y epo not tested
Frosty said:
Just out of interest, why was EPO not tested for in some of the tests?
Cobber said:
The EPO test uses urine samples. For days when a urine sample was not taken, there will be no EPO test results.
whilst cobber’s observation holds true in most cases it fails in other case - like on 2/19/09, 4/30/09, 7/8/09 (see table) when urine
was taken.
here are several other possibilities:
(i) they may not have targeted him that day for epo but perhaps steroids or something else as the epo test being rather expensive is part of a
different targeting strategy (check 11/22 and 12/15 usada tested him in the us on the uci’s email - clearly looking for an off-season epo and nothing else)
(ii) they may not have found enough epo isomers in the urine - either due to masking (inserting a grain of detergent in the urethra will wipe out
all epo) or poor sample handling (shyte happens but it‘s unlikely).
(iii) armstrong’s handlers deliberately distorted a record and replaced an inconclusive verdict with not tested.
it would be of little surprise coz the records inexplicably changed several times.