Team Ineos (Formerly the Sky thread)

[Digger]

in 2009 was his first big break. I'm sure he was happy as one could be.

Yeah I am sure he was cool with being beaten by two dopers who cost him a podium spot...strange actions for a 'clean' rider.

 

[JimmyFingers]

Yeah I am sure he was cool with being beaten by two dopers who cost him a podium spot...strange actions for a 'clean' rider.

I think we've established he's a coward. How many other riders on '09 tour called out Lance?

 

[coinneach]

He was leaving hospital (inside a car), he was injured (some broken ribs) -
I didnt realize that such exposure and terrible injuries meant he was unable to smile or wave at the people.

I wonder why Sky felt the need to issue an apology the next day - maybe they did not realize just how sore he really was.

I hate to contradict everyone on this forum (ok, I enjoy it, its normal) BUT I read the photo was taken outside his house, not outside the hospital. Some pressmen blocked the path of the car, while others took photos. Not ideal behaviour but then he couldn't get out and deal with them the way he'd have liked to.

Also, why is it that folk jump on any obvious mistake he makes, whilst expecting others to forget their own errors on the forum by (compounding them by) saying "my bad"?

 

[Dr. Maserati]

I hate to contradict everyone on this forum (ok, I enjoy it, its normal) BUT I read the photo was taken outside his house, not outside the hospital. Some pressmen blocked the path of the car, while others took photos. Not ideal behaviour but then he couldn't get out and deal with them the way he'd have liked to.

Also, why is it that folk jump on any obvious mistake he makes, whilst expecting others to forget their own errors on the forum by (compounding them by) saying "my bad"?

I actually don't care that he made that sign or what he did. It does make him look rather silly and petulant - but he is a big boy, I am sure he will be fine and not too bothered about what I think.

However, the reason I showed it was because I had been informed that Brad was more mature than 2007, or less angry or some other phsycho babble that is used to explain away why he does not criticize dopers more, and why he could not have a journalist near him (for 8 days).

 

[richtea]

Yes it does as per that example and others. Go away, look at the FSI index, look at their methodology, then come back and talk to me.

The FSI is just an index that tries to measure a latent unobserved variable (probability of state failure) by combining quantitative evidence and expert opinions across 12 dimensions. I can't see immediately the relevance of this index. But I doubt that you are claiming that all items that are correlated are causally related (e.g. domestic violence is correlated with living in the north, but being northern is not a cause of domestic violence), in which case I'm not even sure where your disagreement is.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

In 2009 he was beaten by Lance and AC...Not a word.

Either he is doping or is a coward.

I think 'coward' is a bit unfair though for a rider in a position like that. What does a rider like Wiggins stand to gain from shouting down Astana at that point? He's a comparative no-name, at least in road cycling, and he's on a team which are in their first year as a pro team, trying to hold on to an unexpected good GC place. Against him he has the best rider on the planet (who's probably juiced), and the most famous rider on the planet (who's probably juiced), both on the strongest and most powerful team to take on the Tour in years (probably even stronger than 2012 Sky). He's watching what's happening within that very team as a guy is being carefully ostracized and character assassinated in the press for having the temerity to ride the Tour de France to try to win, not even attacking Armstrong himself per se. Wiggins may well have suspected Armstrong was pilled up, but it is most clearly in his own interests to keep his mouth shut, at least while Lance is active; Lance's media presence at that point is far too powerful. And of course, if he does call Lance out, he will be forever answering questions about Lance from there to eternity rather than being allowed to concentrate on his own race.

A guy like David Moncoutié has the reputation for racing clean throughout a career spanning more than a decade. His reputation was long established by that point, but he wasn't tearing down Astana, or calling out Valverde and Mosquera at the Vuelta. Why? Because David Moncoutié isn't a crusader or a martyr; he's simply a cyclist who most people are happy to believe was clean.

I don't think Moncoutié is a coward for not calling people out. After all, if he sat with the rest of the Cofidis team 10 years ago and endured constant mockery about not joining in, as has been attested by Gaumont and Millar, then fair play to the guy. But similarly, Wiggins isn't a coward for not calling Armstrong out in 2009 - it simply would have been a poor move for him at the time.

I think Wiggins has said and done plenty of things that are worth criticism, but it would take a man more heroic and especially more foolish than most to have called out Astana at the 2009 Tour.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

The FSI is just an index that tries to measure a latent unobserved variable (probability of state failure) by combining quantitative evidence and expert opinions across 12 dimensions. I can't see immediately the relevance of this index. But I doubt that you are claiming that all items that are correlated are causally related (e.g. domestic violence is correlated with living in the north, but being northern is not a cause of domestic violence), in which case I'm not even sure where your disagreement is.

Correlation ≠ Causality

 

[Mrs John Murphy]

The FSI is just an index that tries to measure a latent unobserved variable (probability of state failure) by combining quantitative evidence and expert opinions across 12 dimensions. I can't see immediately the relevance of this index. But I doubt that you are claiming that all items that are correlated are causally related (e.g. domestic violence is correlated with living in the north, but being northern is not a cause of domestic violence), in which case I'm not even sure where your disagreement is.

FSI is not a predictive index but rather a measure of state failure - it is a continuous rather than a discreet measure.

I did not say that in all cases that correlation = casuality. However, in certain circumstance it can do - FSI is one such example. The blanket statement that correlation does not equal causality is not true. In some circumstances there is no relationship, but in others there is. You do however have to approach the data with care.

 

[martinvickers]

He was leaving hospital (inside a car), he was injured (some broken ribs) -
I didnt realize that such exposure and terrible injuries meant he was unable to smile or wave at the people.

I didn't realise he was obligated to smile and wave either?

Jesus wept! - now 'He doesn't like paps' = 'he's a doper'?

seriously, guys?

 

[martinvickers]

The FSI is just an index that tries to measure a latent unobserved variable (probability of state failure) by combining quantitative evidence and expert opinions across 12 dimensions. I can't see immediately the relevance of this index. But I doubt that you are claiming that all items that are correlated are causally related (e.g. domestic violence is correlated with living in the north, but being northern is not a cause of domestic violence), in which case I'm not even sure where your disagreement is.

There's a good article in the guardian on the methodological flaws in the Failed States Index, but seriously, if the **** is trying to tie some social science qualitative analysis down as a working proof that Post Hoc Ergo is in fact not a logical fallicy, in the face of hundreds of years of consideration of logic, I can't help him.

He doesn't even seem to consider whether the 13 factors used by the fund for peace are a 'symptom' of a failed state, or a 'cause' - or frankly just coterminus with some other factor like material poverty, lack of resources or mobile f***ing phone coverage!

As I've said elsewhere, Jesus wept.

 

[Mrs John Murphy]

You obviously haven't looked at the methodology and are just going off a Guardian article. Nice try though.

However, if you care to provide the link to the critique that'd be good because it sounds interesting.

Two things - firstly none of the causal/correlating factors are taken in isolation and the inter-connectedness between them is taken into account when you do the secondary analysis. Secondly the cause/symptom dynamic is also taken into account by tracking the various measures across time.

Whenever I read your posts Shakespere springs to mind.

It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury
Signifying nothing.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

I didn't realise he was obligated to smile and wave either?

Jesus wept! - now 'He doesn't like paps' = 'he's a doper'?

seriously, guys?

No, not seriously at all - because you just made up something that I never suggested or said.

 

[martinvickers]

You obviously haven't looked at the methodology and are just going off a Guardian article. Nice try though.

Whenever I read your posts Shakespere springs to mind.

Odd; I was just thinking the same thing about you -

Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice. His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff—you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them they are not worth the search.

 

[blackcat]

Correlation ≠ Causality

Israel would be off the chart. Where are they. Dont eat chocolate? not kosher?

 

[Wallace and Gromit]

I did not say that in all cases that correlation = casuality. However, in certain circumstance it can do.

I'm not sure that this is particularly helpful in isolation. In fact, it's pretty obvious that sometimes factors A and B are correlated because A causes B and sometimes they are correlated despite neither A causing B nor vice-versa.

The trick is to be able to identify what's cause and what's effect when factors are correlated. I can't help here in a general sense, but I can advise people not to add windows to their house to increase its value, despite the value of a house and the number of windows it possesses being highly correlated.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

But if he were doping in 2009-2010, he can get f***ed, completely."

I'll go with coward

I'll go with still not convinced. And going as soft on Lance as he possibly can.

 

[Avoriaz]

I'll go with still not convinced. And going as soft on Lance as he possibly can.

And yet harder than most

 

[coinneach]

You obviously haven't looked at the methodology and are just going off a Guardian article. Nice try though.

However, if you care to provide the link to the critique that'd be good because it sounds interesting.

Two things - firstly none of the causal/correlating factors are taken in isolation and the inter-connectedness between them is taken into account when you do the secondary analysis. Secondly the cause/symptom dynamic is also taken into account by tracking the various measures across time.

Whenever I read your posts Shakespere springs to mind.

Dude: if you are trying to be pretentious and quote Shakespeare, spelling his name wrong kinda undermines your credibility.
And that's before we've read what you are trying to say.

 

[Spencer the Half Wit]

Dude: if you are trying to be pretentious and quote Shakespeare, spelling his name wrong kinda undermines your credibility.
And that's before we've read what you are trying to say.

To be fair, in the contemporaneous documentation that mention Shakespeare, his name is spelt about 5 different ways

 

[Susan Westemeyer]

Stay on topic please.

Susan

 

[RownhamHill]

I think 'coward' is a bit unfair though for a rider in a position like that. What does a rider like Wiggins stand to gain from shouting down Astana at that point? He's a comparative no-name, at least in road cycling, and he's on a team which are in their first year as a pro team, trying to hold on to an unexpected good GC place. Against him he has the best rider on the planet (who's probably juiced), and the most famous rider on the planet (who's probably juiced), both on the strongest and most powerful team to take on the Tour in years (probably even stronger than 2012 Sky). He's watching what's happening within that very team as a guy is being carefully ostracized and character assassinated in the press for having the temerity to ride the Tour de France to try to win, not even attacking Armstrong himself per se. Wiggins may well have suspected Armstrong was pilled up, but it is most clearly in his own interests to keep his mouth shut, at least while Lance is active; Lance's media presence at that point is far too powerful. And of course, if he does call Lance out, he will be forever answering questions about Lance from there to eternity rather than being allowed to concentrate on his own race.

A guy like David Moncoutié has the reputation for racing clean throughout a career spanning more than a decade. His reputation was long established by that point, but he wasn't tearing down Astana, or calling out Valverde and Mosquera at the Vuelta. Why? Because David Moncoutié isn't a crusader or a martyr; he's simply a cyclist who most people are happy to believe was clean.

I don't think Moncoutié is a coward for not calling people out. After all, if he sat with the rest of the Cofidis team 10 years ago and endured constant mockery about not joining in, as has been attested by Gaumont and Millar, then fair play to the guy. But similarly, Wiggins isn't a coward for not calling Armstrong out in 2009 - it simply would have been a poor move for him at the time.

I think Wiggins has said and done plenty of things that are worth criticism, but it would take a man more heroic and especially more foolish than most to have called out Astana at the 2009 Tour.

This is the post I would like to have written, if I hadn't been afraid it would bring down a torrent of abuse as a fanboy and doping apologist: Balanced, rational, based on both an understanding of the specific context of the 2009 tour, and more generally a passing familiarity with the world as it is, rather than how one might want it to be.

Are you sure you're posting in the right forum?

EDIT: Oh yeah, also it's the post I would like to have written had I been capable of writing it as well!

 

[Tim_sleepless]

He was leaving hospital (inside a car), he was injured (some broken ribs) -
I didnt realize that such exposure and terrible injuries meant he was unable to smile or wave at the people.

I wonder why Sky felt the need to issue an apology the next day - maybe they did not realize just how sore he really was.

The real question is who is behind the Wiggins (and maybe Sutton) crash, and why?

Was it so that there's a credible reason for why Wiggins doesn't do as well next year if they have to cut back his program due to increased surveliance?

Or is it so that he can be out of the public eye while his program is racheted up (with possible reason for TUE's for cortisoids etc)..

Or was it a warning, in case he was getting uncomfortable with the doping?

How did Wiggins' wife get to the scence so fast, unless she knew it was going to happen?

Notice that the crash was caused by a van. What do installers of Sky Satellite systems drive .... vans.


Join the dots.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Join the dots.

Too busy joining your troll posts.

 

[JimmyFingers]

This is the post I would like to have written, if I hadn't been afraid it would bring down a torrent of abuse as a fanboy and doping apologist: Balanced, rational, based on both an understanding of the specific context of the 2009 tour, and more generally a passing familiarity with the world as it is, rather than how one might want it to be.

Are you sure you're posting in the right forum?

EDIT: Oh yeah, also it's the post I would like to have written had I been capable of writing it as well!

This. People spout off about omerta within truely empathising what it is like to be in a situation like that. Libertine's post gets close to the truth and rationale behind the choices a pro-rider has to make. In any organisation, be it a sport of business, it takes tremendous courage and risk to blow the whistle on more senior and established members who you know are doing wrong.

I am not sure why it was supposed to be Wiggins job to call out Lance in 2009, there were another 170+ riders in the race.

And he was just a rider. He may, as Libertine sugggested, suspect that Lance was juiced. His team principal would have been certain. Vaughters could have taken a stand then, but he didn't. And why? Because he knew a lone voice would have done more harm than good, and made him another sacrificial lamb like Simeoni, Bassons, Betsy Andreu and Landis. It took the combined testimony of 11 witnesses and a huge mass of evidence to take Armstrong down.

I'm not sure why that responsibility has been shifted to Wiggins. He is the Le Patron now but certainly wasn't in 2009, he would have been crucified if he spoke up.

Omerta isn't broken by the riders, it's broken by the management and leaders of the organisation: you need to feel you can speak up, be believed and action be taken. You need to know you can keep your livelihood and provide for your family. Given the pervasive power of the Armstrong brand, and the complicit nature of the UCI leadership, it would have been suicide.

 

[Grandillusion]

And yet harder than most

Which doesn't mean much really. Armstrong is history, the appropriate anger is supposed to be directed elsewhere now, but isn't being.

Just been over to Professional Road Racing for a while...it's great! Everyone's so psyched about their favourites, and barely able to contain their anticipation for next year's big races. Nobody gives a hoot about the doping stuff (I know they're not allowed to discuss it), and you can tell they don't even want to think about it.

Maybe they're right, and the annoying outside world should just leave 'em all alone. They must loathe Travis Tygart's guts! Probably do think Greg LeMond is a bitter fat whiner? Walsh & Kimmage are only interested in their career advancement?

A very happy parallel universe, and maybe it's better that way?