Team Ineos (Formerly the Sky thread)

[BYOP88]

Re: Re:

The only non-sanctioned winners in the EPO era
Sastre (2008)
Evans
Wiggo
Froome
Nibali

80% are the most recent winners, so haven't stood the test of time as of yet.
There is reasonable doubt as to Sastre (but thats discussion for another thread).

The only one who posted signficantly reduced numbers (while beating Contador and Schleckette) is Evans.

And considering the teams Evans rode for this is a leap of imagination I don't think a sane person can make.

I wouldn't put my hand in the fire for any off them, although I'd spend a touch more time thinking about it with Evans.

 

[wendybnt]

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

 

[Tommy79]

Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Nailed it, thanks for sharing.

 

[gazr99]

Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

 

[Franklin]

Agreed, Tommy, exactly to your liking.

We have forgotten that each and every winner at the highest levels of cycling, and certainly in the Tour de France, are outliers and unusual.

Too bad that the author "forgets" that give or take everyone of those outliers have been shown to be doping.

The author also forgets to mention that the published wattages by Sky can't be right due to this odd things called physics.

So actually the article is hopscotching about the real problem and "forgetting"to mention that the numbers are lalalala idiocy.

So yes, I can imagine you are loving it. It's USPS all over again.

 

[wendybnt]

To be fair, Franklin, whilst the last two posters have seized upon the article as a defence of their own position, you too are missing the wider point.

 

[slim charles]

I am sure it is not easy for Froome to be in this position, regardless of whether he's doping. He can't prove he isn't. But, the thing is, this 'innocent till proven guilty' doesn't work. Because he isn't suspended based solely on suspicion he's doping.

And it also isn't 'just about numbers'. It is about his incredible transformation. From nobody to the best. I mean, we've been trough all this so many times. He might never fail a doping test and might end up being considered one of the best riders ever. But the fact will always remain - his performances are suspicious.

 

[gillan1969]

Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Its a view....there are a few problems with it however...no mention of Vuelta 2011 transformation...none...zilch...this is the single biggest indictment of Froome and yet he can't find time to mention it...strange for a prof

nobody as far as I know wants 'all the data' and I notice he carefully constructs that himself "defining transparency here as "show us all your data""...again not very good for a prof. In fact Kimmage et al would be happy with current weight and any pre Vuelta 2011 data...not training schedules just basic data e.g. VO2 and BP results...

Ten Dam - yup nobody can prove a negative as Brailsford keeps reminding us but Ten Dam has far more chance of being clean than Froome and I would imagine most people here would agree...he does that by being transparent....well that and not producing notnormal performances of course

Talking of transparency here is Brailsford in 2013 with regard to Kennaugh's weight loss - 5 kilos in two months - (severe and rapid weight loss being highlighted in the CIRC report) "It's a good question to ask. That is a lot of weight to lose and I totally agree with you. What do we do to get to that kind of weight loss? They're the types of questions that would be legitimate to answer. I don't think there's any great secret in that." Only SKY, who have produced Kennauh and the two skinniest GT winners ever have...eh...never answered that question...

if the prof can't face the tricky questions he should stick to the day job....

 

[gillan1969]

Re:

To be fair, Franklin, whilst the last two posters have seized upon the article as a defence of their own position, you too are missing the wider point.

what is the wider point?

 

[red_flanders]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Re:

Agreed, Tommy, exactly to your liking.

We have forgotten that each and every winner at the highest levels of cycling, and certainly in the Tour de France, are outliers and unusual.

Too bad that the author "forgets" that give or take everyone of those outliers have been shown to be doping.

The author also forgets to mention that the published wattages by Sky can't be right due to this odd things called physics.

So actually the article is hopscotching about the real problem and "forgetting"to mention that the numbers are lalalala idiocy.

So yes, I can imagine you are loving it. It's USPS all over again.

When "Wendy" posted I kinda guessed it was not going to be worth reading. The article title embedded in the URL lent credence to this initial intuition, but the Tommy response confirms it.

 

[gillan1969]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Its a view....there are a few problems with it however...no mention of Vuelta 2011 transformation...none...zilch...this is the single biggest indictment of Froome and yet he can't find time to mention it...strange for a prof

nobody as far as I know wants 'all the data' and I notice he carefully constructs that himself "defining transparency here as "show us all your data""...again not very good for a prof. In fact Kimmage et al would be happy with current weight and any pre Vuelta 2011 data...not training schedules just basic data e.g. VO2 and BP results...

Ten Dam - yup nobody can prove a negative as Brailsford keeps reminding us but Ten Dam has far more chance of being clean than Froome and I would imagine most people here would agree...he does that by being transparent....well that and not producing notnormal performances of course

Talking of transparency here is Brailsford in 2013 with regard to Kennaugh's weight loss - 5 kilos in two months - (severe and rapid weight loss being highlighted in the CIRC report) "It's a good question to ask. That is a lot of weight to lose and I totally agree with you. What do we do to get to that kind of weight loss? They're the types of questions that would be legitimate to answer. I don't think there's any great secret in that." Only SKY, who have produced Kennauh and the two skinniest GT winners ever have...eh...never answered that question...

if the prof can't face the tricky questions he should stick to the day job....

in fact...give brailsford his due...to claim transperency and answer a question with
They're the types of questions that would be legitimate to answer.
is sheer brilliance...its just as well the majority of fans can't do that 2+2 sum

 

[wendybnt]

I'm not sure you've grasped what the point of the article is. It's neither an attack on nor a defence of Froome. It's about the overlooked problematic nature of 'transparency'.

 

[Tommy79]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

Great point.... or would be if all the other teams had a former Sky GC rider.

 

[red_flanders]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

Great point.... or would be if all the other teams had a former Sky GC rider.

\

One, I'm not talking about just Sky, two, you do get that Sky have been going for several years now, and riders who have been in and out of that team have interacted with people who have interacted with other people, etc.

You do also get that other teams who do know their riders' actual weights are riding up the same climbs, right? As such, they know exactly what power numbers riders from other teams are putting out on the climbs.

Do you really think any of the GT contenders think that Sky or anyone else at the sharp end are clean? You can't really be that naive, can you?

 

[gillan1969]

Re:

I'm not sure you've grasped what the point of the article is. It's neither an attack on nor a defence of Froome. It's about the overlooked problematic nature of 'transparency'.

yes but Ten Dam is looked at with less suspicion than Froome and the prof himself sets the level of transparency he wants...a level which nobody is calling for...a discussion on the nature of transparency would be betters served by a discussion on the Brailsford sentence as quoted above....any thoughts on that gem?



and it is an implicit defence of Froome...because to omit the biggest elephant in the room in your analysis...it is not a very good analysis to begin with...

 

[gazr99]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

Does the rider take the data with them or does it belong to the team? Yes of course riders will tell their new team training methods but trying to gain a competitive advantage through training methods is still an aim, as the team would have benefitted from this training for at least a year before the rider left.

The methods of training and diet are constantly evolving/changing, so S&C coaches are always trying to find out what the opposition are doing and how they benefit.

Say if Sky introduced something new this year, how would the other teams know about it?

 

[Tommy79]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

Great point.... or would be if all the other teams had a former Sky GC rider.

\

One, I'm not talking about just Sky, two, you do get that Sky have been going for several years now, and riders who have been in and out of that team have interacted with people who have interacted with other people, etc.

You do also get that other teams who do know their riders' actual weights are riding up the same climbs, right? As such, they know exactly what power numbers riders from other teams are putting out on the climbs.

Do you really think any of the GT contenders think that Sky or anyone else at the sharp end are clean? You can't really be that naive, can you?

70% sure and rising that Sky are clean based on what we know at the moment.

I can only think of Tinkoff that will have a real insight into Sky's training. Not so much Movistar and Astana.

As far as I'm concerned they have a right to keep their training data a secret. And power data isn't going to prove anything either way.

 

[ScienceIsCool]

The formatting is awful, but here's the data I collected on Froome's flat time trial performance (non-prologue):

From his start as a pro until mid 2011 at Romandie, he was mediocre at best. On average he placed in the top 27% of the field and lost an average of 6.4 seconds/km to the winner (i.e., 5 minutes in a 50 km race). Since TdS 2011 he consistently places on or near the podium and loses on average a second/km to the winner.

There it is in numbers. He flipped a switch. Vrooooom!!

John Swanson


Placing Distance Year Race Time Loss per km (s) Placing (%)

16/145 53 km 2008 TdF -3:00 3.4 11.0%
33/176 29 km 2008 TdF -1:49 3.8 18.8%
32/169 15 km 2009 Giro -1:00 4.0 18.9%
34/186 62 km 2009 Giro -5:36 5.4 18.3%
71/117 17 km 2010 Eneco -2:01 7.1 60.7%
14/127 26 km 2010 Osterreich -1:26 3.3 11.0%
39/154 13 km 2010 Giro -3:47 17.5 25.3%
62/103 22 km 2010 Murcia -3:35 9.8 60.2%
22/131 24 km 2011 ToC -1:39 4.1 16.8%
50/141 21 km 2011 Romandie -1:49 5.2 35.5%
Avg 6.4 27.6%

9/139 32 km 2011 TdS -1:02 1.9 6.5%
2/185 40 km 2011 Vuelta -0:59 1.5 1.1%
3/193 39 km 2012 Vuelta -0:39 1.0 1.6%
2/153 52 km 2012 TdF -1:16 1.5 1.3%
2/178 38 km 2012 TdF -0:35 0.9 1.1%
6/171 54 km 2012 Dauphine -1:33 1.7 3.5%
39/133 17 km 2012 Romandie -1:45 6.2 29.3%
1/177 32 km 2013 TdF -0:00 0.0 0.6%
2/182 33 km 2013 TdF -0:12 0.4 1.1%
3/172 33 km 2013 Dauphine -0:52 1.6 1.7%
3/115 19 km 2013 Romandie -0:34 1.8 2.6%
6/107 9 km 2013 Tirreno -0:15 1.7 5.6%
Avg 1.7 4.7%

 

[SlowFeet]

Re:

I'm not sure you've grasped what the point of the article is. It's neither an attack on nor a defence of Froome. It's about the overlooked problematic nature of 'transparency'.

This sort of argument (on both sides of it) I think leads naturally to the position I have been personally considering for a while now. Transparency is a very tricky thing to achieve. In actual fact, I think it is never truly achieved. Even if people actually are clean, you can't 100% know they are clean regardless of what evidence is presented. Any numbers can be manipulated before they are given to the public. Any output of passports and testing is fraught with problems that mean they aren't 100% believable.

There is absolutely nothing anyone can do to unequivocally convince someone on the other side of an argument like this. If UCI produces a test result tomorrow showing Froome is on <insert drug of choice>, some people will believe the test to be wrong/lying/rigged. If UCI produces a test tomorrow that they say can detect every last thing Froome has ever taken into his body and it's clean, some people will believe the test to be wrong/lying/rigged.

The main problem is that the skeptics in both camps have some reasonable chance of being right and can point to historical situations where their skepticism would have been correct.

So, we are left with the question of what to do...and here is the heretical position I have been contemplating and I think may be the only real way forward for sport. Allow doping. Officially, as opposed to the current stance of "we don't allow doping" that actually means "well, mostly we don't allow doping, but you can use this chemical all the time, this other one some of the time, this other one never but we can't test for it, etc." Basically, limited doping is allowed right now...everyone dopes at least a little...but nobody knows what exactly is allowed. It's sort of like speed limits in the US...you can break the speed limit as long as you don't do it by too much, everyone speeds at least a little sometimes, but you never are quite sure how much you can get away with.

So. Get rid of all this drama about doping. Make it officially legal. Provide some basic limits like max hematocrit etc. Put in a rule that if your riders die or have serious health problems your whole team and everyone associated with them is banned for 10 years. We allow these guys to take risks descending at 100 km/h...why not allow them to take these other risks as well, as long as they have a helmet on...

That would remove all this froth. It would likely make the playing field more even as everyone then can dope to the best of their ability rather than trying to dope to the levels they think they can get away with. It would remove the politics involved with enforcement (if Froome had a failed test, can we be sure it would see the light of day? Amrstrong's positives would have stayed mostly buried if he weren't such a raging a-hole). The Clinic would turn into discussions of what things are likely being done without the overhead of the idea that people are morally corrupt. Winners would be winning "fair." The drama would move back to the racing and the training.

Heresy? Certainly. Worth considering? I think so.

 

[buckle]

Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Professor of "Cultural Diversity and Wellbeing". Do Sky have a Director of Cultural Diversity and Wellbeing?

 

[red_flanders]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

Does the rider take the data with them or does it belong to the team? Yes of course riders will tell their new team training methods but trying to gain a competitive advantage through training methods is still an aim, as the team would have benefitted from this training for at least a year before the rider left.

The methods of training and diet are constantly evolving/changing, so S&C coaches are always trying to find out what the opposition are doing and how they benefit.

Say if Sky introduced something new this year, how would the other teams know about it?

Per JV on this forum, he sees the exact data and physiological parameters of potential hires.

If Sky are doing something new this year, it explains nothing about the previous 4+ years.

Simple answer here is obvious.

 

[gazr99]

Re: Re:

Don't know if this article by Professor Fry has already been posted.

An excellent piece, in my view, about the difficulties with demanding more and more evidence.

http://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/07/the-curious-case-of-chris-froome-why-he-and-cycling-deserve-better/

Excellent piece and agree with everything written in it. I have a similar mindset when it comes to doping and cycling

You all get that with every transfer, the other teams see rider data and get information about other riders right? Yet people lap up this "competitive advantage" stuff like it's a real difference maker. The fact is that every other team knows exactly what training methods and power numbers the other teams use/have at this point.

But good folks found a reason to believe and keep the facts shielded. That's what PR does, it tells people the lies they want to hear.

Does the rider take the data with them or does it belong to the team? Yes of course riders will tell their new team training methods but trying to gain a competitive advantage through training methods is still an aim, as the team would have benefitted from this training for at least a year before the rider left.

The methods of training and diet are constantly evolving/changing, so S&C coaches are always trying to find out what the opposition are doing and how they benefit.

Say if Sky introduced something new this year, how would the other teams know about it?

Per JV on this forum, he sees the exact data and physiological parameters of potential hires.

If Sky are doing something new this year, it explains nothing about the previous 4+ years.

Simple answer here is obvious.

Potential hires being the key phrase. For example, When Tinkoff signed Michael Rogers they would have seen his data but not Froome's or Wiggins.

My point about changing methods is that they are constantly evolving/changing, so a rider could go to another team say what he did the previous year at a rival team, but then the rival team may evolve the training in the new season. Training methods very rarely stay the exact same for more than two years at most

 

[jalep]

Re:

The formatting is awful, but here's the data I collected on Froome's flat time trial performance (non-prologue):

From his start as a pro until mid 2011 at Romandie, he was mediocre at best. On average he placed in the top 27% of the field and lost an average of 6.4 seconds/km to the winner (i.e., 5 minutes in a 50 km race). Since TdS 2011 he consistently places on or near the podium and loses on average a second/km to the winner.

There it is in numbers. He flipped a switch. Vrooooom!!

John Swanson


Placing Distance Year Race Time Loss per km (s) Placing (%)

16/145 53 km 2008 TdF -3:00 3.4 11.0%
33/176 29 km 2008 TdF -1:49 3.8 18.8%
32/169 15 km 2009 Giro -1:00 4.0 18.9%
34/186 62 km 2009 Giro -5:36 5.4 18.3%
71/117 17 km 2010 Eneco -2:01 7.1 60.7%
14/127 26 km 2010 Osterreich -1:26 3.3 11.0%
39/154 13 km 2010 Giro -3:47 17.5 25.3%
62/103 22 km 2010 Murcia -3:35 9.8 60.2%
22/131 24 km 2011 ToC -1:39 4.1 16.8%
50/141 21 km 2011 Romandie -1:49 5.2 35.5%
Avg 6.4 27.6%

9/139 32 km 2011 TdS -1:02 1.9 6.5%
2/185 40 km 2011 Vuelta -0:59 1.5 1.1%
3/193 39 km 2012 Vuelta -0:39 1.0 1.6%
2/153 52 km 2012 TdF -1:16 1.5 1.3%
2/178 38 km 2012 TdF -0:35 0.9 1.1%
6/171 54 km 2012 Dauphine -1:33 1.7 3.5%
39/133 17 km 2012 Romandie -1:45 6.2 29.3%
1/177 32 km 2013 TdF -0:00 0.0 0.6%
2/182 33 km 2013 TdF -0:12 0.4 1.1%
3/172 33 km 2013 Dauphine -0:52 1.6 1.7%
3/115 19 km 2013 Romandie -0:34 1.8 2.6%
6/107 9 km 2013 Tirreno -0:15 1.7 5.6%
Avg 1.7 4.7%

Very nice work, John Swanson

Vrooooooom, Vroooooom

 

[jalep]

Re: Re:

Potential hires being the key phrase. For example, When Tinkoff signed Michael Rogers they would have seen his data but not Froome's or Wiggins.

My point about changing methods is that they are constantly evolving/changing, so a rider could go to another team say what he did the previous year at a rival team, but then the rival team may evolve the training in the new season. Training methods very rarely stay the exact same for more than two years at most

Yes, think about the exciting prospect for Sky fans next year. With the budget they have, there is the potential there to buy both Quintana and Valverde. Both have been great this TdF and their tactics impress me with those of someone trying to impress Sky. They shoot for 2nd place for Quintana and how can they overlook the help Valverde has been when chasing down Contador.

But that's really a stretch of imagination...or is it? Not beyond consideration is what I think.

What is more real is the rumor of Mikel Landa going to Sky. So, you really believe Landa going from Astana (a team vilified and treading on thin doping ice) to Sky will be believed as clean at Sky? Even Walsh didn't believe Landa's performance at the Giro d'Italia. Even me, a relative newbie to following pro cycling and a big fan of Nibali's style of riding, can't get on board with Landa as clean. Going to Sky...it takes a wall of willful denial or an acute case of adult magical thinking to digest such a whopper.

At least drop the CLEAN act. Stop trying to lie about that, it's offensive.

That link and article by the professor Wendy posted - it's a lot of whining about the ill-treatment Sky/Froome get. lol, really. So this year, we have the Lars Boom controversy and the screws are tightened on Astana - the message is sent and he leaves the race eliminated from helping Nibali; last year Krueziger is eliminated from helping Contador. Sky however gets the completely believable transmutation Geraint Thomas to help Froome. That is progress, that is a fair and proper leg-up on the competition.

Next year everyone will be defending Landa in his supportive role and he was mocked as a doper riding the GdI for Astana. No surprise to you simply because Sky has superior methods / constantly evolving and changing. Mmm, that's convenient, huh