Will Anyone Test Positive at the Tour of Flanders

[punyhuman]

With the Tour of Flanders tomorrow and how much hype people give it (more than San Remo), it's not a stretch to think that many/most/all the riders will be hitting it hard (with the drugs) given how a good performance can make or break an entire career or your next contract. Do you think anyone will actually test positive at the Tour of Flanders? Personally, I think the anti-doping tests are a huge waste of time and no one will test positive.....unless it's like 10 years down the road and it's because of a mole and someone didn't get paid. I haven't even heard of any riders testing positive at the European classics this year.

Speaking of which, what are the hot drugs / methods this year in the peleton?

 

[Benotti69]

When was the last positive in Belgium?

UCI not interested in catching dopers, if Cookson was it would've been the first thing he changed when he got elected President.

 

[punyhuman]

When was the last positive in Belgium?

UCI not interested in catching dopers, if Cookson was it would've been the first thing he changed when he got elected President.

I believe it was Boonen's cocaine use way back when he crashed a Ferrari.

I don't think there is anything Cookson can do or would be of any practical consequence since doping is so widespread. Anything he does would just be hand waving at this point and fighting the tides.

 

[Benotti69]

I believe it was Boonen's cocaine use way back when he crashed a Ferrari.

I don't think there is anything Cookson can do or would be of any practical consequence since doping is so widespread. Anything he does would just be hand waving at this point and fighting the tides.

So the police found a positive, not an anti doping agency. Surprise surprise.

Cookson could start by making anti doping independent and fund it properly, making bans a minimum of 4 years etc etc

 

[punyhuman]

Cookson could start by making anti doping independent and fund it properly, making bans a minimum of 4 years etc etc

The global pharmaceutical industry has revenues of $1 trillion. An independent anti-doping agency will still be able to do squat. You just need one drug that works to be doping whereas for anti-doping you have to be able to test for everything and that will ALWAYS be a losing battle. And 4 year bans won't even make a dent on anything. An athlete looking to improve performance won't care if it's 2 years or 4 years.

 

[Benotti69]

The global pharmaceutical industry has revenues of $1 trillion. An independent anti-doping agency will still be able to do squat. You just need one drug that works to be doping whereas for anti-doping you have to be able to test for everything and that will ALWAYS be a losing battle. And 4 year bans won't even make a dent on anything. An athlete looking to improve performance won't care if it's 2 years or 4 years.

Global pharmacies dont really give a fig about a couple of hundred or a thousand athletes. They deal in multiple of millions of people.

Athletes will stop doping if the risk outweighs the reward. Also teams would stop doping if the fines were for riders on teams testing positive were huge!

They are ways to make doping minimal.

 

[biokemguy]

one day races are clean

I bet most riders are clean on race day for the classics.

They'd have to be stupid to show up glowing to something like Flanders.
If a classics rider were to test positive, I'd expect it more during the smaller
mid-week prep races.

For the tin-foil hat crowd: Sagan (and others) dropped out of Driedaagse De Panne after only a couple stages. Perhaps too many days in the leaders jersey is too dangerous.

Or it's just smart training.

 

[Afrank]

Sagan and others dropped out purely for training and no other reason. Same as last year, and the year before that, and, yep you guessed it, the year before that too.

Doubt there will be any positives. But no positives doesn't really mean anything, now does it.

 

[oldcrank]

When was the last positive in Belgium?

The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-24658278

 

[The Hitch]

I bet most riders are clean on race day for the classics.

They'd have to be stupid to show up glowing to something like Flanders.

Only 2 months ago a recent winner of the race was banned for 2 years. Or maybe Alessandro was clean in all the 1 day races and doped for all those gts he won

 

[biokemguy]

Sadly, Ballan never tested positive to my knowledge.

 

[The Hitch]

I think we are misunderstanding eachother. From your posting history you don't strike me as someone who would think Ballan was clean. Are you saying he didn't dope on race days but in the prep, or are you saying he didn't dope for classics period and riders wouldn't dope for classics?

 

[manafana]

big no from me, if anything is going on its not been picked up and won't all of a sudden at flanders.

 

[biokemguy]

I think we are misunderstanding eachother. From your posting history you don't strike me as someone who would think Ballan was clean. Are you saying he didn't dope on race days but in the prep, or are you saying he didn't dope for classics period and riders wouldn't dope for classics?

Sorry, guess my first post wasn't clear.

I definitely think Ballan is a doper (that's what I meant by "sadly"), just in prep for classics not on race day.

I think that's true for most classics riders and a big part of the reason we don't see many positives (I can't think of any off hand) from these races.

 

[SundayRider]

Only an idiot or someone really desperate would test positive for a one day race.

 

[ebandit]

no

no ........not because of fault with wada

how many riders will be tested..........what the are chances of those riders messing up their preperation?

reality check
Mark L

 

[SundayRider]

no ........not because of fault with wada

how many riders will be tested..........what the are chances of those riders messing up their preperation?

reality check
Mark L

This, only a very small % of the race is tested and the chance of that small % messing up glowtime is small, most get good advice after all.

 

[pot belge]

Perhaps beer is the new fuel for the "motor"

 

[manafana]

my question is whats the doping like in womans cycling has anyone spoken out?

 

[Benotti69]

my question is whats the doping like in womans cycling has anyone spoken out?

Nicole Cooke has spoken out about it a little. Jeannson, Tammy, Longo and there others are proven to have doped or linked to doping.

I think the women peloton mirrors the mens but in a smaller environment. So in my opinion yes they dope, but not to the levels of the men because the finance is not there for most.

 

[Master50]

The global pharmaceutical industry has revenues of $1 trillion. An independent anti-doping agency will still be able to do squat. You just need one drug that works to be doping whereas for anti-doping you have to be able to test for everything and that will ALWAYS be a losing battle. And 4 year bans won't even make a dent on anything. An athlete looking to improve performance won't care if it's 2 years or 4 years.

At some point B69 will look at WADA and all IOC sports to see that these sports do not have the option to have dope testing independent. That would take a much bigger change in the WADA code. I have to agree that this would be good for all the sports. It will take more than cycling to demand a change. PM said this a few times but like many things in politics when Pat said it it was just Pat defending Pat. Brian implied he would get independent testing and the Anti doping part of the UCI is run independently but not by WADA. This is one thing I hope will change but it might not make any change on the ground I fear or even make doping worse if the same organization covers all sports. The real big money sports are truly a JOKE when it comes to this problem. No one wants a doping problem in soccer and honest testing would show their problem.
As for Big Pharma and illicit drug sales. I recall a discussion that pointed out the total illicit sales of EPO amounted to less than the prescribed sales in Alberta a Canadian province with about 3 million people.
Extrapolate that to a world population and EPO sales to sports won't cover executive bonuses. I am sure if my numbers are wildy off that we will hear a correction.
The CERA test was one of the few blood doping drugs that the pharma company actually cooperated with anti doping to insert a marker for the drug. Ricco was surprised by that one so sometimes big drug companies do assist anti doping efforts.

 

[Catwhoorg]

Cookson has started doing something for sure.

Besides CIRC getting going, he got an external audit of the UCI anti-doping undertaken (it reported last month IIRC), the recommended changes are supposed to be undertaken, simultaneously with the changes required under the 2015 WADA code.

Cookson says he is out of the loop on cases, and only hears when they are ready to prosecute, that the anti-doping wing has full independent authority.
That has of course been said many times before, and so I wouldn't be surprised if people are jaded.

Its my opinion he hasn't done enough yet, and certainly not fast enough, but he had a huge bureaucratic inertia to overcome. Lets see how the rest of his term pans out.


<edit>

The list of recomendations

Couple of keys ones to my mind:
reestablishment of a committee to review TUE's
and
The system of handing Biopassport cases to NADO's should be reviewed, due to the complexity of these cases.