The doped bike exists (video of pro version)!

[D-Queued]

One further thought on the bike changes.

Is it possible that Cancellera was doing marketing promo for Specialized? Would there be any reason to have pictures of Cancellera riding a particular frame?

If so, is it possible (second possibility) that Cancellera may have preferred a different frame for the body of the race?

If both possibilities are true, then wouldn't he try and switch bikes at least twice?

Dave.

 

[MacRoadie]

Re: Re:

That means for multiple reasons that some sort of bushing(s) would still have to be inserted below the seatpost insert to align a motor properly. That is really hard to do without cutting the frame. And any internal ribbing, or even minor inconsistency on the inner tube walls would almost certainly preclude anything but cutting the frame open to try and install said motor.

Dave.

As I said, food for thought in a general sense.

Specific to the Tarmac SL2, my take is that even if you did have the ability to insert a motor, in that specific frameset, the amount of play (sheer volume of space) at the seat tube to BB shell interface would make maintaining alignment with a spline on the spindle, as well as securing the motor within the seat tube (the videos we've seen show two short bolts inserted through the seat tube wall) extremely difficult if not impossible.

I'm guessing the seat tube mounted motor relies on a snug fit along the entire length of the motor housing within the tube, and the sheer size of the Tarmac BB shell would leave that motor hopelessly flopping around.

 

[veganrob]

REpairing a doctored frame is a pretty simple task in the skilled hands of carbon expert like Craig Calfee. I sent a Cervelo R5 frame to him for a customer who had tore the cable stop off the chain stay in a racing accident. Calfee cut the entire stay out and fashioned a new one. And this is a very critical part in the integrity of the frame. You could never tell any work had been done and it was now stronger than before. Doing a BB shell would be a piece of cake.

 

[D-Queued]

REpairing a doctored frame is a pretty simple task in the skilled hands of carbon expert like Craig Calfee. I sent a Cervelo R5 frame to him for a customer who had tore the cable stop off the chain stay in a racing accident. Calfee cut the entire stay out and fashioned a new one. And this is a very critical part in the integrity of the frame. You could never tell any work had been done and it was now stronger than before. Doing a BB shell would be a piece of cake.

Calfee is phenomenal.

Based upon past enquiries, however, they may not touch the the fork, BB area or the seat post collar.

Here are some responses:

"...We don't offer fork inspections for liability reasons ..."
"...We are not able to repair around the seat collar area or post insertion area because it's too high stress and repairs in the past have not performed well..."

Dave.

 

[joe_papp]

Re: Re:

Hi Sniper,

Ok, after watching the video many, many times, here are some points of interest:

Thanks for sharing your insights on this.

 

[Archibald]

REpairing a doctored frame is a pretty simple task in the skilled hands of carbon expert like Craig Calfee. I sent a Cervelo R5 frame to him for a customer who had tore the cable stop off the chain stay in a racing accident. Calfee cut the entire stay out and fashioned a new one. And this is a very critical part in the integrity of the frame. You could never tell any work had been done and it was now stronger than before. Doing a BB shell would be a piece of cake.

Calfee is phenomenal.

Based upon past enquiries, however, they may not touch the the fork, BB area or the seat post collar.

Here are some responses:

"...We don't offer fork inspections for liability reasons ..."
"...We are not able to repair around the seat collar area or post insertion area because it's too high stress and repairs in the past have not performed well..."

Dave.

this is consistent with the responses I got after cracking the tube housing my BB... No carbon workers would touch it

 

[ray j willings]

REpairing a doctored frame is a pretty simple task in the skilled hands of carbon expert like Craig Calfee. I sent a Cervelo R5 frame to him for a customer who had tore the cable stop off the chain stay in a racing accident. Calfee cut the entire stay out and fashioned a new one. And this is a very critical part in the integrity of the frame. You could never tell any work had been done and it was now stronger than before. Doing a BB shell would be a piece of cake.

Calfee is phenomenal.

Based upon past enquiries, however, they may not touch the the fork, BB area or the seat post collar.

Here are some responses:

"...We don't offer fork inspections for liability reasons ..."
"...We are not able to repair around the seat collar area or post insertion area because it's too high stress and repairs in the past have not performed well..."

Dave.

this is consistent with the responses I got after cracking the tube housing my BB... No carbon workers would touch it

I thought I would chuck in ...this is my friend Ed's carbon repair shop http://londoncarbonrepairs.co.uk/

Ed can just about repair anything carbon. He has replaced bb shells and turned a BSA into a press fit etc.

I think if you broke the tube on BB, its a major point of strength. I don't see a reason why it could not be fixed / section replaced , I would hazard its just such a big job that it would not be worth it cost wise.

A lot is possible

 

[veganrob]

Had friend wIth Giant road bike had cracked seat stay fixed and also had to have 3cm of seat mast built on top. It was done by Matt in Indianapolis who does carbon work on Indy cars. Turned out great. I had my Zipp Super 9 repaired by him after Zipp and Calfee both refused to do it. I am not even close to strength of pro rider but still, someone is doing this kind of work and it appears to be safe.
I would think it depends on extent of damage to BB/seat tube area before someone will not touch it though.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Repairing something that has been damaged randomly through an accident would, I think, be different than deliberately altering a frame for motor insertion?

 

[veganrob]

Re:

Repairing something that has been damaged randomly through an accident would, I think, be different than deliberately altering a frame for motor insertion?

Agree. It would be much easier to just cover up an altered BB shell junction than repairing a damaged one.

 

[D-Queued]

Re: Re:

Repairing something that has been damaged randomly through an accident would, I think, be different than deliberately altering a frame for motor insertion?

Agree. It would be much easier to just cover up an altered BB shell junction than repairing a damaged one.

Am going to have to continue to argue here.

Wouldn't a deliberate cut actually be potentially much worse?

In the cases cited above, two of three requested repairs from Calfee were for stress cracks and not a crashed frame. In that case, you can compensate for and reinforce the known stress areas.

Deliberately cut the BB would weaken the entire area/line of the cutout. There would be no more fancy kinds of interlocking carbon fibers working together across that complex cut shape. As the cutout would not follow natural stress points, its 'complex' geometry would create new weaknesses. It would seem reasonable that you would probably want to fully wrap the BB area as thickly, or almost as thickly as the original frame wall thickness. This would create a pretty significant bulge in the BB area, and should be easily detectable from a distance. Again, please recall that frames replaced under warranty have the BB cut off so that the frame is not repairable.

Another consideration would be a frame failure in a race. The sponsor/frame supplier would be pretty damn embarrassed and pretty damn upset by that. It would be a PR disaster. Please recall that we are talking about challenging courses like Paris-Roubaix.

Minimally, you would want to stress test the frame, if you could. Again, this would create yet more evidence and get more and more people involved making a secret harder and harder to keep secret.

Of course, if you worked with a frame manufacturer instead of around them, you could spend tons of dough to have them create an internal structure to house a motor.

But, again, more and more evidence.

Dave.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

I think they are cutting into the BB axle tube though, not the BB itself.

I don't have skin in this game and am just considering aspects of intent vs accident.

 

[The Carrot]

Having followed this subject with interest, a key point made by those who don't think that motors would be used, is that this would be a taking cheating just that little bit too far. I would point out that these people should really cease to judge those involved in pro cycling by their own views of normal behaviour. It's a sport where:

The main star used cancer as a shield against doping!
Coaches sought out kids with low Htc levels to ensure bigger 'top ups'!
A Team Principal used the death of a member of staff as justification for hiring a doping Dr!

Just three examples off the top of my head to highlight the parallel universe that is cycling. There are no lengths this lot will not go to. So until a NASA scientist/engineer or someone of that ilk tells me that the bike motor is technically impossible, I'm saying this type of skulduggery is plausible.

 

[ray j willings]

It would be easy for a rider of Fabs status to get a custom frame made.
Legend bikes for instance have made/ make exact replicas of team bikes for pro teams, they have personal dimension's / structure that give a pro rider what he wants. It would be easy to get a frame to look exactly like a sponsors bike and only minimum amount of people would have to know. It could easily be strengthened at the right points and made incredibly light at less stressful points.

 

[sniper]

exactemundo (to both Carrot and Ray).
The whole argument that "because too many people would know, the risk would be too high" really doesn't stand up to scrutiny.
It's an argument that originates (i think) from reflecting one's own, personal ideas about ethics and risk-reward ratio onto the pro-riders.
We've seen in past with e.g. Armstrong, Ricco, you name them, that that doesn't work.

And don't forget wrt Fab, we're talking about the year 2010: motorization was not yet a topic and not tested for whereas blooddoping was right in the UCI's focus. In that context, it's not hard to imagine people being tempted to try mechanical doping.

I don't think motorization is currently widespread at all, but to use 'ethics' or 'risk' as an argument as to why it may or may not have happened, that just doesn't cut it.

 

[Carstenbf]

Was just thinking to myself how completely unacceptable mech doping would be to me as a cycling fan.

Yet, here I am watching every day, while they fill themselves with carcinogenics. Strange world indeed!

 

[ray j willings]

Re:

Was just thinking to myself how completely unacceptable mech doping would be to me as a cycling fan.

Yet, here I am watching every day, while they fill themselves with carcinogenics. Strange world indeed!

You have to watch it for what it is. If you thought to hard morally about things in the huge commercial world we live in, it could drive you crazy.

FWIW motor doping IMO is a line crossed to far. Riders dope but they at least still have to train physically to deliver the goods , its still about turning the pedals.
if Valentino Rossi wins next years tour I'm off to watch this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWgg20IqibM

 

[gobuck]

I was a bike tester for a major company. One of the frames that I tested didn't have a bottom bracket shell. The carbon sides of the frame at the bottom bracket cracked after 3 months. The frame rode like any bike and it was stupid light. You could put a motor in that bike without doing anything to it.

 

[D-Queued]

Re:

Having followed this subject with interest, a key point made by those who don't think that motors would be used, is that this would be a taking cheating just that little bit too far. I would point out that these people should really cease to judge those involved in pro cycling by their own views of normal behaviour. It's a sport where:

The main star used cancer as a shield against doping!
Coaches sought out kids with low Htc levels to ensure bigger 'top ups'!
A Team Principal used the death of a member of staff as justification for hiring a doping Dr!

Just three examples off the top of my head to highlight the parallel universe that is cycling. There are no lengths this lot will not go to. So until a NASA scientist/engineer or someone of that ilk tells me that the bike motor is technically impossible, I'm saying this type of skulduggery is plausible.

As an advocate for 'no he didn't', please allow me to observe that I fully believe Willy Voet when he said that Richard Virenque would drink his own urine if you told him it would provide a benefit.

It is difficult to believe that Spartacus isn't employing some kind of artificial enhancement. Just not the mechanical kind. Rather, a type of enhancement with:
- Extensive proof of benefits that can produce additional wattage that said motor is believed capable of, repeatedly, AND without any concern of batteries running out of juice
- Is very difficult to detect when done properly (and no red flag in the bicycle)
- Has no 'baggage' to carry around and no compromise to the equipment

I am also under no illusion that cyclists won't try and modify their equipment to their advantage, sometimes with catastrophic results. Cyclists have been doing dumb things for years. Now is no time to stop.

With respect to NASA scientist/engineers, as this is an anonymous forum, touting one's credentials only ever serves to diminish the strength of one's argument. Thus, impressive or not, I am not about to divulge mine. You will simply have to judge by the arguments presented.

The challenge is not whether a pro cyclist would consider it. From what we have seen, that is impossible to argue against.

There are two fundamental points.

1. Is it practical?
2. Is it easy to avoid detection?

On #1, the answer is not really. There are too many challenges. Only some of which relate to the challenges of inserting into a carbon frame.

On #2, the answer is also not really. And, all of the above recent arguments don't even touch on the obvious and undisputed - the noise the thing would emit. Somebody would notice.

A further issue is how long you might have to carry around the dead weight in the frame. A motor might have greatest benefit going up a long climb. But, the battery life will be limited and should the thing stop working for any reason you'd likely be willing to switch your helmet for a dunce cap.

I was a bike tester for a major company. One of the frames that I tested didn't have a bottom bracket shell. The carbon sides of the frame at the bottom bracket cracked after 3 months. The frame rode like any bike and it was stupid light. You could put a motor in that bike without doing anything to it.

Thanks for the insight. Don't take this the wrong way and perhaps it is just me, but this doesn't sound like strong evidence that modifying a bottom bracket on a Paris-Roubaix bound cycle for one of the strongest and heaviest guys in the peloton is a good idea.

Dave.

 

[sniper]

good post, BUT:
somebody did notice. (I've mentioned it and linked to it only about six or seven times)
there was talk about noise coming from his bike at Roubaix.
it was noted by two different sources.
it is an important part why the rumors became so strong, including and most notably within the peloton.
remember what Roux said: "dans le peloton, on ce parle". You think he was kidding? read the interview, he was dead serious.
More generally, there is whole bunch of riders on the record saying that motors have been used, that it's possible, that the technique is there, including at least four (ex)pros stating that they've tested the technology themselves. Some of them showing it on TV.
All linked up thread.
How is it possible to dismiss all that?

 

[D-Queued]

Re:

good post, BUT:
somebody did notice. (I've mentioned it and linked to it only about six or seven times)
there was talk about noise coming from his bike at Roubaix.
it was noted by two different sources.
it is an important part why the rumors became so strong, including and most notably WITHIN the peloton.
remember what Roux said: "dans le peloton, on ce parle". You think he was kidding? read the interview, he was dead serious.
More generally, there is whole bunch of riders on the record saying that motors have been used, that it's possible, that the technique is there, including at least four (ex)pros stating that they've tested the technology THEMSELVES. Some of them showing it on TV.
All linked up thread.
How is it possible to dismiss all that?

And they even have film of the Sasquatch.

Dave.

 

[blackcat]

Re: Re:

And they even have film of the Sasquatch.

Dave.

i photobombed that photo dave!

 

[D-Queued]

Re: Re:

And they even have film of the Sasquatch.

Dave.

i photobombed that photo dave!

That's music to my ears. And, here is a great way to hide the motor whine:

Then again, maybe we need to give this idea a bit more kick:

Dave.

 

[blackcat]

chitty chitty bang bang does bikes^

 

[ScienceIsCool]

Re: Re:

good post, BUT:
somebody did notice. (I've mentioned it and linked to it only about six or seven times)
there was talk about noise coming from his bike at Roubaix.
it was noted by two different sources.
it is an important part why the rumors became so strong, including and most notably WITHIN the peloton.
remember what Roux said: "dans le peloton, on ce parle". You think he was kidding? read the interview, he was dead serious.
More generally, there is whole bunch of riders on the record saying that motors have been used, that it's possible, that the technique is there, including at least four (ex)pros stating that they've tested the technology THEMSELVES. Some of them showing it on TV.
All linked up thread.
How is it possible to dismiss all that?

And they even have film of the Sasquatch.

Dave.

That would be *super* relevant. If you could also order a Sasquatch online.

John Swanson