year's TdF.

Unlike several here, I don't let my distain for Lance the A-Hole to govern how I view the teams and riders he has been associated with. I want to see another TdF with Contador and Leipheimer. Last year's event was... disappointing. Sure Sastre's win on L'Alpe was pivotal, and nice (always been a fan of Carlos) but Bjarni Riis' CSC has always struck me as cycling's favorite son. (Almost as if Riis' doping is forgiven because he lost to super-doper Pantani the following year.) Riis' SaxoBank is great, but Brunel' Astana needs to be forsaken.

While I acknowledge the results both Lance and Bjarni have produced, I don’t respect either. What ****es me off is that those associated with Lance seem to have much higher barriers set before them.

 

[BikeCentric]

It makes it easier to take if you view these guys as victims of the system rather than evil selfish *** who chose personal aggrandizement over the good of the sport. In reality of course it must be a little bit of both.

 

[unsheath]

I refuse to belive it. He never tested positive. He has undergone hundreds of tests and passed every one with flying colors. There is no possible way he could have doped. You cannot trust the germans. They hate--err..uh--other germans. Yeah, that's it. That's the ticket. I hear his performance is due to a high cadence and an iron will powered by hope and the belief in miracles. When will you guys stop tearing down the sport with these wild allegations.

hahahaha!!

But, Lothar Heinrich and Andreas Schmid are my personal friends. I only visited them to have coffee, biscuits and errr some training advice. They are good men, so why wouldn't I call them my mates???

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

This part is downright frightening, and something every rider in cycling should read.

According to the report, the doctors did not explain to the riders the possible side effects of the doping products. For example, on July 2, when Sinkewitz is said to have driven from the Tour de France to Freiburg, there were problems with the first bag of blood that the doctors attempted to transfuse into him. Schmid allegedly got a second bag, which was also full of clots and did not flow properly.

Apparently the blood was either bacterially infected or improperly stored... However, Schmid did not inform Sinkewitz of that.

Good God. All I can say is that I'm glad Patrick is okay.

For those of you who don't know what it means, this could give you sepsis, septicemia (blood poisoning) possibly putting you in irreversible shock, or just kill you.

 

[BroDeal]

On a related note, what about Kessler? His suspension should be done or almost done by now. I think under WADA rules whatever he did in 2006 is counted as the same offense as the 2007 one, so the 2006 blood doping should not be sanctionable. Will he be blackballed?

Also, I thought Sinkewitz said that half a dozen riders took that early stage field trip into Germany. Although I am a little haze about whether it was six riders plus Sinkewitz or six riders including Sinkewitz. Lat would mean either all but one or all the riders of T-Mob were blood doping, which leaves a big question as to where Rogers fits into this?

 

[Susan Westemeyer]

Also, I thought Sinkewitz said that half a dozen riders took that early stage field trip into Germany. Although I am a little haze about whether it was six riders plus Sinkewitz or six riders including Sinkewitz. Lat would mean either all but one or all the riders of T-Mob were blood doping, which leaves a big question as to where Rogers fits into this?

There have been claims and counterclaims in both directions -- that all the riders participated and that Sinkewitz went alone. AS I said in my story, the "Spiegel" article only mentions the three German riders. Whether this is because they were the only ones who may or may not have gone, or because the magazine felt its readership would not be interested in foreign and therefore lesser-known riders, is not clear.

Susan

 

[Susan Westemeyer]

On a related note, what about Kessler? His suspension should be done or almost done by now.

His suspension expires the end of July 2009.

 

[Bartoli]

No surpises here. What is kind of disturbing, is that we're talking about a few years ago. The question is how long the sport is going to punish it's dopers after it happened. We're talking now about 2006, that's quite recent. But Valverdes case is from 2004/ 2005. There are gonna pop up stories about riders (that whole Vienna thing that is probably gonna see the light in the future) who doped years ago. Should all those riders still pay for mistakes they made years ago or should we draw a line somewhere? For example agree to stop investigating cases older than 5 years and use the time and money that could be used, use for research on new techniques to discover the use of dope.

 

[Mellow Velo]

Anyone remember how Kessler went, at the 2006 Tour?
Best described as "Off the planet".
Long ITT's give a good pointer to dodgy practices, IMO.
The whole T Mob squad dominated that Tour's opener.
Hochar???
T MOb's CPO said on air (Eurosport) that all new riders went to the Uni of Fribourg for "extensive medical testing", whatever that might entail.

Anyhow: What of Astana and Kloden? Since this pre dates them, I can't see it causing the ASO to react, unless he's named for the race. (which he is, at the moment)
However, since they have a medical monitoring programme that was used to give Gusev the boot, for "suspicious values", should Kloden not receive the same treatment, if the official document is as damning as expected?

Its not going to look good, if they fail to act.

What of Mick Rogers at "clean" Columbia?

 

[ingsve]

Well, one question you could ask is...If a cyclist has been been involved in blood doping without getting caught and then moves to a diffrent team. Will he suddenly stop? Especially since the place he was visiting still was in action at that later point...

 

[ak-zaaf]

I refuse to belive it. He never tested positive. He has undergone hundreds of tests and passed every one with flying colors. There is no possible way he could have doped. You cannot trust the germans. They hate--err..uh--other germans. Yeah, that's it. That's the ticket. I hear his performance is due to a high cadence and an iron will powered by hope and the belief in miracles. When will you guys stop tearing down the sport with these wild allegations.

win win win

 

[ak-zaaf]

No surpises here. What is kind of disturbing, is that we're talking about a few years ago. The question is how long the sport is going to punish it's dopers after it happened. We're talking now about 2006, that's quite recent. But Valverdes case is from 2004/ 2005. There are gonna pop up stories about riders (that whole Vienna thing that is probably gonna see the light in the future) who doped years ago. Should all those riders still pay for mistakes they made years ago or should we draw a line somewhere? For example agree to stop investigating cases older than 5 years and use the time and money that could be used, use for research on new techniques to discover the use of dope.

In Valverde's case he got away while others were punished. Basso was sitting at home while he won LBL.
Basso couldn't deny anymore, while the valv.piti codename should have been enough for his team or the uci knowing he actually has a dog named piti.
i mean come on.

If they are going against human-rights laws with the adams-system it's not a big step to consider circumstancial evidence enough to ban a rider.



in other cases, like the t-mobile one, let it go and look on.

 

[unsheath]

Remember the 06 ITT well. Honchar was riding a massive gear for the whole course. Unless directly implicated, I doubt anything would happen to Mick Rogers. Big George is nice and settled despite his dubious past.

 

[ingsve]

Remember the 06 ITT well. Honchar was riding a massive gear for the whole course. Unless directly implicated, I doubt anything would happen to Mick Rogers. Big George is nice and settled despite his dubious past.

Look at 1996-2008, Gonchar was riding with a massive gear for 13 years straight.

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

The "line in the sand" is currently 8 years. If you doped more than 8 years ago, the UCI won't try to punish you.

It's my opinion however that anyone doping pre about 2007 should be given a chance at amnesty as long as they cooperate to help clean up the sport. In exchange they would receive a hefty fine and short suspension. I say this because it's pretty well accepted among us hard-core fans that just about everyone who was trying to seriously compete during that era was doping, with several teams on systematic team implemented doping programs. The solution is to think to the future - get the riders to talk, break the omerta for good, and set-up a system that punishes the teams, management, and sponsors, on top of just the riders. Unfortunately the UCI is about as interested in doing this as American political parties are in campaign finance reform.

If they are going against human-rights laws with the adams-system it's not a big step to consider circumstantial evidence enough to ban a rider.

Well, that's pretty much how they went after Leogrande. He never tested positive for anything, but USADA approached it like a criminal case, getting testimony and evidence, and successfully got him suspended.

 

[jaylew]

In Valverde's case he got away while others were punished.

What else is new? That's what always happens. And even if Valverde is suspended, there will be many others still riding that were never punished.

in other cases, like the t-mobile one, let it go and look on.

Not that I see it happening, but I'm with Alpe on this one. I'm for some sort of amnesty, and a general "coming clean" with steep penalties for new offenders. Don't think it'll happen though, because I'm sure some of the powers that be would be involved, and I'm sure they don't want their role in everything coming to light.

 

[El Loto]

So if Kloeden was doping at the 2006 Tour, that means Floyd is the Tour champion amirite?

 

[180mmCrank]

I agree - I think it would be great to clean things out but as you say there are too many people that still have much to lose to go down the amnesty route right now.

For me it is about giving it time ... if the sport continues to be diligent ... in 3-5 years we will have a much cleaner and healthier peleton (It would seem to be a lot better already). I also think it will be safer for folks to speak out and we will start to hear more of a chorus of people comming clean because they want to rather than because they need to. Just my point of view.

 

[Escarabajo]

I agree - I think it would be great to clean things out but as you say there are too many people that still have much to lose to go down the amnesty route right now.

For me it is about giving it time ... if the sport continues to be diligent ... in 3-5 years we will have a much cleaner and healthier peleton (It would seem to be a lot better already). I also think it will be safer for folks to speak out and we will start to hear more of a chorus of people comming clean because they want to rather than because they need to. Just my point of view.

I agree with you. We have to give it some time. It can not happen overnight. As they grow older and they look at their own children in their faces I hope some of them will regret it and will want to change it. You see that more from people that retire, than from active riders. Of course they don't anything to loose but at least they have admitted it.