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Oct 28, 2010
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maltiv said:
I don't know, perhaps he prefers being filthy rich over dying from cancer or embolism? 3 years with 4 million euro's a year (or whatever he is making) is more than enough to live comfortable for one's entire life!

Well, being worried about the health when the financial part of your future is already secured sounds more persuasive then just money, but then:

1. BMC offered a certain rider big money after he had an outstanding season. Does that mean they don't know what's going on in the sport? Could it be true that some teams know it, whole the clinic forum knows it but some other teams don't?
2. If Gilbert starts winning again, would it be a sign that he is not affraid of dying from cancer or embolism?

As for Boonen yesterday:

1. The field wasn't very strong;
2. Wilfried Peeters (OPQS sport director) said that Boonen had the tailwind;
3. 4 Sky riders led the chase. Out of these 4 Stannard looked exhausted from the very beginning, Eddy wasn't that great as well. Who's left? Post-injured Flecha and Hayman?
4. Niki Terpstra had done an awesome job slowing down the chase by destroying Sky's line.
5. The cobbles were Tommeke's allies. There he gained the biggest part of the gap and it's pretty natural since he is the best on cobbles.
6. Lars Boom was the only rider in the chase group who could theoretically bridge the gap at some point but he had a flat tire and I was shocked that he managed to come back and then almost immediately launched an attack which gave 'only' 10sec. But considering his flat tire it was much more than 10sec.
 
The STEPFORD TEAM

Dekker_Tifosi said:
If I understand correctly .Team doctor ibarguen worked for Lotto last year, was named in the Mantua-case and worked for Saunier Duval in the past year.

I mean... COME ON. Wow I wonder why all their riders ride faster than ****ing lightning.
Also explains Gilberts super year last year. Not to mention the Saunier Duval super duper trio of Cobo, Piepoli and Ricco :rolleyes:


OPQS are the STEPFORD TEAM .

I,ve been wondering what they have done with Tony Martin - i bet he,s plugged in and being re-wired. Maybe Leipheimer keeps hitting the deck coz they,ve got a dodgey fuse in him :)
 
Kvinto said:
Well, being worried about the health when the financial part of your future is already secured sounds more persuasive then just money, but then:

1. BMC offered a certain rider big money after he had an outstanding season. Does that mean they don't know what's going on in the sport? Could it be true that some teams know it, whole the clinic forum knows it but some other teams don't?
2. If Gilbert starts winning again, would it be a sign that he is not affraid of dying from cancer or embolism?

As for Boonen yesterday:

1. The field wasn't very strong;
2. Wilfried Peeters (OPQS sport director) said that Boonen had the tailwind;
3. 4 Sky riders led the chase. Out of these 4 Stannard looked exhausted from the very beginning, Eddy wasn't that great as well. Who's left? Post-injured Flecha and Hayman?
4. Niki Terpstra had done an awesome job slowing down the chase by destroying Sky's line.
5. The cobbles were Tommeke's allies. There he gained the biggest part of the gap and it's pretty natural since he is the best on cobbles.
6. Lars Boom was the only rider in the chase group who could theoretically bridge the gap at some point but he had a flat tire and I was shocked that he managed to come back and then almost immediately launched an attack which gave 'only' 10sec. But considering his flat tire it was much more than 10sec.

Sigh, I thought to myself yesterday that I won't get involved

I don't understand your point about BMC. Does every transfer go according to expectations? Do they expect Gilbert to score 500+ (or whatever he actually scored last year) WT points every season or 3000 CQ points? Then, do you know whether BMC pays riders according to their "market value" or above it? Rumors about Van Garderen's salary suggest that it's possible that Gilbert is overpaid and BMC paying big money isn't necessarily an indication that they believe that the riders on their team will always perform to their best ability (regardless of medical support, equipment etc).

Then you write about Gilbert winning again. Are you confident that he can be head and shoulders abover the rest on the Mur again? Yes, it's possible that his performance last year was not due to doping and all the stars alligned in the right manner, but then it's quite a staggering difference between the clean Gilbert of 2011 and clean Gilbert with a toothache of 2012.

As for Roubaix

1 is very subjective especially when the winner is head and shoulders above the rest

4 is one of the reasons why the thread is still going on

5 I don't know. He was doing well everywhere including the last 15km where the remaining cobbles are easier.

6 Ballan and Flecha were more likely than Boom to bridge the gap because they have actual pedigree in Roubaix unlike Boom who killed himself with his acceleration. Boom did gain 10 seconds and then lost them. You say flat tire, I say 40km attack the vast majority of which alone. Fact is that the gap between Boonen and the first chasers only grew from the point where the chase group exploded on the Carrefour de l'Arbre to the end.
 
Oct 28, 2010
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roundabout said:
Sigh, I thought to myself yesterday that I won't get involved

I don't understand your point about BMC. Does every transfer go according to expectations? Do they expect Gilbert to score 500+ (or whatever he actually scored last year) WT points every season or 3000 CQ points? Then, do you know whether BMC pays riders according to their "market value" or above it? Rumors about Van Garderen's salary suggest that it's possible that Gilbert is overpaid and BMC paying big money isn't necessarily an indication that they believe that the riders on their team will always perform to their best ability (regardless of medical support, equipment etc).

Then you write about Gilbert winning again. Are you confident that he can be head and shoulders abover the rest on the Mur again? Yes, it's possible that his performance last year was not due to doping and all the stars alligned in the right manner, but then it's quite a staggering difference between the clean Gilbert of 2011 and clean Gilbert with a toothache of 2012.

TBH I feel highly uncomfortably in the Clinic (definitely not my comfort area) but since I started this myself:

The issue being whether OPQS 2012 performance is the result of dope (the best dope that the others don't have) or not. Somebody pointed out that they (OPQS) work with the same doctor who worked with Lotto in 2011. Then I (who isn't very familiar with the dark side of the sport) became curious: if a right doctor is the only solution then why did Philippe Gilbert refuse this opportunity and joined the BMC? Quite a logical question, isn't it? Is it about the money vs the health? Everything else is assumptions since I don't know what is his current salary or how much he'd been offered in the OPQS or maybe there was something more important than money, I dunno, but now he is in BMC and his last year's doctor in the OPQS.

There are two options then:

1. Gilbert sucks further in the season and it inevitably inspires further talks about the dope no matter what is the real reason. But if this certain doctor is the best solution for a rider who want to win races, then how can it be that BMC had no idea about the nature of Phil's wins?
2. Gilbert starts winning again (I'm not talking about another best season, but, say, 2010 level). This might be a proof that the OPQS doctor is not this mysterious reason why the OPQS are winning everything or BMC have their own 'right' doctor so that OPQS and BMC are in the same conditions (they are either both dope or don't dope).


As for Roubaix

1 is very subjective especially when the winner is head and shoulders above the rest

4 is one of the reasons why the thread is still going on

5 I don't know. He was doing well everywhere including the last 15km where the remaining cobbles are easier.

6 Ballan and Flecha were more likely than Boom to bridge the gap because they have actual pedigree in Roubaix unlike Boom who killed himself with his acceleration. Boom did gain 10 seconds and then lost them. You say flat tire, I say 40km attack the vast majority of which alone. Fact is that the gap between Boonen and the first chasers only grew from the point where the chase group exploded on the Carrefour de l'Arbre to the end.

1. I should agree, it's subjective

5. In the first about 20-30km it looked like Boonen rides the same tempo on the asphalt and increases the gap on cobbles. Then I think they had simply given up.
6. I've mentioned Boom because he had attacked and gained some marginal 10sec which he had lost almost immediately but right before it he had a flat tire and it looked like a miracle that he managed to come back so I presume without the puncture he might have gained much more than 10sec. I'm not sure either of Ballan or Flecha with their 'cobbled pedigree' was stronger than Lars yesterday. One thing for sure - it was already too late in the Carrefour de l'Arbre, once the gap reached 1:00 I became sure that Boonen wins.
 
Interesting points.

But

Let's be honest, I don't see the connection between Gilbert joining BMC instead of QS and Ibarguren's ability to prepare riders.

Ibarguren has the doping history, riders under team have had some rather amazing results and the change in fortunes for QS is rather peculiar (leaving Gilbert alone for the momement).

Now on to Gilbert. Even though the doctor isn't there at BMC there's a soigneur slash suspected doping supplier who who is well familiar to Gilbert and his manager.

As for the 2 options you listed, 1 is not unlikely and certainly isn't unheard of (see Cobo, even if he is an alleged nut, L Sanchez, probably others), 2 would still mean something because there's still a large difference between the 2011 and 2010 Gilberts, also regarding 2 it's not a question of either dope or not dope but rather the quesion of how much one takes to be successful and within the limits.
 
Oct 28, 2010
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roundabout said:
Interesting points.

But

Let's be honest, I don't see the connection between Gilbert joining BMC instead of QS and Ibarguren's ability to prepare riders.

Ibarguren has the doping history, riders under team have had some rather amazing results and the change in fortunes for QS is rather peculiar (leaving Gilbert alone for the momement).

Now on to Gilbert. Even though the doctor isn't there at BMC there's a soigneur slash suspected doping supplier who who is well familiar to Gilbert and his manager.

As for the 2 options you listed, 1 is not unlikely and certainly isn't unheard of (see Cobo, even if he is an alleged nut, L Sanchez, probably others), 2 would still mean something because there's still a large difference between the 2011 and 2010 Gilberts, also regarding 2 it's not a question of either dope or not dope but rather the quesion of how much one takes to be successful and within the limits.

OK, I didn't take into account the possibility that Gilbert can still use Ibarguren's services but something has definitely gone wrong in his preparation. We know that Ibarguren worked with Lotto last year but apart from Gilbert I have not noticed the other flying riders there who are suspiciously bad now: Greipel looks the same, Van den Broeck maybe even better so far, Vanendert sucks, but he wasn't any better in the same time last year, we have to wait untill the Ardennes to draw conclusions, though in fact his breakthrough year was really 2011, Roelandts is still injured but he shows similar results several years in a row. That's nothing similar to the OPQS 2012, with their 26 wins at the moment. I read somewhere that after HTC-Highroad folded at the end of 2011 a huge part of their lower-level stuff were hired by Lefevere, so maybe they are doing a new HTC there?

I understand that at some point it all inevitably boils down to the dope, its amount, quality, detectability but I'm tempted to believe that all teams/riders are more or less in the same conditions in their walking on the edge of a knife so that the performances like the OPQS this year and particularly Boonen yesterday are not only because of the dope.
 
Oh, you misunderstand me. There's a soigneur with a very shady past who moved to Lotto specifically to work with Gilbert and then left for BMC in the end of 2009 (when Dr. Jose came along). I doubt that Gilbert has access to Ibarguren today.

Lotto riders, well, Van den Broeck I believe would have done very well in the Tour and he recovered pretty quickly for the Vuelta. Vanendert had his breakthrough year in 2011 as you say. I have certain doubts about him repeating that form, but similarly I have doubts about the current state of anti-doping in Belgium which unfortunately nobody was able to confirm/deny/elaborate upon (but that's for a different topic).

Lower level staff making such a difference is hard to believe. Yes I believe they got a doctor and a couple of soigneurs, but I am not aware of them having such a colorful past.

Finally, I am not the one who would say that a rider is useless without dope. But say a 2010 Gilbert with a bit of "help" becoming unstoppable is a good indications of small boost that makes very good riders dominating especially in the era where the differences between riders are very small.
 
Jul 10, 2010
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Gilbert - I don't buy into Gilbert doping just because he has a doctor willing to provide something. I do firmly believe it is possible he is a lot off his pace this year due to the seemingly minor illnesses he is complaining of. I remember well when I was racing that, far from making me immune to minor ailments, the heavy toll of racing and riding super miles made me more susceptible to small things. And something as small as a 24 hour bug could knock me way off.

Just because Boonen's team manager is LeFevre, and his team doctor has a bad doping rep, too, doesn't automatically mean he is doping. But I would strongly suspect that it means they would turn and look the other way if some new joy juice happened to find its way into Boonen's pocket.

I watched the race on Eurovision, and then on Versus - or whatever versus is now. My question was, COULD this have been legit? Boonen WAS lucky this year, and luck does play a part in it. But what made the whole thing suspicious for me was when he not only pulled away, he stayed away and the guys chasing couldn't close that gap. They were good enough riders, and they certainly had enough desire. They had time on the regular roads - and the gap just wasn't going down.

So, yeah, it could have been legit, but it sure smells like a skunk to me. So, yeah. Exactly like Ricco. And we know what that was.
 
hiero2 said:
Gilbert - I don't buy into Gilbert doping just because he has a doctor willing to provide something. I do firmly believe it is possible he is a lot off his pace this year due to the seemingly minor illnesses he is complaining of. I remember well when I was racing that, far from making me immune to minor ailments, the heavy toll of racing and riding super miles made me more susceptible to small things. And something as small as a 24 hour bug could knock me way off.

Just because Boonen's team manager is LeFevre, and his team doctor has a bad doping rep, too, doesn't automatically mean he is doping. But I would strongly suspect that it means they would turn and look the other way if some new joy juice happened to find its way into Boonen's pocket.

I watched the race on Eurovision, and then on Versus - or whatever versus is now. My question was, COULD this have been legit? Boonen WAS lucky this year, and luck does play a part in it. But what made the whole thing suspicious for me was when he not only pulled away, he stayed away and the guys chasing couldn't close that gap. They were good enough riders, and they certainly had enough desire. They had time on the regular roads - and the gap just wasn't going down.

So, yeah, it could have been legit, but it sure smells like a skunk to me. So, yeah. Exactly like Ricco. And we know what that was.
1- If a Doctor with that reputation is hired, it is for one simple reason and that is "Doping". Otherwise you would hire somebody else.
2- I find it difficult to believe that he was hire to dope the helpers or second tier riders in the team while the big captains or contenders on the team are winning the races, in impressive way, free of doping. Even if that is true the captains are benefitting from the helpers doping with their work during the race, but I don't think that is the case here.

Having said that, you are right in saying that excess in exercise put your immune system down. But that does not mean that he was not in a doping program with this shady Doctor last year where he was very healthy. Doping can help your immune system with the excess miles.
 
hiero2 said:
Gilbert - I don't buy into Gilbert doping just because he has a doctor willing to provide something. I do firmly believe it is possible he is a lot off his pace this year due to the seemingly minor illnesses he is complaining of. I remember well when I was racing that, far from making me immune to minor ailments, the heavy toll of racing and riding super miles made me more susceptible to small things. And something as small as a 24 hour bug could knock me way off.

Just because Boonen's team manager is LeFevre, and his team doctor has a bad doping rep, too, doesn't automatically mean he is doping. But I would strongly suspect that it means they would turn and look the other way if some new joy juice happened to find its way into Boonen's pocket.

I watched the race on Eurovision, and then on Versus - or whatever versus is now. My question was, COULD this have been legit? Boonen WAS lucky this year, and luck does play a part in it. But what made the whole thing suspicious for me was when he not only pulled away, he stayed away and the guys chasing couldn't close that gap. They were good enough riders, and they certainly had enough desire. They had time on the regular roads - and the gap just wasn't going down.

So, yeah, it could have been legit, but it sure smells like a skunk to me. So, yeah. Exactly like Ricco. And we know what that was.

So teams hire doctors with known doping histories because they...

A) Want to look edgy.
B) Like to keep their press officer busy


or.....

C) Want to get better at doping

Place your bets.
 
Apr 19, 2010
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Moose McKnuckles said:
After soloing for 50+ kilometers, Boonen looked fresh enough to go 5-sets with Nadal.

Gilbert's incredible 2011, the WC Cyclocross race where the Belgians destroyed the field, Boonen soloing in 2012, Terpstra soloing in 2012.

WTF?


You forget Jaroslav Kulhavy last year in world cup MTB - riding away from everyone effortlessly.
I can't remember which race it was specifically but he was coming up to the finish line (in 1st place, obviously) spinning the gears round like he was on a training ride - you almost saw the "oh ****, I'd better make it look like I'm tired" moment on the final straight. Ridiculous.

All the MTB rounds are on ctorrents if anyone wants to see the comedy.
 
Oct 30, 2011
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Whilst I have no doubt that there is dope involved, I think we do allow ourselves to get carried away here. There are so many other factors that can come into play - it is far too easy to just put all variation in performance down to doping, as if a perfectly clean field would perform more or less the same every time.

Yes, Ibagurgen is giving OPQS dope.

There are so many reasons why Boonen won, other than that he was very strong. When people say Sky were chasing him down, they just look at the fact that for a while Sky were on the front. Quite frankly, having just bridged up to the chasing group, I wouldn't expect Ian Stannard to be able to close Boonen down on the cobbles. Sky were ****ing into the wind on that chase, they each did super long turns, rather than TTTing it.

Also, Boonen was very different at Flanders and at Roubaix. At Flanders he could barely hang onto Pozzato's wheel - if Pozzato hadn't been there, he would probably never have got up to Ballan, and ended up coming 2nd. That would turn this from possibly the best northern classics season ever, to not even Boonen's best ever.

I would have expected him to dope as much, if not more, for Flanders, since hanging on in the hills (not really his thing) is so important there. He was very strong at Roubaix, so I think we can see that whatever he's taking, daily/weekly condition still plays a massive role. In Flanders, he almost got beaten by Pozzato in a sprint for crying out loud.

These wins will always have Ibagurgen hanging over them, but they aren't like Ricco in '08, for me. There is a plethora of other (I think more important) factors that explain the dominance, and the difference (if there is any) in the quality of program that Ibargurgen is proving doesn't feel like it would be huge.
 
Oct 30, 2011
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hrotha said:
There's one problem with your reasoning: this isn't only, or even mainly, about Boonen. It's also about Chavanel, Terpstra and the whole of OPQS.

Good point. I still feel like a lot of what I said was valid - there are a lot of non-doping reasons why these things happened. Chavanel and Terpstra are no donkeys either.

I'm sure Ibagurgen is giving them dope - probably good dope. I just don't believe, yet, that he is giving them magic winning juice.

Sometimes doping discussions remind me of a case in the UK where a mother was wrongly convicted of murdering two of her children. In reality they both died of SIDS, but because both died, it was flagged as suspicious. At the trial, an expert witness was asked what the chance of this happening was, and said "less than one in a million". Before appeal, however, they didn't account for the fact that they only held the trial because something unlikely happened in the first place.

Unlikely outcomes are investigated, and then how unlikely it is to happen is given as evidence that it must be foul play.

I think part of me just wants to believe in these wins, but I genuinely don't believe that the doping is the only difference between previous years and this year.
 
Mar 4, 2012
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If Levi has some "unbelievable" performances in the Tour, and also Tony wins the gold medal in the Olympic TT by a huge margin (although there will be Wiggins, with his ever-decreasing body weight and ever-increasing power), I will firmly believe something fishy is happening.
 
May 22, 2011
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One is brought to mind of similar eye-popping efforts over the years: Johan Muhlegg (sp?) at the Salt Lake City Olympics, making the other skiers look like juniors in his wake. Roland Green of Canada utterly destroying cross country fields in MTB in the early 2000's before his health vanished. Ricco of course and and a certain American dancing away on col after col in the early 2000's. Rumor has it that the press room erupted in laughter as senior journos witnessed Juan Pelotas ridiculous attacks.

Does this mean that Gilbert last year and Boonen this spring are on similar quality rocket juice ? Not definitively but it does give one pause.
 

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