Pulling a Wiggins

[doperhopper]

Re: Re:

Sure, he describes what hayfever looks like.
I could do that too after quickly consulting wikipedia.
Problem is nobody, including Wiggins himself, has ever seen any of those symptoms on wiggins.
Well not prior to the fancybear leak.

The symptoms he describes are exactly what I get at a similar time of the year. Okay you might be able to get a few symptoms of Wikipedia but specific examples of how those symptoms manifest themselves in your body as he describes? I don't think so.

Those around him wouldn't see a lot of those symptoms. In fact if you were to ask 10 of my friends if I suffered from hayfever probably 50% of them would say I didn't. My doctor always suggests that I take Zirtek/Cetrizine a few weeks before the pollen to get it into my system, as a preventative. You don't wait until it feels like somebody has lobbed a handful of sand in your eyes and shoved two corks up your nose before you start taking anti-histamine tabs, drops and spray.

Bizarrely, when I used to race I just thought I went crap in the summer months and always had a blocked nose and sore eyes. Wasn't till a couple of years after when sneezing became a symptom I realised I had suffered from mild hayfever for some years beforehand.

BUT I am giving the benefit of doubt here. Whilst the allergy story stacks up, the rest of it still doesn't and the description of how the performance/medical part of Team Sky is managed doesn't read as convincing at all.

Lifelong condition dramatically affecting racing... never mentioned in four books.

There goes your benefit of doubt.

 

[70kmph]

What a nonsense propaganda campaign about Leinders.

Why would he join Sky as a Soigneur according to the team... there's no way

Epic facepalm

 

[proffate]

Re: Re:

Who else has done it? More to the point, who else has won a tour without drugs in a field of TUE abusers? Or for that matter, who else has won a tour without drugs...

it's probably the case that if you can win a tour at 34 you were already winning in your 20s and by the time you get to that age, with some tours under your belt, you find you have nothing left to prove.

I guess in the case of Evans you could argue that a cleaner field finally made it possible for a clean Evans to win when he should have been racking up tours for a decade.

 

[Lyon]

Re:

What a nonsense propaganda campaign about Leinders.

Why would he join Sky as a Soigneur according to the team... there's no way

Epic facepalm

Because finally finding a clean team made him so happy he could settle for less. The Leinders we saw at Sky is the real Leinders - the god fearing, good to his mother, salt of the earth doc who only acts in the best interest of his patients. Imagine the horror of having a carreer of buying, smuggling and administering drugs to cheating low life when all you want to do is treat saddle sores for the gods.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Re: Re:

The symptoms he describes are exactly what I get at a similar time of the year. Okay you might be able to get a few symptoms of Wikipedia but specific examples of how those symptoms manifest themselves in your body as he describes? I don't think so.

Those around him wouldn't see a lot of those symptoms. In fact if you were to ask 10 of my friends if I suffered from hayfever probably 50% of them would say I didn't. My doctor always suggests that I take Zirtek/Cetrizine a few weeks before the pollen to get it into my system, as a preventative. You don't wait until it feels like somebody has lobbed a handful of sand in your eyes and shoved two corks up your nose before you start taking anti-histamine tabs, drops and spray.

Bizarrely, when I used to race I just thought I went crap in the summer months and always had a blocked nose and sore eyes. Wasn't till a couple of years after when sneezing became a symptom I realised I had suffered from mild hayfever for some years beforehand.

BUT I am giving the benefit of doubt here. Whilst the allergy story stacks up, the rest of it still doesn't and the description of how the performance/medical part of Team Sky is managed doesn't read as convincing at all.

The problem with giving the benefit of the doubt in this is the 2013 doses. If he's always had them around about the same time as you mention, that's one thing, and you'd say ok, fair enough, while we don't like the TUE usage for such a strong substance the timing makes sense. The fact that it's apparently so severe he needs something as strong as that so soon after winning the Dauphiné and has never mentioned it before raises eyebrows, but you know, if he regularly gets hay fever in late June/early July then ok (although it does seem like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut in terms of treatment, a bit like having a headache and finding a doctor who'll prescribe morphine).

So if it was just 2011-12 when his season was set out the same, then fine. But the 2013 dose is problematic if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, happening as it does just before the start of the Giro d'Italia. Because that was him suffering similarly heavily from allergies - we know because he had to be prescribed the same heavy stuff, right? - that he typically suffered in late June/early July. Who knows, the Giro has always had connections to people will allergies dropping out or suffering because of the time of the year. However, at the very time of year that he needed the triamcolone in 2013, he won - without the need for TUEs - the Tour de Romandie in 2012. He also won the Giro's opening time trial in 2010 without the need for TUEs. In 2008 and 2009 he rode the Giro without trouble, and in 2009 he did the Giro AND the Tour. In 2007 he rode the 4 Jours de Dunkerque in early May - winning the TT - and the Tour.

This isn't Jimmy Casper forgetting to submit his renewal paperwork for a substance he's had a TUE in place for 12 years. This is a TUE that he's developed the need for over a decade into his career, and he's seemingly gone from not suffering badly enough to not race using only OTC, non-TUE medicine, to suffering so badly he needs one of the strongest substances around for it. Is it implausible? Of course not. But when the need for it then isn't consistent, moving around the time of year matching his season's goals, of course people are going to cry foul.

 

[B_Ugli]

Re: Re:

The symptoms he describes are exactly what I get at a similar time of the year. Okay you might be able to get a few symptoms of Wikipedia but specific examples of how those symptoms manifest themselves in your body as he describes? I don't think so.

Those around him wouldn't see a lot of those symptoms. In fact if you were to ask 10 of my friends if I suffered from hayfever probably 50% of them would say I didn't. My doctor always suggests that I take Zirtek/Cetrizine a few weeks before the pollen to get it into my system, as a preventative. You don't wait until it feels like somebody has lobbed a handful of sand in your eyes and shoved two corks up your nose before you start taking anti-histamine tabs, drops and spray.

Bizarrely, when I used to race I just thought I went crap in the summer months and always had a blocked nose and sore eyes. Wasn't till a couple of years after when sneezing became a symptom I realised I had suffered from mild hayfever for some years beforehand.

BUT I am giving the benefit of doubt here. Whilst the allergy story stacks up, the rest of it still doesn't and the description of how the performance/medical part of Team Sky is managed doesn't read as convincing at all.

The problem with giving the benefit of the doubt in this is the 2013 doses. If he's always had them around about the same time as you mention, that's one thing, and you'd say ok, fair enough, while we don't like the TUE usage for such a strong substance the timing makes sense. The fact that it's apparently so severe he needs something as strong as that so soon after winning the Dauphiné and has never mentioned it before raises eyebrows, but you know, if he regularly gets hay fever in late June/early July then ok (although it does seem like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut in terms of treatment, a bit like having a headache and finding a doctor who'll prescribe morphine).

So if it was just 2011-12 when his season was set out the same, then fine. But the 2013 dose is problematic if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, happening as it does just before the start of the Giro d'Italia. Because that was him suffering similarly heavily from allergies - we know because he had to be prescribed the same heavy stuff, right? - that he typically suffered in late June/early July. Who knows, the Giro has always had connections to people will allergies dropping out or suffering because of the time of the year. However, at the very time of year that he needed the triamcolone in 2013, he won - without the need for TUEs - the Tour de Romandie in 2012. He also won the Giro's opening time trial in 2010 without the need for TUEs. In 2008 and 2009 he rode the Giro without trouble, and in 2009 he did the Giro AND the Tour. In 2007 he rode the 4 Jours de Dunkerque in early May - winning the TT - and the Tour.

This isn't Jimmy Casper forgetting to submit his renewal paperwork for a substance he's had a TUE in place for 12 years. This is a TUE that he's developed the need for over a decade into his career, and he's seemingly gone from not suffering badly enough to not race using only OTC, non-TUE medicine, to suffering so badly he needs one of the strongest substances around for it. Is it implausible? Of course not. But when the need for it then isn't consistent, moving around the time of year matching his season's goals, of course people are going to cry foul.

I agree with everything you have said and you have understood what I am getting at without insulting me hence why I am responding.

The point I am trying to get across is that hayfever isn't as linear and predictable as people think. FWIW my hayfever in the UK wasn't that bad this year but I went to Holland in early summer stayed somewhere slap bang in the middle of a pine forest and it was horrendous for the whole week I was there. So it can be different from year to year and area to area.

I think that the whole story is mired in lies and inconsistencies but on the actual account of how the hayfever manifests itself I don't think that.

The strength of the medication given etc etc, I don't buy this one little bit at all and its murky.

I recognise that its deeply unpopular for me to say this on this forum but whilst Sky are telling a pack of lies Wiggins account of his hayfever is the one area I am inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt.

I know that's unpopular and I have been insulted for having that view on here but that's the view I have. I respect that fact that others disagree with it.

 

[Red Rick]

Seriously. "I trained for 7 hours without breakfast to lose weight, and the injections made me loose too much weight". You can't expect anybody to believe that

 

[The Hitch]

Re:

Seriously. "I trained for 7 hours without breakfast to lose weight, and the injections made me loose too much weight". You can't expect anybody to believe that

And yet...

 

[Red Rick]

Re: Re:

Seriously. "I trained for 7 hours without breakfast to lose weight, and the injections made me loose too much weight". You can't expect anybody to believe that

And yet...

You're probably right tho

 

[sniper]

Time for cycling fans to wake up and see the light

The use of TUEs by top cyclists such as Bradley Wiggins is only the tip of a rotten iceberg

‘Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know, I was blind but now I see.’

The Gospel of John, 9:25

https://www.businesspost.ie/time-for-cycling-fans-to-wake-up-and-see-the-light/

 

[The Hegelian]

Re:

Seriously. "I trained for 7 hours without breakfast to lose weight, and the injections made me loose too much weight". You can't expect anybody to believe that

This is where the Wiggins defence falls into a million pieces.

What was always going to be his number one hurdle in winning a GT?

Weight.

What was always going to be his big worry?

Losing time on the big cols. He got a favourable course in 2012, but climbing was always going to be the big concern.

What have corticosteriods always been used/abused for?

Keeping weight off whilst retaining or increasing power.

It all looks so bad for Wiggins because he just can't spin out of these facts. In the end, resorting to the claim that those drugs aren't performance enhancing is like looking at a white swan and claiming it to be black. Simply not believable.

 

[DamianoMachiavelli]

The reason Wiggins is going down the ludicrous route of claiming Kenacort has no performance benefit or it was only bringing him up to normal levels is that he is afraid the lazy journalists out there will actually do a bit of work and look up the WADA code. He is preparing the way to claim he was not in violation of the code. The relevant section is below:


4.1 An Athlete may be granted a TUE if (and only if) he/she can show, by a balance of probability, that each of the following conditions is met:

a. The Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method in question is needed to treat an acute or chronic medical condition, such that the Athlete would experience a significant impairment to health if the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method were to be withheld.

b. The Therapeutic Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is highly unlikely to produce any additional enhancement of performance beyond what might be anticipated by a return to the Athlete’s normal state of health following the treatment of the acute or chronic medical condition.

c. There is no reasonable Therapeutic alternative to the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method.

d. The necessity for the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is not a consequence, wholly or in part, of the prior Use (without a TUE) of a substance or method which was prohibited at the time of such Use.

Comment to 4.1: When a TUEC is deciding whether or not to recognize a TUE granted by another Anti-Doping Organization (see Article 7, below), and when WADA is reviewing a decision to grant (or not to grant) a TUE (see Article 8, below), the issue will be the same as it is for a TUEC that is considering an application for a TUE under article 6, below, i.e., has the Athlete demonstrated by a balance of probability that each of the conditions set out in article 4.1 is met? The WADA documents titled “Medical Information to Support the Decisions of TUECs”, posted on WADA’s website, should be used to assist in the application of these criteria in relation to particular medical conditions.

Clearly Wiggins TUE fails on multiple criteria. He was doping. Full stop.

 

[The Hegelian]

Jeez. Hadn't seen those before. To be devils advocate for a moment, you could probably at least make an argument for A. If it was in court, there would be doctors on both sides and evidence both ways. Remembering that once it gets legalistic, it is not a question of what is actually true or just, but how you can make reality fit the law. I reckon a good lawyer could make it fit, if and only if, there are actually medical records of allergies et al.

However, B and C totally fail.

Which means, your conclusion totally holds.

I think the really big question is: how on earth were those TUES approved?

 

[Blakeslee]

Re:

Froome must be laughing his head off that the leaks cast more of a shadow over Wiggins than himself. That's the thing I still find hardest or believe out of this whole episode.

This whole episode casts suspicion over the entire Sky team. It is hard not to notice the downright skeletal physique of the Sky riders over the last several season, all while seemingly pumping out some of the biggest power numbers in the pro peloton. Reading about potential gains in power to weight ratio provided by the drug Wiggins took, makes me wonder exactly how the rest of the Sky riders are achieving similar remarkable physiques.

 

[B_Ugli]

The reason Wiggins is going down the ludicrous route of claiming Kenacort has no performance benefit or it was only bringing him up to normal levels is that he is afraid the lazy journalists out there will actually do a bit of work and look up the WADA code. He is preparing the way to claim he was not in violation of the code

Yep Sky spin machine in full *** hair splitting mode here, pre-empting the next way media scrutiny is going to go.

Dave Brailsford:

"well you see the thing is I run a tight ship, nothing gets passed without my say so, I am scrupulous with my attention to detail, I even carry out a kit inspection everyday to make sure my clones, sorry I mean riders are all exactly identical. Yep I take full responsibility for my team and we are thorough beyond believe in every aspect of what we do. The buck stops at me I check everything administered to my riders from a health/performance level"

..........apart from googling Kenacort to see whether it would be a good idea to give it to my star rider before the biggest race of his career/how it might be perceived if it became public.

 

[gillan1969]

The reason Wiggins is going down the ludicrous route of claiming Kenacort has no performance benefit or it was only bringing him up to normal levels is that he is afraid the lazy journalists out there will actually do a bit of work and look up the WADA code. He is preparing the way to claim he was not in violation of the code. The relevant section is below:


4.1 An Athlete may be granted a TUE if (and only if) he/she can show, by a balance of probability, that each of the following conditions is met:

a. The Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method in question is needed to treat an acute or chronic medical condition, such that the Athlete would experience a significant impairment to health if the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method were to be withheld.

b. The Therapeutic Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is highly unlikely to produce any additional enhancement of performance beyond what might be anticipated by a return to the Athlete’s normal state of health following the treatment of the acute or chronic medical condition.

c. There is no reasonable Therapeutic alternative to the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method.

d. The necessity for the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is not a consequence, wholly or in part, of the prior Use (without a TUE) of a substance or method which was prohibited at the time of such Use.

Comment to 4.1: When a TUEC is deciding whether or not to recognize a TUE granted by another Anti-Doping Organization (see Article 7, below), and when WADA is reviewing a decision to grant (or not to grant) a TUE (see Article 8, below), the issue will be the same as it is for a TUEC that is considering an application for a TUE under article 6, below, i.e., has the Athlete demonstrated by a balance of probability that each of the conditions set out in article 4.1 is met? The WADA documents titled “Medical Information to Support the Decisions of TUECs”, posted on WADA’s website, should be used to assist in the application of these criteria in relation to particular medical conditions.

Clearly Wiggins TUE fails on multiple criteria. He was doping. Full stop.

indeed...and remember that this is "each of" i.e. all are met...not one of the following..

 

[Grandillusion]

Paging Travis Sapstead! Oh, she's busy grilling some Linda McCartneys. Not.

 

[gregrowlerson]

Re: Re:

The symptoms he describes are exactly what I get at a similar time of the year. Okay you might be able to get a few symptoms of Wikipedia but specific examples of how those symptoms manifest themselves in your body as he describes? I don't think so.

Those around him wouldn't see a lot of those symptoms. In fact if you were to ask 10 of my friends if I suffered from hayfever probably 50% of them would say I didn't. My doctor always suggests that I take Zirtek/Cetrizine a few weeks before the pollen to get it into my system, as a preventative. You don't wait until it feels like somebody has lobbed a handful of sand in your eyes and shoved two corks up your nose before you start taking anti-histamine tabs, drops and spray.

Bizarrely, when I used to race I just thought I went crap in the summer months and always had a blocked nose and sore eyes. Wasn't till a couple of years after when sneezing became a symptom I realised I had suffered from mild hayfever for some years beforehand.

BUT I am giving the benefit of doubt here. Whilst the allergy story stacks up, the rest of it still doesn't and the description of how the performance/medical part of Team Sky is managed doesn't read as convincing at all.

The problem with giving the benefit of the doubt in this is the 2013 doses. If he's always had them around about the same time as you mention, that's one thing, and you'd say ok, fair enough, while we don't like the TUE usage for such a strong substance the timing makes sense. The fact that it's apparently so severe he needs something as strong as that so soon after winning the Dauphiné and has never mentioned it before raises eyebrows, but you know, if he regularly gets hay fever in late June/early July then ok (although it does seem like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut in terms of treatment, a bit like having a headache and finding a doctor who'll prescribe morphine).

So if it was just 2011-12 when his season was set out the same, then fine. But the 2013 dose is problematic if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, happening as it does just before the start of the Giro d'Italia. Because that was him suffering similarly heavily from allergies - we know because he had to be prescribed the same heavy stuff, right? - that he typically suffered in late June/early July. Who knows, the Giro has always had connections to people will allergies dropping out or suffering because of the time of the year. However, at the very time of year that he needed the triamcolone in 2013, he won - without the need for TUEs - the Tour de Romandie in 2012. He also won the Giro's opening time trial in 2010 without the need for TUEs. In 2008 and 2009 he rode the Giro without trouble, and in 2009 he did the Giro AND the Tour. In 2007 he rode the 4 Jours de Dunkerque in early May - winning the TT - and the Tour.

This isn't Jimmy Casper forgetting to submit his renewal paperwork for a substance he's had a TUE in place for 12 years. This is a TUE that he's developed the need for over a decade into his career, and he's seemingly gone from not suffering badly enough to not race using only OTC, non-TUE medicine, to suffering so badly he needs one of the strongest substances around for it. Is it implausible? Of course not. But when the need for it then isn't consistent, moving around the time of year matching his season's goals, of course people are going to cry foul.

Excellent in-depth write up and explanation. Everything you have mentioned, plus the four autobiographies where Wiggins never mentioned it, all leave Bradley without a leg to stand on here.

Morally. But what he has done is still legal. The bigger questions should be possed at those who allowed the TUE's.

And another thing. How do we know that many other GT contenders weren't doing exactly what Wiggins was? This has been leaked by the Russians, so wouldn't they not release similar info about Contador (because he is riding for a Russian team) for example? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here?

 

[GJB123]

You are wrong imho. The TUE be illegal if it was obtained based on bogus medical information. It would be like a kid who gets a sik note from his parents without being sick and then blaming the head master for not picking up on it.

As for the other contenders. Most of them probably do the same thing, but what doe that matter? It doesn't level the playing field one way or the other and I can hardly blame the Russians for going after some other staunchest critics. Ans who knows, perhaps Sky received some favors in obtaining sift TUE's that other riders are not getting. It wouldn't be unheard off. In conclusion, you are deflecting. What others are or are not doing is irrelevant since we have the 2012 TdF-winner who doped himself on a bogus TUE.

 

[Benotti69]

Re: Re:

The symptoms he describes are exactly what I get at a similar time of the year. Okay you might be able to get a few symptoms of Wikipedia but specific examples of how those symptoms manifest themselves in your body as he describes? I don't think so.

Those around him wouldn't see a lot of those symptoms. In fact if you were to ask 10 of my friends if I suffered from hayfever probably 50% of them would say I didn't. My doctor always suggests that I take Zirtek/Cetrizine a few weeks before the pollen to get it into my system, as a preventative. You don't wait until it feels like somebody has lobbed a handful of sand in your eyes and shoved two corks up your nose before you start taking anti-histamine tabs, drops and spray.

Bizarrely, when I used to race I just thought I went crap in the summer months and always had a blocked nose and sore eyes. Wasn't till a couple of years after when sneezing became a symptom I realised I had suffered from mild hayfever for some years beforehand.

BUT I am giving the benefit of doubt here. Whilst the allergy story stacks up, the rest of it still doesn't and the description of how the performance/medical part of Team Sky is managed doesn't read as convincing at all.

The problem with giving the benefit of the doubt in this is the 2013 doses. If he's always had them around about the same time as you mention, that's one thing, and you'd say ok, fair enough, while we don't like the TUE usage for such a strong substance the timing makes sense. The fact that it's apparently so severe he needs something as strong as that so soon after winning the Dauphiné and has never mentioned it before raises eyebrows, but you know, if he regularly gets hay fever in late June/early July then ok (although it does seem like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut in terms of treatment, a bit like having a headache and finding a doctor who'll prescribe morphine).

So if it was just 2011-12 when his season was set out the same, then fine. But the 2013 dose is problematic if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, happening as it does just before the start of the Giro d'Italia. Because that was him suffering similarly heavily from allergies - we know because he had to be prescribed the same heavy stuff, right? - that he typically suffered in late June/early July. Who knows, the Giro has always had connections to people will allergies dropping out or suffering because of the time of the year. However, at the very time of year that he needed the triamcolone in 2013, he won - without the need for TUEs - the Tour de Romandie in 2012. He also won the Giro's opening time trial in 2010 without the need for TUEs. In 2008 and 2009 he rode the Giro without trouble, and in 2009 he did the Giro AND the Tour. In 2007 he rode the 4 Jours de Dunkerque in early May - winning the TT - and the Tour.

This isn't Jimmy Casper forgetting to submit his renewal paperwork for a substance he's had a TUE in place for 12 years. This is a TUE that he's developed the need for over a decade into his career, and he's seemingly gone from not suffering badly enough to not race using only OTC, non-TUE medicine, to suffering so badly he needs one of the strongest substances around for it. Is it implausible? Of course not. But when the need for it then isn't consistent, moving around the time of year matching his season's goals, of course people are going to cry foul.

Excellent in-depth write up and explanation. Everything you have mentioned, plus the four autobiographies where Wiggins never mentioned it, all leave Bradley without a leg to stand on here.

Morally. But what he has done is still legal. The bigger questions should be possed at those who allowed the TUE's.

And another thing. How do we know that many other GT contenders weren't doing exactly what Wiggins was? This has been leaked by the Russians, so wouldn't they not release similar info about Contador (because he is riding for a Russian team) for example? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here?

Sorry Wiggins has not done something legal. He cheated.

Have a look at the criteria for getting a TUE and there a 4 parts. Wiggins needs to satisfy all 4 parts. He didn't. He doped, with the assistance of his team, Sky and the UCI.

Wiggins, TeamSky and UCI are cheated here.

relevant parts about TUE taken from DamianoMachiavelli's post above;

4.1 An Athlete may be granted a TUE if (and only if) he/she can show, by a balance of probability, that each of the following conditions is met:

a. The Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method in question is needed to treat an acute or chronic medical condition, such that the Athlete would experience a significant impairment to health if the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method were to be withheld.

b. The Therapeutic Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is highly unlikely to produce any additional enhancement of performance beyond what might be anticipated by a return to the Athlete’s normal state of health following the treatment of the acute or chronic medical condition.

c. There is no reasonable Therapeutic alternative to the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method.

d. The necessity for the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is not a consequence, wholly or in part, of the prior Use (without a TUE) of a substance or method which was prohibited at the time of such Use.

Comment to 4.1: When a TUEC is deciding whether or not to recognize a TUE granted by another Anti-Doping Organization (see Article 7, below), and when WADA is reviewing a decision to grant (or not to grant) a TUE (see Article 8, below), the issue will be the same as it is for a TUEC that is considering an application for a TUE under article 6, below, i.e., has the Athlete demonstrated by a balance of probability that each of the conditions set out in article 4.1 is met? The WADA documents titled “Medical Information to Support the Decisions of TUECs”, posted on WADA’s website, should be used to assist in the application of these criteria in relation to particular medical conditions.

He doped. No question. He doped and he was assisted in his doping by Sky and the UCI. Wiggins doesn't get off because the UCI let him dope. He still doped.

 

[Craigee]

Agree with Benotti here. People are beating round the bush here a bit. Is it Brad's fault? Is it Sky's? Is it Wada's or the UCI?

Has anyone considered that just maybe it is possibly one big conspiracy, team work, all in it together? Why do the Tour of France organisers make the route so friendly first for Wiggins when he won and then afterwards for Froome?

Probably not all in it of course but gee a lot of things do fall in to place for the top team with the most money behind them don't they? State funded too.

 

[Grandillusion]

Anybody listen to Daniel Benson's Cyclingnews podcast? I didn't hear anything really in the way of serious critique of the anomalies and holes in Wiggins' account to Fotheringham. There were multiple repeats of the 'it was all signed off so therefore above board' type, with one guy (PR smoothie concerned with reputations management guff) claiming the TUE system wasn't a grey area (!). A few minutes later he said it was.
The only interesting contributor was Jaksche, who answered Wiggins question re. the doping regime he's been on with Kenacort. They used 20mg injections. So half what Wiggins used three years in succession before major Tours.

 

[TheSpud]

Re: Re:

The symptoms he describes are exactly what I get at a similar time of the year. Okay you might be able to get a few symptoms of Wikipedia but specific examples of how those symptoms manifest themselves in your body as he describes? I don't think so.

Those around him wouldn't see a lot of those symptoms. In fact if you were to ask 10 of my friends if I suffered from hayfever probably 50% of them would say I didn't. My doctor always suggests that I take Zirtek/Cetrizine a few weeks before the pollen to get it into my system, as a preventative. You don't wait until it feels like somebody has lobbed a handful of sand in your eyes and shoved two corks up your nose before you start taking anti-histamine tabs, drops and spray.

Bizarrely, when I used to race I just thought I went crap in the summer months and always had a blocked nose and sore eyes. Wasn't till a couple of years after when sneezing became a symptom I realised I had suffered from mild hayfever for some years beforehand.

BUT I am giving the benefit of doubt here. Whilst the allergy story stacks up, the rest of it still doesn't and the description of how the performance/medical part of Team Sky is managed doesn't read as convincing at all.

The problem with giving the benefit of the doubt in this is the 2013 doses. If he's always had them around about the same time as you mention, that's one thing, and you'd say ok, fair enough, while we don't like the TUE usage for such a strong substance the timing makes sense. The fact that it's apparently so severe he needs something as strong as that so soon after winning the Dauphiné and has never mentioned it before raises eyebrows, but you know, if he regularly gets hay fever in late June/early July then ok (although it does seem like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut in terms of treatment, a bit like having a headache and finding a doctor who'll prescribe morphine).

So if it was just 2011-12 when his season was set out the same, then fine. But the 2013 dose is problematic if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, happening as it does just before the start of the Giro d'Italia. Because that was him suffering similarly heavily from allergies - we know because he had to be prescribed the same heavy stuff, right? - that he typically suffered in late June/early July. Who knows, the Giro has always had connections to people will allergies dropping out or suffering because of the time of the year. However, at the very time of year that he needed the triamcolone in 2013, he won - without the need for TUEs - the Tour de Romandie in 2012. He also won the Giro's opening time trial in 2010 without the need for TUEs. In 2008 and 2009 he rode the Giro without trouble, and in 2009 he did the Giro AND the Tour. In 2007 he rode the 4 Jours de Dunkerque in early May - winning the TT - and the Tour.

This isn't Jimmy Casper forgetting to submit his renewal paperwork for a substance he's had a TUE in place for 12 years. This is a TUE that he's developed the need for over a decade into his career, and he's seemingly gone from not suffering badly enough to not race using only OTC, non-TUE medicine, to suffering so badly he needs one of the strongest substances around for it. Is it implausible? Of course not. But when the need for it then isn't consistent, moving around the time of year matching his season's goals, of course people are going to cry foul.

Excellent in-depth write up and explanation. Everything you have mentioned, plus the four autobiographies where Wiggins never mentioned it, all leave Bradley without a leg to stand on here.

Morally. But what he has done is still legal. The bigger questions should be possed at those who allowed the TUE's.

And another thing. How do we know that many other GT contenders weren't doing exactly what Wiggins was? This has been leaked by the Russians, so wouldn't they not release similar info about Contador (because he is riding for a Russian team) for example? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here?

Sorry Wiggins has not done something legal. He cheated.

Have a look at the criteria for getting a TUE and there a 4 parts. Wiggins needs to satisfy all 4 parts. He didn't. He doped, with the assistance of his team, Sky and the UCI.

Wiggins, TeamSky and UCI are cheated here.

relevant parts about TUE taken from DamianoMachiavelli's post above;

4.1 An Athlete may be granted a TUE if (and only if) he/she can show, by a balance of probability, that each of the following conditions is met:

a. The Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method in question is needed to treat an acute or chronic medical condition, such that the Athlete would experience a significant impairment to health if the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method were to be withheld.

b. The Therapeutic Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is highly unlikely to produce any additional enhancement of performance beyond what might be anticipated by a return to the Athlete’s normal state of health following the treatment of the acute or chronic medical condition.

c. There is no reasonable Therapeutic alternative to the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method.

d. The necessity for the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is not a consequence, wholly or in part, of the prior Use (without a TUE) of a substance or method which was prohibited at the time of such Use.

Comment to 4.1: When a TUEC is deciding whether or not to recognize a TUE granted by another Anti-Doping Organization (see Article 7, below), and when WADA is reviewing a decision to grant (or not to grant) a TUE (see Article 8, below), the issue will be the same as it is for a TUEC that is considering an application for a TUE under article 6, below, i.e., has the Athlete demonstrated by a balance of probability that each of the conditions set out in article 4.1 is met? The WADA documents titled “Medical Information to Support the Decisions of TUECs”, posted on WADA’s website, should be used to assist in the application of these criteria in relation to particular medical conditions.

He doped. No question. He doped and he was assisted in his doping by Sky and the UCI. Wiggins doesn't get off because the UCI let him dope. He still doped.

Can you post a link to those actual rules - just so we can check.

 

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Sorry Wiggins has not done something legal. He cheated.

Have a look at the criteria for getting a TUE and there a 4 parts. Wiggins needs to satisfy all 4 parts. He didn't. He doped, with the assistance of his team, Sky and the UCI.

Wiggins, TeamSky and UCI are cheated here.

relevant parts about TUE taken from DamianoMachiavelli's post above;

4.1 An Athlete may be granted a TUE if (and only if) he/she can show, by a balance of probability, that each of the following conditions is met:

a. The Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method in question is needed to treat an acute or chronic medical condition, such that the Athlete would experience a significant impairment to health if the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method were to be withheld.

b. The Therapeutic Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is highly unlikely to produce any additional enhancement of performance beyond what might be anticipated by a return to the Athlete’s normal state of health following the treatment of the acute or chronic medical condition.

c. There is no reasonable Therapeutic alternative to the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method.

d. The necessity for the Use of the Prohibited Substance or Prohibited Method is not a consequence, wholly or in part, of the prior Use (without a TUE) of a substance or method which was prohibited at the time of such Use.

Comment to 4.1: When a TUEC is deciding whether or not to recognize a TUE granted by another Anti-Doping Organization (see Article 7, below), and when WADA is reviewing a decision to grant (or not to grant) a TUE (see Article 8, below), the issue will be the same as it is for a TUEC that is considering an application for a TUE under article 6, below, i.e., has the Athlete demonstrated by a balance of probability that each of the conditions set out in article 4.1 is met? The WADA documents titled “Medical Information to Support the Decisions of TUECs”, posted on WADA’s website, should be used to assist in the application of these criteria in relation to particular medical conditions.

He doped. No question. He doped and he was assisted in his doping by Sky and the UCI. Wiggins doesn't get off because the UCI let him dope. He still doped.

Can you post a link to those actual rules - just so we can check.

here is the link to the document being quoted in this thread, which is the 2016 document, the one currently in vigour:
https://wada-main-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/resources/files/wada-2016-istue-final-en_0.pdf

but to do things correctly, it's the 2011 document we should be looking at. there isn't much difference between the 2011 and the 2016 texts, though. here the 2011 document link: https://wada-main-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/resources/files/WADA_ISTUE_2011_revJanuary-2012_EN.pdf




everything (apart for some high level information that is contained in the WADA Code) concerning TUEs is on WADA's TUE resource page, which can be found here: https://www.wada-ama.org/en/resources/therapeutic-use-exemption-tue/international-standard-for-therapeutic-use-exemptions-istue

 

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Seriously. "I trained for 7 hours without breakfast to lose weight, and the injections made me loose too much weight". You can't expect anybody to believe that

This is where the Wiggins defence falls into a million pieces.

What was always going to be his number one hurdle in winning a GT?

Weight.

What was always going to be his big worry?

Losing time on the big cols. He got a favourable course in 2012, but climbing was always going to be the big concern.

What have corticosteriods always been used/abused for?

Keeping weight off whilst retaining or increasing power.

It all looks so bad for Wiggins because he just can't spin out of these facts. In the end, resorting to the claim that those drugs aren't performance enhancing is like looking at a white swan and claiming it to be black. Simply not believable.

i agree.

for me all i wanted to known is if he lost weight. now i know that he did lose weight, so my curiosity is satisfied that he did get performance enhancing gains from the triamcinolone injection.

and the interesting thing is that he "complains" now of losing "too much" weight, yet he took the injection again the next year, and again the year after (well, maybe he is trying to tell us that he could definitely have followed Christopher Froome on La Toussuire if it weren't for the triamcinolone that made him so weak).

i don't know, i can't quite imagine a doctor re-prescribing a drug that makes you weak if you've actually complained to them that it makes you weak, especially given that there probably were alternative treatments to chose from. except... except if he genuinely felt weak in 2011 from losing too much weight and then adapted his whole weight management to triamcinolone in 2012. meaning: in 2012 he tried less hard to lose weight through long training rides without breakfast, he arrived at the 2012 tour de france with 1 or 2 kilos more than he did in 2011, knowing that he would lose them thanks to the triamcinolone injection.

he will probably never truthfully say if he felt the other performance enhancing effects of triamcinolone, i.e. the euphoria or the pain-killing, anti-inflammatory effects. but now we know he lost weight. i don't even know why he's said that. if i was him i'd keep this quiet.