Team Ineos (Formerly the Sky thread)

[Benotti69]

That sounds to me as if he was not, at the time, a Sky rider, whether he had been training with them or not.

What Wallace and Gromit said was absolutely correct.

Also, the results of which he was stripped were those that were achieved pre-Sky. There can be no argument about the fact that he was riding for Endura Racing before his Sky contract, announced in October 2012 for the 2013 season.

Not that it makes it look any better for JTL, of course.

The line between Team Sky and BC was so blurred to be indistinguishable. JTL was a Sky rider in all but name. He was eating Sky prepared meals, training according to Sky training plans, seeing Sky personnel about his training and no doubt racing, etc etc......

 

[thehog]

The line between Team Sky and BC was so blurred to be indistinguishable. JTL was a Sky rider in all but name. He was eating Sky prepared meals, training according to Sky training plans, seeing Sky personnel about his training and no doubt racing, etc etc......

Yes, if you go to each of their web sites both are intrinsically linked:

 

[wrinklyvet]

Yes, if you go to each of their web sites both are intrinsically linked:

Nobody denies there are links. Sky sponsors both.

I am not trying to say anything at all in favour of JTL or to suggest Sky does not put money into British Cycling. If they did not, we would not have the many events that so enliven the British cycling scene for so many people. It's not at all surprising that BC promotes Team Sky and blurs the differences between them

What I was on about was this, said by Wallace and Gromit, "Wasn't JTL busted because his pre Sky blood readings were anomalous given the baseline subsequently established when he was tested more regularly whilst at Sky? "

And yes, he was.

Spin it how it suits you, but what W & G said was true.

The baseline tests came later, just as he says. The later tests revealed the problem with the September 2012 result.

 

[Benotti69]

Nobody denies there are links. Sky sponsors both.

I am not trying to say anything at all in favour of JTL or to suggest Sky does not put money into British Cycling. If they did not, we would not have the many events that so enliven the British cycling scene for so many people. It's not at all surprising that BC promotes Team Sky and blurs the differences between them

What I was on about was this, said by Wallace and Gromit, "Wasn't JTL busted because his pre Sky blood readings were anomalous given the baseline subsequently established when he was tested more regularly whilst at Sky? "

And yes, he was.

Spin it how it suits you, but what W & G said was true.

The baseline tests came later, just as he says. The later tests revealed the problem with the September 2012 result.

Sky/Brailsford talked about their attention to details and leaving no stone unturned in their quest for 'marginal gain' excellence, so where does that leave Sky while they had JTL in the camps and under their watch?

Spin it whatever way you want but sky are not off the hook on JTL.

 

[wrinklyvet]

Sky/Brailsford talked about their attention to details and leaving no stone unturned in their quest for 'marginal gain' excellence, so where does that leave Sky while they had JTL in the camps and under their watch?

Spin it whatever way you want but sky are not off the hook on JTL.

That's only so if you consider Sky responsible for what JTL did. They weren't responsible for what he did at Endura. The result of his subsequent passport tests while at Sky did not replicate his September 2012 result.

I think it was obviously an independent effort on his part, designed to impress his prospective employers.

If you think that original state of affairs was all down to Sky there's nothing I can say to disabuse you but it rather appears that while he was in the team he wasn't doing what he did before. You can't have it both ways. If what he did before was somehow the responsibility of Sky and he was normal after he joined, how does that lead to your conclusion? It takes particularly convoluted thinking to achieve that. Spin is what I call it. It's certainly not fact or fair comment.

 

[blackcat]

Sky/Brailsford talked about their attention to details and leaving no stone unturned in their quest for 'marginal gain' excellence, so where does that leave Sky while they had JTL in the camps and under their watch?

Spin it whatever way you want but sky are not off the hook on JTL.

how about if Sky searched their roster, machiavellian style, for an English scapegoat, they could throw to the wolves and say, look, there goes JTL, but Froome and Wiggo, patently clean.

that is what happened to Australian Rules Football League in the last 20 months. A small fish thrown to the wolves. 40 Big Fish, still going thru the anti-doping process.


JTL was worth a mint to Sky. He demonstrated their transparency and ethics and values and propaganda were above board.
Do you think Wiggo or Froome will sling JTL a rolex? What was Lance's bonus for the 8 domestiques? US$ 50k each for a July win?

I think both Froome and Wiggo owe JTL 50k in gbp, plus a rolex. Lets say, a patek philippe. fukc rolex.

 

[wrinklyvet]

how about if Sky searched their roster, machiavellian style, for an English scapegoat, they could throw to the wolves and say, look, there goes JTL, but Froome and Wiggo, patently clean.

that is what happened to Australian Rules Football League in the last 20 months. A small fish thrown to the wolves. 40 Big Fish, still going thru the anti-doping process.


JTL was worth a mint to Sky. He demonstrated their transparency and ethics and values and propaganda were above board.
Do you think Wiggo or Froome will sling JTL a rolex? What was Lance's bonus for the 8 domestiques? US$ 50k each for a July win?

I think both Froome and Wiggo owe JTL 50k in gbp, plus a rolex. Lets say, a patek philippe. fukc rolex.

Why didn't I think of that?

Why indeed.

Rest up a bit until you see a true target, keep your powder dry and have a Happy New Year!

 

[ray j willings]

Pre Sky, JTL had a season where he won shi%loads of races.
The season before he hardly won anything. He was not a new rider.
To all of a sudden at his age start winning and riding at a level he never managed before would/should raise eyebrows.

For some reason Sky seemed to ignore this and did not even question this remarkable turn around of form.

Very strange for a team with the non doping policy

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Pre Sky, JTL had a season where he won shi%loads of races.
The season before he hardly won anything. He was not a new rider.
To all of a sudden at his age start winning and riding at a level he never managed before would/should raise eyebrows.

For some reason Sky seemed to ignore this and did not even question this remarkable turn around of form.

Very strange for a team with the non doping policy

Not when you consider they hired Wiggins after a similar breakout 2009, and watched Froome have a similar breakout 2011.

JTL was 3 for 3.

Meanwhile EBH et al spun their wheels and went nowhere.

 

[MartinGT]

Who's ever blamed Endura?

Errrr you?

What's 'theory' got to do with it? His sanction is the reality of his doping in a previous team, not from his time at Sky. This is fact, no theory is required.

Come on kid, keep up with yourself.

 

[ray j willings]

Not when you consider they hired Wiggins after a similar breakout 2009, and watched Froome have a similar breakout 2011.

JTL was 3 for 3.

Meanwhile EBH et al spun their wheels and went nowhere.

JTL association with Sky has killed his career. I wonder how much stuff he knows about Sky etc etc Why hasn't he talked ...what's your views?

 

[bobbins]

JTL association with Sky has killed his career. I wonder how much stuff he knows about Sky etc etc Why hasn't he talked ...what's your views?

If he talks, he'll never work in cycling again.

 

[Wallace and Gromit]

JTL association with Sky has killed his career. I wonder how much stuff he knows about Sky etc etc Why hasn't he talked ...what's your views?

JTL got paid circa 800k euros for his time as Sky (unless he had some of it clawed back via a doping clause in his Sky contract, though it was his pre Sky doping that did for him). He was on about 1/20 of that at Endura, so going to Sky and getting busted might be the end of his career, but he made more money out of his chosen "career path" in cycling than he would have got by staying legit or going elsewhere. No-one else was going to give him such a big contract.

I guess he's not talked because he doesn't know anything provable. If he makes unprovable allegations he's simply going to be dismissed as a bitter and twisted doper. In general, the time to talk and be taken seriously is before getting busted.

 

[thehog]

JTL got paid circa 800k euros for his time as Sky (unless he had some of it clawed back via a doping clause in his Sky contract, though it was his pre Sky doping that did for him). He was on about 1/20 of that at Endura, so going to Sky and getting busted might be the end of his career, but he made more money out of his chosen "career path" in cycling than he would have got by staying legit or going elsewhere. No-one else was going to give him such a big contract.

I guess he's not talked because he doesn't know anything provable. If he makes unprovable allegations he's simply going to be dismissed as a bitter and twisted doper. In general, the time to talk and be taken seriously is before getting busted.

It was 395k not 800k.

 

[Freddythefrog]

That's only so if you consider Sky responsible for what JTL did. They weren't responsible for what he did at Endura. The result of his subsequent passport tests while at Sky did not replicate his September 2012 result.

I think it was obviously an independent effort on his part, designed to impress his prospective employers.

If you think that original state of affairs was all down to Sky there's nothing I can say to disabuse you but it rather appears that while he was in the team he wasn't doing what he did before. You can't have it both ways. If what he did before was somehow the responsibility of Sky and he was normal after he joined, how does that lead to your conclusion? It takes particularly convoluted thinking to achieve that. Spin is what I call it. It's certainly not fact or fair comment.

Wrinkly - so how does a long term friend of mine that hasn't ridden a race for the last 25 years, no longer lives in the UK but gets Cycling Weekly delivered by snail mail each week, manage to tell me, totally unbidden that JTL is doped up to the gills; the joke was along the lines of Brailsford needing to hire him so he and Brad could learn how to train properly, JTL had found the elixir of life.

So the hypotheses is that if, to interested casual observers, JTL's performance was not credible and so obviously PED induced, then given the vast amount of time JTL spent with the masters of marginal gains - every stone is turned over repeatedly aka Sky/BC during that season prior to signing, it is impossible to hold the twin beliefs that:
1 Brailsford is expert at his job of managing a clean team;
2 JTL slipped in under the radar.

One of those has to be false.

However just remove "clean" from the 1st proposition and they hang together very well again.

I suggest that only a donkey who was managing a clean team would not have been bringing into play every tool he could to find out if JTL was clean given a letter of intent and his performance profile. Brailsford is no donkey.

 

[wrinklyvet]

Wrinkly - so how does a long term friend of mine that hasn't ridden a race for the last 25 years, no longer lives in the UK but gets Cycling Weekly delivered by snail mail each week, manage to tell me, totally unbidden that JTL is doped up to the gills; the joke was along the lines of Brailsford needing to hire him so he and Brad could learn how to train properly, JTL had found the elixir of life.

So the hypotheses is that if, to interested casual observers, JTL's performance was not credible and so obviously PED induced, then given the vast amount of time JTL spent with the masters of marginal gains - every stone is turned over repeatedly aka Sky/BC during that season prior to signing, it is impossible to hold the twin beliefs that:
1 Brailsford is expert at his job of managing a clean team;
2 JTL slipped in under the radar.

One of those has to be false.

However just remove "clean" from the 1st proposition and they hang together very well again.

I suggest that only a donkey who was managing a clean team would not have been bringing into play every tool he could to find out if JTL was clean given a letter of intent and his performance profile. Brailsford is no donkey.

You can say what you like about Brailsford's incompetence in this and I probably would not disagree. You misunderstand me if you think I am here to fight his corner or Sky's on every angle of this or on anything.

What your friend may have thought or said is no concern of mine.

You may not know much about me. I ride and race my bike contre la montre and have done for some years. I do that despite the fact that some people of my age can't get on one. I take an interest in this sport sufficiently to have an opinion. I don't own a single piece of Sky kit. I don't come riding to their rescue every time somebody has a go at them.

With respect, I don't think either of us knew just how the assessment of JTL took place, as we weren't there. However, I see no reason to draw particular conclusions from that apparent incompetence. I remember Brailsford appearing embarrassed about it, but I believe that was largely because they screwed up the selection process.

At the end of the day I don't hold JTL's pre-Sky doping against Sky and I think that's simple and fair. If it's too simple for you I'm sure you will go on about for ever unless and until something more substantial takes your fancy.

 

[bobbins]

Wrinkly - so how does a long term friend of mine that hasn't ridden a race for the last 25 years, no longer lives in the UK but gets Cycling Weekly delivered by snail mail each week, manage to tell me, totally unbidden that JTL is doped up to the gills; the joke was along the lines of Brailsford needing to hire him so he and Brad could learn how to train properly, JTL had found the elixir of life.

So the hypotheses is that if, to interested casual observers, JTL's performance was not credible and so obviously PED induced, then given the vast amount of time JTL spent with the masters of marginal gains - every stone is turned over repeatedly aka Sky/BC during that season prior to signing, it is impossible to hold the twin beliefs that:
1 Brailsford is expert at his job of managing a clean team;
2 JTL slipped in under the radar.

One of those has to be false.

However just remove "clean" from the 1st proposition and they hang together very well again.

I suggest that only a donkey who was managing a clean team would not have been bringing into play every tool he could to find out if JTL was clean given a letter of intent and his performance profile. Brailsford is no donkey.

Brailsford signed him because Garmin wanted him. Brailsford hates JV so signed JTL out of spite despite being warned not to.

 

[The Hitch]

Brailsford signed him because Garmin wanted him. Brailsford hates JV so signed JTL out of spite despite being warned not to.

Why?

10 characters

 

[thehog]

Why?

10 characters

Battle of the clean propagandists?

 

[ChewbaccaD]

Just watched Rough Rider, the documentary on Kimmage. I really appreciated all of the skeptical looks he gave at the 2013 TdF. I don't believe Sky either Paul. Too bad David drank the Kool-Aid.

 

[Digger]

That's funny about JV and Brailsford

I must say, and this might surprise people considering how I have laid into JV, I would back JV before Brailsford any day.

Brailsford is an awful person...real bully.

 

[wrinklyvet]

Just watched Rough Rider, the documentary on Kimmage. I really appreciated all of the skeptical looks he gave at the 2013 TdF. I don't believe Sky either Paul. Too bad David drank the Kool-Aid.

How do you defend the use of the expression "drank the Kool-Aid" then? Perhaps this peculiarly American expression alluding to something that resulted a massacre has become bland and acceptable in the States?

 

[Digger]

Regading JTL - non disclosure agreement.

Like everyone else on the staff - same with the likes of Julich et al...

Was reading about Thomas Lovkvist today about how he thought Kerrrison's training was a joke and he went backwards with it - amazing how this guy's genius training methods only seem to work for........no one.

Froome largely ignored Kerrison.

Kerrison is only a cover up, an excuse for their improvement - not one thing sky do regarding training hasn't been done elsewhere.

But the story is selling, to the general public that is - to the seasoned fans, then we all know it's rubbish.

Some things I had forgotten - like how Fran Millar was telling me they didn't know about Leinders - yet I did a google search in May 2012 and found it - an excerpt of an autobiography where he was named.

So the marginal gains team didn't even manage a google search!! Or to ask the former Rabobank riders who were then on the Sky roster.

I ask anyone...if Sky are clean, how are they beating doped riders? When, in all fairness to any pro, they are all talented....the marginal gains aren't gains because others are doing them...they haven't signed the best riders - I mean their current best rider was barely a journeyman domestique.

Walsh writes page upon page about their marginal gains but then accepts that he doesn't know what goes on with other teams.

I know one journalist in 2012 who was told to write positive or come home (not kimmage or walsh)
I have been told that Brailsford has tried to bully editors.

We know that Yates and Sky have changed their story about why he left.

We know that Brailsford used the excuse of Txema to justify Leinders - which was awful...yet Walsh denied this ever happened...

As for Wiggins - the way he has achieved what he has disgusts him.

Froome...god knows what he'll do or say next....I don't think it's because he's necessarily a maverick or hard to handle, but down to a serious lack of intelligence...

I see in 2011 Vuelta he asked Lovkvist with 150km to go if another team would attack on the next climb - Lovkvist laughed at the ridiculousness of it - and this was apparently the new improved Froome with tactical know how...

 

[Freddythefrog]

You can say what you like about Brailsford's incompetence in this and I probably would not disagree. You misunderstand me if you think I am here to fight his corner or Sky's on every angle of this or on anything.

What your friend may have thought or said is no concern of mine.

You may not know much about me. I ride and race my bike contre la montre and have done for some years. I do that despite the fact that some people of my age can't get on one. I take an interest in this sport sufficiently to have an opinion. I don't own a single piece of Sky kit. I don't come riding to their rescue every time somebody has a go at them.

With respect, I don't think either of us knew just how the assessment of JTL took place, as we weren't there. However, I see no reason to draw particular conclusions from that apparent incompetence. I remember Brailsford appearing embarrassed about it, but I believe that was largely because they screwed up the selection process.

At the end of the day I don't hold JTL's pre-Sky doping against Sky and I think that's simple and fair. If it's too simple for you I'm sure you will go on about for ever unless and until something more substantial takes your fancy.

Wrinkly you are trying to run away from your false position. Nowhere do I say Brailsford is incompetent. I believe entirely the opposite. You stated the following was true

"Wasn't JTL busted because his pre Sky blood readings were anomalous given the baseline subsequently established when he was tested more regularly whilst at Sky?"

Other posters have once again..........

[I dread to think how many times the "JTL went on Sky camps early in the season and worked with the BC/Sky coaches that year" facts have been reeled out when yet another skybot has posted "JTL was nothing to do with Sky, Sky's wonderful super team found him out - aren't they brilliant at anti-doping - therefore Froome must be the best rider ever in the history of cycling" ] ................pointed out the factual position.

I agree it doesn't matter what we think but it is entirely impossible to hold simultaneously, two mutually exclusive concepts and be of sound mind. You seem to want to do that.

I don't for a moment think Brailsford is stupid. Therefore I don't doubt that he had exactly the same doubts about the veracity of JTL's performance as so many of us did that year. But the critical thing is you and I are not paid £600k or more a year to manage the clean Sky team. Brailsford is.

The first bit of BS was "our systems worked". Next line was "he did it with Endura". Only a fool swallows those two in the face of the facts.

 

[ChewbaccaD]

How do you defend the use of the expression "drank the Kool-Aid" then? Perhaps this peculiarly American expression alluding to something that resulted a massacre has become bland and acceptable in the States?

I get it. You're butt-hurt that a Sky are a bunch of lying dopers.

I don't have to defend anything about the saying. This thread isn't about defending the use of "drank the Kool-Aid." It's about Sky. We have rules here at cyclingnews forums, obey them please.