Motor doping thread

[Metabolol]

Just further proof that the whole family is scum.

 

[sniper]

Re:

@sniper

The UCI claims they found a dirty bike with a new scan method:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BBNpEMCHF4k/
A bike that had not been used during the race is confiscated from the pits. The UCI announces how they are on the ball with their technology and no cheater is safe.

Then the news comes out that there where rumours for months about her using an e-bike. A suspicious picture of her bike is also being spread before she is caught. It makes the official UCI story a bit strange.

The UCI as usual creates mist. They are not showing any pictures of the confiscated bike. The UCI states that the confiscated bike has not been used at the world championships, insinuating Femke was riding a normal bike. I'm saying in the WC she is using the same bike as in Leuven which was motorized on the 3rd of January.

cheers, excellent reasoning.
doesn't look pretty.

 

[Maxiton]

Re: Mechanical doping: first rider caught

I think something forced their hand in this case. The UCI, I mean. For some reason not known (maybe complaints from fans and some other cyclists) the UCI felt it had to bust this girl. They made sure when they did, though, that they took a bike that, apparently, had not been ridden in the race.

I recall seeing a sit down interview with Armstrong, pre-bust, where the interviewer was pressing him a bit on issues of fairness and competitiveness and doping in sport. Armstrong made the usual noises about protecting the health of athletes and wanting a clean game; and then went on to advise that people not take cycling so seriously. "It's really just entertainment," he said. "If people understood that, I think we wouldn't have so many problems."

That's how the UCI sees cycling, as entertainment, and they are (as Armstrong was) in the entertainment business. They, like Armstrong, see doping as something that makes for a more exciting (i.e. entertaining) race.

They had no problem whatsoever with riders doping until someone died (Simpson). Then they started making noises, increasingly, about doping being bad - while allowing it and even facilitating it behind the scenes. Everything they've done against doping has been forced on them by circumstances and was done for the sake of appearances, and it must have been a real headache for them.

So when a new technology comes along that makes for greater entertainment without the need of drugs - hey, they must think, what's not to like? This could really help our business . . . .

 

[Chipist]

Just had a thought, this 'app' on the tablet picks up electromagnetic radiation? There wouldn't be any unless the motor was running.....and it then becomes pretty obvious that there is a motor inside with no need for an 'app'. Also there wouldn't be any heat either, so I am calling BS on some of the UCI claims.

Now smartphones and tablets do have magnetometers so they could potentially detect a permanent magnet in the motor if it has one.

 

[Metabolol]

Yes, their hand was forced but what was it? This not a normal doping case, they knew this would be huge news. So it would take a lot to make them act. It can't just be rumours going around amongst other cyclists. This whole new testing equipment thing is just a smoke screen.

Is this like the hematocrit limit the UCI put in place in 97? Are they telling cyclists, moto dope but don't push the watts too high?

Did something happen at the Tour down under?

 

[Tienus]

It could be the picture that was spread on friday. Apparently it was taken by someone from Femke's team. She has dutch riders in her team which could explain how Sabrina Stultiens got to see the photo. It is plausable the UCI found out about it and realized they had to act quick. It would be a little bit embarassing if the press outed the first mechanical doper. I would not be surprised if they made up the story about the detecting app. Anyone knows what kind of tablet they are using?

 

[Tienus]

I'm actually hoping its an e reader and the UCI will explain they are the best for testing e bikes.

 

[thehog]

Re:

I'm actually hoping its an e reader and the UCI will explain they are the best for testing e bikes.

The UCI has Froome to tell them who is using a motor, that's better than any electromagnetic testing device

Froome said: "It's a concern I've had, something I brought up with the UCI. It would be my advice that the UCI starts checking bikes more regularly."

 

[King Boonen]

Re:

@King Boonen
I agree. Those two pictures are going round on twitter at the moment. I added them for fun like the parakeet story.

Ah ok, I thought it was a continuation of the narrative.

 

[King Boonen]

Re:

Just had a thought, this 'app' on the tablet picks up electromagnetic radiation? There wouldn't be any unless the motor was running.....and it then becomes pretty obvious that there is a motor inside with no need for an 'app'. Also there wouldn't be any heat either, so I am calling BS on some of the UCI claims.

Now smartphones and tablets do have magnetometers so they could potentially detect a permanent magnet in the motor if it has one.

doesn't a battery emit EMR all the time if it's charged?

 

[.Froomestrong.]

Re: Re:

Apparently Femke was photographed using the 'Moto' Bike the day before race on the course

http://www.1limburg.nl/stultiens-ontving-foto-van-verdacht-frame-met-motortje?context=section-2

I'm confused. The bike shown in the photo you linked is not the same bike as the one shown in the photo that Tienus linked. Different stripe pattern at the lower headtube. Also different wheels and tires but those can be changed from day to day.

Which is the motor bike that was seized by the UCI?. Surely someone photographed it as it was being scanned and confiscated?

Let me explain what I did. I looked at the replay of the under 23cc world championship race:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEEP7EGFk_U

Femke is riding the bike you see in the article from Benotti, the picture in the article is actually taken at the world championship race. This bike is quite different from the other two I've seen her use this season. For example it has different paint scheme, different front derailleur clamp and a white saddle. Lets call it the white saddle bike.

The UCI and the press claim that her dirty bike had been confiscated in the first lap from the pits. I therefore assumed the white saddle bike is clean. I should not have made this assumption as the UCI cannot be trusted. Why did the UCI not confiscate all three of her bikes? In the video above she walks with the white saddle bike after a broken chain (44:15). At 45:49 she is seen in the pits jumping on bike nr3, which has not been confiscated. The white saddle bike has disappeard.

Looking at this video from Koppenberg she is riding the same bike throughout the race and its not bike nr3. I will call it Nico's bike.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AlvQJqkfpk
By the way I hope its not Nico with her dad in the pits at 33:05.
Plenty of picture available from this race like the one I linked earlier. There are a few here as well: http://www.sportfoto.nl/albums/image/334fc20bd4c43a068389588508c080c537a65ea8/
I'm sure you can get some high resolution ones if you pay.

On the day before the race some riders where apparantly shown a picture of Nico's bike. Not nescessary taken on the day before the race. I think the UCI found out about this and actually saw this picture. They pretended they had some kind of app to scan bikes and took Nico's bike.

I got suspicious when I saw Femke had a really good result with the white saddle bike in Leuven:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGiyRsz6hHk
The race is really hard from the start and she bridges a gap to the front group, which consists of the best elite riders, a few times. To me it looks like she switches of her engine at 52:19.

Spot the difference on the frame in these pictures:
http://s3.nieuwsbladcdn.be/Assets/Images_Upload/2015/02/18/cd71a9b0-b769-11e4-a8c0-abf7dfebd1f7_original.jpg?scale=both&format=jpg
http://ciclicornale.altervista.org/wilier/telaio_ciclocross_carbon_disc.jpg

Her dad and brother seem busy steeling Parakeets at the moment:
http://www.hln.be/regio/nieuws-uit-jabbeke/-die-familie-deinst-voor-niets-terug-a2603590/

I'll take my alu hat of now

good spot wrt Leuven. Indeed her little finger makes a Fabian-esque flick exactly at 52:19.

jezus flippin christ, i thought you were joking about the parakeets!

could you summarize what you're saying about UCI? How exactly do you think they got onto the trail of Femke's motor? I've lost track a bit. You make a good point about why they didn't take her other bikes as well.

Not to rain on the fun here but...

1. The "flick" at 52:19 is her solo'ing in at the end of the race, alone. Why on earth would she use the motor for this? No one in front of her for maybe 10 sec, and same behind. I doubt the "flick" in this case shows anything.
On Di2 bikes, there is an existing button in the hoods which has been used to activate motors...but it is not on the side- its on the top of the hood where your thumb rests.

2. The frames you showed for comparison arent even the same model bike. Femke is riding a canti brake bike, and the frameset image is of a disk bike. Femke's bike clearly has a much larger downtube- which would house a battery, etc, but the comparison photos are useless, since these are different model bikes entirely.

 

[Benotti69]

Re: Re:

Apparently Femke was photographed using the 'Moto' Bike the day before race on the course

http://www.1limburg.nl/stultiens-ontving-foto-van-verdacht-frame-met-motortje?context=section-2

I'm confused. The bike shown in the photo you linked is not the same bike as the one shown in the photo that Tienus linked. Different stripe pattern at the lower headtube. Also different wheels and tires but those can be changed from day to day.

Which is the motor bike that was seized by the UCI?. Surely someone photographed it as it was being scanned and confiscated?

Let me explain what I did. I looked at the replay of the under 23cc world championship race:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEEP7EGFk_U

Femke is riding the bike you see in the article from Benotti, the picture in the article is actually taken at the world championship race. This bike is quite different from the other two I've seen her use this season. For example it has different paint scheme, different front derailleur clamp and a white saddle. Lets call it the white saddle bike.

The UCI and the press claim that her dirty bike had been confiscated in the first lap from the pits. I therefore assumed the white saddle bike is clean. I should not have made this assumption as the UCI cannot be trusted. Why did the UCI not confiscate all three of her bikes? In the video above she walks with the white saddle bike after a broken chain (44:15). At 45:49 she is seen in the pits jumping on bike nr3, which has not been confiscated. The white saddle bike has disappeard.

Looking at this video from Koppenberg she is riding the same bike throughout the race and its not bike nr3. I will call it Nico's bike.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AlvQJqkfpk
By the way I hope its not Nico with her dad in the pits at 33:05.
Plenty of picture available from this race like the one I linked earlier. There are a few here as well: http://www.sportfoto.nl/albums/image/334fc20bd4c43a068389588508c080c537a65ea8/
I'm sure you can get some high resolution ones if you pay.

On the day before the race some riders where apparantly shown a picture of Nico's bike. Not nescessary taken on the day before the race. I think the UCI found out about this and actually saw this picture. They pretended they had some kind of app to scan bikes and took Nico's bike.

I got suspicious when I saw Femke had a really good result with the white saddle bike in Leuven:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGiyRsz6hHk
The race is really hard from the start and she bridges a gap to the front group, which consists of the best elite riders, a few times. To me it looks like she switches of her engine at 52:19.

Spot the difference on the frame in these pictures:
http://s3.nieuwsbladcdn.be/Assets/Images_Upload/2015/02/18/cd71a9b0-b769-11e4-a8c0-abf7dfebd1f7_original.jpg?scale=both&format=jpg
http://ciclicornale.altervista.org/wilier/telaio_ciclocross_carbon_disc.jpg

Her dad and brother seem busy steeling Parakeets at the moment:
http://www.hln.be/regio/nieuws-uit-jabbeke/-die-familie-deinst-voor-niets-terug-a2603590/

I'll take my alu hat of now

good spot wrt Leuven. Indeed her little finger makes a Fabian-esque flick exactly at 52:19.

jezus flippin christ, i thought you were joking about the parakeets!

could you summarize what you're saying about UCI? How exactly do you think they got onto the trail of Femke's motor? I've lost track a bit. You make a good point about why they didn't take her other bikes as well.

Not to rain on the fun here but...

1. The "flick" at 52:19 is her solo'ing in at the end of the race, alone. Why on earth would she use the motor for this? No one in front of her for maybe 10 sec, and same behind. I doubt the "flick" in this case shows anything.
On Di2 bikes, there is an existing button in the hoods which has been used to activate motors...but it is not on the side- its on the top of the hood where your thumb rests.

2. The frames you showed for comparison arent even the same model bike. Femke is riding a canti brake bike, and the frameset image is of a disk bike. Femke's bike clearly has a much larger downtube- which would house a battery, etc, but the comparison photos are useless, since these are different model bikes entirely.

Any kind of button and motor size permutations are possible.

 

[sniper]

Re:

It could be the picture that was spread on friday. Apparently it was taken by someone from Femke's team. She has dutch riders in her team which could explain how Sabrina Stultiens got to see the photo. It is plausable the UCI found out about it and realized they had to act quick. It would be a little bit embarassing if the press outed the first mechanical doper.

this is what i had in mind.
similarly UKAD couldn't ignore Gabriel Evans when the dad of one of his competitors found a syringe on him. Otherwise Evans would still be winning and the press would still be cheering blindly for him like they did when he became junior TT champ.

I would not be surprised if they made up the story about the detecting app. Anyone knows what kind of tablet they are using?

wrinlyvet should be able to provide details. if not, you can be sure the detecting app was a hoax.

 

[joe_papp]

Re:

Hey Joe, did people talk much about your looks as your own scandals unfolded?

Sorry, I guess you didn't get the implied sarcastic reference to Geneviève Jeanson vs. Paola Pezzo discussions from years back.

 

[wrinklyvet]

Re: Re:

It could be the picture that was spread on friday. Apparently it was taken by someone from Femke's team. She has dutch riders in her team which could explain how Sabrina Stultiens got to see the photo. It is plausable the UCI found out about it and realized they had to act quick. It would be a little bit embarassing if the press outed the first mechanical doper.

this is what i had in mind.
similarly UKAD couldn't ignore Gabriel Evans when the dad of one of his competitors found a syringe on him. Otherwise Evans would still be winning and the press would still be cheering blindly for him like they did when he became junior TT champ.

I would not be surprised if they made up the story about the detecting app. Anyone knows what kind of tablet they are using?

wrinlyvet should be able to provide details. if not, you can be sure the detecting app was a hoax.

Wrinklyvet has zilch connection with this, any more than you do. I may look at things a different way sometimes, but that's the extent of it. I am also entitled to express what views I may have. Lay off!!

 

[ScienceIsCool]

Re: Re:

Just had a thought, this 'app' on the tablet picks up electromagnetic radiation? There wouldn't be any unless the motor was running.....and it then becomes pretty obvious that there is a motor inside with no need for an 'app'. Also there wouldn't be any heat either, so I am calling BS on some of the UCI claims.

Now smartphones and tablets do have magnetometers so they could potentially detect a permanent magnet in the motor if it has one.

doesn't a battery emit EMR all the time if it's charged?

Nope. The radiation occurs as a result of current flow (I'll omit the hideously complex stuff like Maxwell's equations, *** potentials, etc, etc). So a charged battery will not emit any electromagnetic radiation. Only the circuit it's attached to will emit radiation, and only when it's turned on. The absolutely easiest way to find a motor is look. They're sizeable and there's only a few places you can put them. I'm guessing the new detection method is something like an fiber optic endoscope that outputs video to a tablet. Snake it down the downtube and seattube and take a peek for anything weird. Quick and easy.

John Swanson

 

[King Boonen]

Thanks John.

 

[WildspokeJoe]

Re:

The UCI claims they found a dirty bike with a new scan method:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BBNpEMCHF4k/
A bike that had not been used during the race is confiscated from the pits. The UCI announces how they are on the ball with their technology and no cheater is safe.

Would it be funny if they, in fact, found the motor because someone ratted her out? Another case where it's an investigation and not testing that nabbed a doper. Hilarious.

 

[jyl]

Re:

@sniper

Then the news comes out that there where rumours for months about her using an e-bike. A suspicious picture of her bike is also being spread before she is caught. It makes the official UCI story a bit strange.

Anyone have this picture?. Or a link to it?

 

[benzwire]

Re: Mechanical doping: first rider caught

I have a feeling that the UCI was taking pictures with that special scanning tablet app, or whatever it is. Some guy just snapping a photo with an iPad, pretending it's some kind of super secret new scanning technology when in fact they were just checking the bike based on tips that have coming in all season long

 

[gooner]

Re: Mechanical doping: first rider caught

Wiggins:

Speaking at a press conference ahead of the Dubai Tour, where he is racing this week, he said: "It has been around for a while, hasn't it? For five years now, they have had this suspicion and have been checking the bikes, but this is the first one they have found.

"I'm sure it has happened in the past, but they haven't found them."

http://www.skysports.com/cycling/news/12040/10153134/sir-bradley-wiggins-sure-femke-van-den-driessche-not-first-to-use-motor

 

[Benotti69]

Re: Mechanical doping: first rider caught

Wiggins:

Speaking at a press conference ahead of the Dubai Tour, where he is racing this week, he said: "It has been around for a while, hasn't it? For five years now, they have had this suspicion and have been checking the bikes, but this is the first one they have found.

"I'm sure it has happened in the past, but they haven't found them."

http://www.skysports.com/cycling/news/12040/10153134/sir-bradley-wiggins-sure-femke-van-den-driessche-not-first-to-use-motor

Better check the hour frame...oops too late!

 

[May0maniac]

To be fair, if this new scan method is really able to detect electromagnetic signals and heat like they claim, then it is perfect to detect an electric bike. If you are the UCI you want to avoid a big scandal, that's why you go after a small fish an tell people about the new method to detect the motor, that should scare all the bigger names and you avoid a bigger scandal, at least that's what I'd do if I was C(r)ookson.

 

[Benotti69]

http://road.cc/content/tech-news/177447-first-look-€10000-typhoon-e-assist-packs-250w-hidden-motor

the e-bike manufacturers must be rubbing hands with all this free publicity..if only they could get a celeb rider to endorse....

 

[Tienus]

I think this is the reason Willier is making a fuss about this scandel:
https://www.salden.nl/nl/wilier-triestina-e-cycl-ocrosser-met-trapondersteuning.html