Escarabajo said:
As you know they are re-testing samples from Last year's Giro and Tour. This makes the retroactive testing effective tool for catching the cheaters.
There are effective tools, but none that are full proof. There are effective masking agents, for example.
For example, let's say they retroactively nail Evans or Sastre for using CERA in 2008. That doesn't make 2008 clean. Will that be a deterrent? Only if riders believe that being caught, eventually, is almost certain. As long as the risk of getting away with it is perceived to be something reasonable from their, uh, unique perspectives (in many cases athletes are willing to give up their lives in order to become champions of their sports), they will continue doping and hoping to get away with it.
Even if you make any violation a lifetime ban, many riders will look at it something like this:
"I'm doomed to a mediocre career if I don't dope, and that's not worth it. I'm doomed if dope and and get caught. So my only chance is to dope and risk getting caught... if I get caught, practically speaking, I'm not really worse off than I would be if I didn't dope (time to find another gig). But, if I get away with it... WOO HOO!!!"
Escarabajo said:
The Bio Passport is a good approach. I just don't think that the UCI is being serious or strict enough to enforce it 100%. And if we believe that they are corrupt organization, that would make this a moot point. So cleaning the organization that runs the business would be a good starting point.
Foxes watching the hen house is a big part of the problem, to be sure. A lot of people are making a lot more money this year because of Lance, for example. And the others points in the opening post will continue to stand, at least to some degree, for a long time if not forever.
Escarabajo said:
Just because we know there is and always will be cheating does not mean that we don't have to do the best we can to stop it or control it. It sounds like you want to legalize it. Am I right? Otherwise what's your point of posting something that we all already know.
A lot of people here don't seem to appreciate the point this thread is making. Many seem to believe the sport can be cleaned up.
No, I'm not for legalizing/allowing doping. As far as I can tell all the testing and publicity is good because it probably helps keep the levels down. However, I also suspect that all this testing ironically pushes the envelope in many ways.
Also, the more effective they are with the testing, the bigger the advantage doping achieves. For example, if nobody is doping, just a little virtually undetectable bit of doping can give a rider a significant advantage. In many cases probably even a scientifically insignificant amount can give a sprinter a very significant bike length, or a climber a few very significant seconds per km.
My main point, per the title, was that the sport can never be clean. I think this is an important point because many people make naive posts here stating that they believe otherwise.
I suggested a thread on this point be a sticky so that this point is brought to their attention hopefully before they start posting.