Wigans goes there. Cadence!

[Ripper]

Catwhoorg: Wiggins did not name clean riders because last time he got heck for not mentioning Sastre
The Hitch: who did he get heck from (that would lead Wiggins to not name names)
Parker: You did, The Hitch, you gave him heck, here, let me quote you repeatedly
Dear Wiggo:



Sorry dude but you clearly missed the entire conversation and should back up a bit and do some of this mysterious reading stuff yourself.

Good one ..

 

[bobbins]

It seems to be generally accepted amongst the journos that Sastre was clean.
Why do you expect Wiggins to name names - if anyone is going to break Omertà, it isn't him. At least not whilst sober and not whilst still racing.

The Team Sky thread contains enough clues as to how they are doing it and any investigative journalist with half a brain could pick up the pieces and get going with exposing them - who knows, they may have started already. All the crap on that thread and this one now just goes in the favour of the cheats and makes everyone who is anti-sky look like a nut case. If you want a thread on what Wiggins should or shouldn't have said, start one.

 

[SundayRider]

It seems to be generally accepted amongst the journos that Sastre was clean.
Why do you expect Wiggins to name names - if anyone is going to break Omertà, it isn't him. At least not whilst sober and not whilst still racing.

The Team Sky thread contains enough clues as to how they are doing it and any investigative journalist with half a brain could pick up the pieces and get going with exposing them - who knows, they may have started already. All the crap on that thread and this one now just goes in the favour of the cheats and makes everyone who is anti-sky look like a nut case. If you want a thread on what Wiggins should or shouldn't have said, start one.

Sastre who rode for Riis, right through the 'dark era' and who won a CERA infested Tour? Yeah must be clean.

 

[gooner]

So, we're waiting for the inevitable revelations after the Statute of Limitations kick in. And then, and only then, will there be sufficient evidence of doping. And THEN this era will be classified as corrupted as the Armstrong years.

In the meantime, cleanest peloton ever. Right?

I don't dictate circumstances and neither can you.

Wiggins referred to the bullying of his kids after Armstrong's confession and for me, the sport even got more stereotyped by people(many who don't follow cycling)after that occurred.

So what incident do you and BroDeal want Wiggins to come clean on regarding specific doping?

 

[Benotti69]

I'm basing my comments on you all thinking that you have some sort of impact outside this forum. That in some way you represent the Zeitgeist in cycling (rather than being the Asylum everyone laughs at). That is the spirit in which Catwhoorg made his comment and on which I made mine.

You appear to have missed that you currently contribute to what you labelled 'the Asylum' and everyone is laughing at you too.

Most people who ever criticise the clinic, 'echo chamber', 'only about 12 people posting' (hence the Clinic 12) are aware of what it represents. That it has been criticised by the likes of Armstrong and Wiggins shows it hurts them and that can only be a good thing.

 

[Catwhoorg]

1. Catwhoorg should speak for himself. I am 96.7% onfident you are completely and utterly wrong here, and a victim of confirmation bias. I will let Catwhoorg, if he can be bothered, confirm or deny this claim.

2. To claim you were being facetious makes no sense. When I asked for clarification, instead of saying, "No, I forgot the emoticon, but I was being sarcastic", you instead wrote, "Try reading".

The thing is, I did read, and nowhere did you suggest your post was sarcastic or "in the spirit of blah blah blah mock anyone who doesn't believe in Sky blah blah blah" like you are now.

Given you are also a member of the forum, as are a number of your Sky believing mates, "you all thinking you are the zeitgeist blah blah blah" is somewhat self defeating, don't you think? Coz you're including all your Sky believing mates in the word, "all".

The Bone idle w&*^%$rs interview shows that Wiggo does read and is aware of the speculation. If not in the clinic, then elsewhere. It obviously does get to him. Its probably harshest here, but I do read other places, and saw similar comments elsewhere.

Which in itself shows nothing, other than he is bad at handling that sort of pressure. If he is clean, then for sure I'd be annoying to be continually question. If he is dirty and guilty, then obviously it would nag at a person. Froome obviously handled the same sort of questioning in a more media savvy manner this year.

 

[gooner]

If the Clinic was around during Armstrong's 7 Tour wins, I suppose we could have stopped his shenanigans.

I blame Future for not setting up this place earlier.

Some like to build up their own importance.

 

[Catwhoorg]

Let me see if got this straight: Sastre is in a grey area and is suspicious. Froome and Wiggins on the other hand is in a clear area and is not suspicious.
Did I get that right? If so, would you care to explain why that is the case?

Sastre as others have pointed out won a very EPO laden tour, in the height of the dark era. I don't subscribe to winning = doper, but throwing in the teams and associations, then yes, there is enough to move him from probably clean to suspicious.

I have some suspicions about Wiggo, the 'break point' to me being the discussions that but for being on the wrong side of an echelon in 2009, he would have beaten Lance on the road. You have to wonder a little about anyone who beats Lance, even if it was on his comeback.
I do still think he is probably clean, but there are little doubts around that statement.

Froome, I have had suspicions about since that Vuelta, but I don't tend to voice them loudly. He is either a once in a generation find that struggled with illness, or something manufactured.

 

[Wallace and Gromit]

I have some suspicions about Wiggo, the 'break point' to me being the discussions that but for being on the wrong side of an echelon in 2009, he would have beaten Lance on the road.

The great imponderable here is how good Lance actually still was by 2009. Three years off - albeit whilst still being active e.g. marathon running - aged 34 to 37 wouldn't have done him any favours, Ferrari's Finest notwithstanding.

In any reliably timed events, the decline over these ages is quite marked in general, even if in full training and competition, so he could conceivably have been Lance only in name and medical programme in '09 vs '05.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

The great imponderable here is how good Lance actually still was by 2009. Three years off - albeit whilst still being active e.g. marathon running - aged 34 to 37 wouldn't have done him any favours, Ferrari's Finest notwithstanding.
.

He came 3rd at the Tour!? That's how good.

You almost make it sound like beating him wouldn't have been all that terribly difficult.

 

[Catwhoorg]

The great imponderable here is how good Lance actually still was by 2009. Three years off - albeit whilst still being active e.g. marathon running - aged 34 to 37 wouldn't have done him any favours, Ferrari's Finest notwithstanding.

In any reliably timed events, the decline over these ages is quite marked in general, even if in full training and competition, so he could conceivably have been Lance only in name and medical programme in '09 vs '05.

I agree, and its even possible Lance was telling the truth and did comeback clean (Lance actually telling the truth would be a first of course). That's why its a little snippet of doubt, not a full blown belief that there is something is up.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

It seems to be generally accepted amongst the journos that Sastre was clean.
Why do you expect Wiggins to name names - if anyone is going to break Omertà, it isn't him. At least not whilst sober and not whilst still racing.

The Team Sky thread contains enough clues as to how they are doing it and any investigative journalist with half a brain could pick up the pieces and get going with exposing them - who knows, they may have started already. All the crap on that thread and this one now just goes in the favour of the cheats and makes everyone who is anti-sky look like a nut case. If you want a thread on what Wiggins should or shouldn't have said, start one.

It's amusing that you use journalists as the arbiters to Satstre being clean.

But it's the second paragraph we shall address now.
The highlighted leaves no doubt that you are sure that Sky are 'doing it'. And you even go as far as to suggest the clues are in the Sky thread, yet you also say that it is being missed and this favors 'the cheats'.

So, why don't you say clearly who is doing what, when, how they are doing it and how they have evaded getting caught.
Because right now it is you that is upholding the omertà and your unwillingness to clearly state what they are doing that is favouring the cheats.

 

[SundayRider]

He came 3rd at the Tour!? That's how good.

You almost make it sound like beating him wouldn't have been all that terribly difficult.

Armstrong wasn't clean in 2009 - afterall his belief is if you aren't doping then you aren't doing your best to win! Remarkable that there was only 4 seconds separating Armstrong and Wiggins in 2010 though.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

I agree, and its even possible Lance was telling the truth and did comeback clean (Lance actually telling the truth would be a first of course). That's why its a little snippet of doubt, not a full blown belief that there is something is up.

Have you seen his blood values? The chance given that he was clean was 1 in a million.

 

[SundayRider]

Have you seen his blood values? The chance given that he was clean was 1 in a million.

Maybe he was 'cleaner' in 2010 - knowing he had little chance of winning?

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Maybe he was 'cleaner' in 2010 - knowing he had little chance of winning?

I don't think you can discount the effect of constantly crashing on the body's ability to recover or perform.

 

[Wallace and Gromit]

He came 3rd at the Tour!? That's how good.

You almost make it sound like beating him wouldn't have been all that terribly difficult.

But he was previously winning Tours by 5 or 6 minutes without looking under any pressure at all (other than 2003).

To go from that to his 2009 performance level represents a serious relative decline. I doubt very much whether the 2009 version of Andy Schleck would have beaten Lance in his prime.

I assume that Lance was as doped up as he possibly could be in 2009, and isn't the "word on the street" that Pat M intercepted his Tour blood readings so he was in no danger of failing the passport test and thus wouldn't have needed to modify his doping regime?

For Wiggo to be as close as he was to the 2009 version of Berto is more of an indicator than his position relative to Lance, as we cannot quantify the impact of age or retirement, neither of which are factors relevant to Berto.

 

[the sceptic]

1. Roberto Heras | Vuelta 2004 | 6,32 W/kg
2. Lance Armstrong | Tour 2003 | 6,18 W/kg
3. Alberto Contador | Tour 2009 | 6,17 W/kg
4. Aitor Gonzalez | Vuelta 2002 | 6,16 W/kg
5. Lance Armstrong | Tour 2004 | 6,09 W/kg
6. Lance Armstrong | Tour 2005 | 6,09 W/kg
7. Ivan Basso | Giro 2006 | 6,08 W/kg
8. Lance Armstrong | Tour 2001 | 6,07 W/kg
9. Denis Mentshov | Vuelta 2005 | 6,05 W/kg
10. Denis Mentshov | Vuelta 2007 | 6,04 W/kg
11. Denis Mentshov | Giro 2009 | 6,02 W/kg
12. Damiano Cunego | Giro 2004 | 6,01 W/kg
13. Angel Casero | Vuelta 2001 | 6,00 W/kg

2009 tour, cleanest tour ever.

 

[SundayRider]

I don't think you can discount the effect of constantly crashing on the body's ability to recover or perform.

Indeed. It's very fine margins at the top of elite sport. The relative drop off in performance to go from 1st - 3rd is likely to be very very small. So Lance must have been very close to his 2005 level to finish 3rd hence it becomes an even more unbelievable performance from BW.

 

[Catwhoorg]

Have you seen his blood values? The chance given that he was clean was 1 in a million.

The difference between the profile for the 2009 Giro and 2009 TDF is very stark that's for sure.

I posted an analysis back when the values leaked.

Interestingly, Pappy Horners 2009 Giro profile is almost the same as Lances for as long as he was in the race. Compare Horners 2009 Giro to 2013 Vuelta at your leisure.

(I'll happily continue this later line of discussion in the Horner thread)

 

[Wallace and Gromit]

The relative drop off in performance to go from 1st - 3rd is likely to be very very small. So Lance must have been very close to his 2005 level to finish 3rd hence...

Is that right, though?

Lance went from being approx 6 minutes better than anyone else to approx 4 minutes down on someone (Schleck A) who isn't going to trouble the authors of the next update of "Greatest cyclists".

This represents a turn round of approx 10 minutes. If you think in terms of where Lance could have found 10 minutes over Andy Schleck in 2009, it quickly boils down to a limited number of climbs and the long TT.

Lance only put 7s in Schleck in the final TT and as he was battling for the podium, it's safe to conclude he was holding nothing back that day. (Wasn't that the day he ordered all the team cars to abandon Berto?) In his prime, he'd had put a couple of minutes into him, as Berto did. That represents a significant loss of power relative to his peak.

There are limited places where he could find time in the hills, so he'd be looking for 2 or 3 minutes on 3-5 key climbs. 2 minutes on a typical 1000m ascent represent around 5% in power terms.

So my conclusion is that for whatever reason, in sustainable power terms, Lance was way off his previous peak in 2009. Unless Lance's rivals during his victorious years were relatively a lot weaker than Andy Schleck. (Ullrich, Vino, Hamilton, Beloki? Not so sure about that, with all due respect to Schleck.)

To put it another way, think how hard it is to go from being scrapping for the podium to a dominant winner of the Tour. The relative performance differential applies in both directions.

 

[webbie146]

Is that right, though?

Lance went from being approx 6 minutes better than anyone else to approx 4 minutes down on someone (Schleck A) who isn't going to trouble the authors of the next update of "Greatest cyclists".

This represents a turn round of approx 10 minutes. If you think in terms of where Lance could have found 10 minutes over Andy Schleck in 2009, it quickly boils down to a limited number of climbs and the long TT.

Lance only put 7s in Schleck in the final TT and as he was battling for the podium, it's safe to conclude he was holding nothing back that day. (Wasn't that the day he ordered all the team cars to abandon Berto?) In his prime, he'd had put a couple of minutes into him, as Berto did. That represents a significant loss of power relative to his peak.

There are limited places where he could find time in the hills, so he'd be looking for 2 or 3 minutes on 3-5 key climbs. 2 minutes on a typical 1000m ascent represent around 5% in power terms.

So my conclusion is that for whatever reason, in sustainable power terms, Lance was way off his previous peak in 2009. Unless Lance's rivals during his victorious years were relatively a lot weaker than Andy Schleck. (Ullrich, Vino, Hamilton, Beloki? Not so sure about that, with all due respect to Schleck.)

To put it another way, think how hard it is to go from being scrapping for the podium to a dominant winner of the Tour. The relative performance differential applies in both directions.

Agree Lance 2009 compared to LA 2005 is a major difference. Lance 05 would had won the prologue or at least be very close, and would had smoked everyone in the ITT. Would have had no problems in the mountains either.

 

[DirtyWorks]

Is that right, though?

Lance went from being approx 6 minutes better than anyone else to approx 4 minutes down on someone (Schleck A) who isn't going to trouble the authors of the next update of "Greatest cyclists".

It is a tiny difference over timed $XYZ hours of a grand tour. 2% off of the aggregate winner's time puts a rider way, way down the rankings.

I'm not saying you are right or wrong. This is issue is like so many where it is possible to argue "big" and "small" and both sides be right depending on how you measure something.

 

[proffate]

It is a tiny difference over timed $XYZ hours of a grand tour. 2% off of the aggregate winner's time puts a rider way, way down the rankings.

this reads like something one might say if they didn't follow cycling. Obviously the 4 hour sprint stages or everything up until the final climb on a MTF isn't a place where you will take time, so counting that in the winner's time is misleading. Best comparison would be final climbs + ITTs, which might be a total of at most three hours in a GT. 10 minutes out of 3 hours is ~5%.

 

[DirtyWorks]

this reads like something one might say if they didn't follow cycling. Obviously the 4 hour sprint stages or everything up until the final climb on a MTF isn't a place where you will take time, so counting that in the winner's time is misleading. Best comparison would be final climbs + ITTs, which might be a total of at most three hours in a GT. 10 minutes out of 3 hours is ~5%.

Please keep in mind the modern grand tour races mostly from the start as repeated breakaway attempts try and fail. The middle of a stage ridden tempo, as some combination of riders is allowed to run out ahead, then the pace goes through the roof for at least the second time. The long grinds to the base of MTF's shell much of the peloton for a reason.

The days of a tranquilo pace and a peloton boss orchestrating the race until 20K to go are long over.