Will Contador Be Juiced Up Again Upon His Return

[deviant]

Clen is a broncho dilator and a stimulant, that is how it is of benefit in competition, same as all the guys who have TUE certs for ventolin/salbutamol...in fact doesn't most of the peleton have exemption for asthma inhalers?....seems weird that all these asthmatics would excel at something like cycling!?.....clen also has a long half life which is bad in terms of glow time but good in that a little goes a long way.... Obviously in the off season it can be used for weight control as it raises the baseline metabolic rate too.

 

[LaFlorecita]

He might be a doper, but the last thing he is is arrogant

Some people are simply clueless.

 

[peloton]

I asked this and was told it clears the airways, helps breathing, a bit like an inhaler for asthma. But I would have thought an inhaler more efficient for immediate effect.

Wasn't the thought that AC had been doing some clen in training and, carelessly, it had gone into a blood bag?

That would be the logical thought, but oddly CAS refuted that (iirc)

 

[dolophonic]

He might be a doper, but the last thing he is is arrogant

only thing worse than a poster in an arrogant poster.. terrible.

 

[dolophonic]

What is more disgusting than an unrepentant doper ?

An arrogant unrepentant doper, which seems the case with Contador of 2014.

Only thing worse than a self righteous poster is an arrogant self righteous poster..

 

[ferryman]

Only thing worse than a self righteous poster is an arrogant self righteous poster..

Steady troops, post not poster!

But I agree, AC may be many things but he is certainly not arrogant. Quite the opposite I would say.

 

[bigcog]

Well, having a black and white attitude about doping, belies the fact that in some cases there are extenuating circumstances. I believe there are cases where it is highly questionable a drug had any performance enhancing effect. And that in the end is what doping is all about - proof of performance enhancement in the particular circumstance.

As much as I detest doping, I detest a system where there is no due process.

In 2010, Contador tested for 50 picograms of clen or 50 trillionths of a gram. Every trained pharmacologist in the world (not paid off by the Clinic cynics) would agree there is no way this amount could have had any performance enhancing effect for AC in the 2010 TDF.

In spite of this CAS imposed a strict liability standard on AC. Fair. No, because today they have a minimum level standard for clen.

While there are ton of suspicions and Bruyneel may have some inside information that to date has not come out, there is no other credible evidence of AC doping in his career. Bruyneel has major credibility problems. Forget Puerto. The evidence there is all circumstantial and unreliable. Forget the plasticizer argument because the test for that in 2010 was not an approved test. The problem with circumstantial evidence is that people can and very frequently do, draw the wrong inference.

Everyone, especially the Clinic cynics, simply assumes he is a doper. Why? Because among other reasons he is Spanish. There is not a rider who has won a GT in the last 30 years except perhaps Sastre, who the Clinicians assume, on no credible evidence, is a doper. This is why the Clinic has no credibility when it comes to doping in spite of the righteous indignation of those very same cynics. (Wait for the outcry on that one!)

What everyone overlooks is that AC is damn good. Now, if I am wrong, I will humbly eat crow.

Have you read Tyler Hamilitons book ? Echo positives were a massive worry even back then.

 

[bigcog]

4. Explain why in the Clinic there is a thread "Can any riders based in Spain be clean" if there is not a huge cultural bias in the Clinic towards Spaniards. I have yet to hear other reasons why people think AC doped.

I suggest you try and understand the difference between being spanish and being based in Spain. Why do you think Pharmstrong and Hamiliton were based in Girona ? As Hamiliton said the testing was easy to avoid, as opposed to being based in France for example.

 

[RownhamHill]

Please show me one post in the clinic of anyone defending Contador, please just one.

Ermmm, pretty sure I've posted a few. . .

 

[BYOP88]

Ermmm, pretty sure I've posted a few. . .

I'm a lazy son of a gun. Not trawling through every post ever posted on these boards.

 

[RownhamHill]

That would be the logical thought, but oddly CAS refuted that (iirc)

Yep, you're right, and it wasn't that odd that CAS refuted it, because IIRC the case for the prosecution from WADA refuted that idea as well.

It's been a while since the decision, so I'm a little hazy now, but I'm pretty sure the case that WADA put forward was that Contador took two infusions - one in the evening of red blood cells, and one the following morning of plasma - something to do with the bio-passport results and the plasticiser spike etc, can't remember the exact chronology. Based on the timing of the Clen tests (and bear in mind they had negative Clen tests from the previous day) they argued that the plasma infusion must have been contaminated, and that this must have been because the donor (who they suggested was Conti, as if had been his plasma his red blood would have been contaminated too (I think!)) had been taking Clentador at some massive level before donating plasma to Contador's 'team'.

So the basic theory was that Contador had gone to the trouble of extracting blood, spinning it, freezing it, re-infusing it in two parts with donated fresh plasma, in a pretty sophisticated enterprise, but hadn't bothered to get a 'clean' donor of the plasma. And they made that argument because that's really all the evidence of the blood-testing would allow.

CAS rejected it on the balance of probability (and noted that the evidence obviously wasn't strong enough to bring a blood transfusion case, as WADA, ahem, didn't) possibly because it sounds bat-**** insane.

As I say though, it's been two years since I read the decision so I may be remembering wrong.

 

[Merckx index]

It's been a while since the decision, so I'm a little hazy now...

Your memory is excellent. Yes, they had to argue for two transfusions, because of the timing of the CB and DEHP positives. That did complicate their case, and made it appear a stretch, though I always felt it was quite possible, even what a rider would likely do (the plasma being used to lower HT following the red cells).

However, the part about another blood (plasma) donor. This was put forth because the prosecution bought (or feared) the defense’s argument that Contador would not have withdrawn blood right after a large dose of CB, which had to be the case for enough CB to appear in a transfusion to trigger a positive. But this is debatable; Contador would not have known at that time that such a sensitive CB test existed.

In the end, I think the decision was intended to satisfy two criteria: 1) it couldn’t be meat, and 2) the transfusion scenario was too complicated. Ruling that it was a contaminated supplement was one of those worst of all possible decisions except the alternative. The irony is that if Bert had argued supplement in the beginning, he might have gotten a reduced sentence. But au contraire, he insisted he didn’t take any supplements.

It's interesting to speculate what would have happened had he been given a one year suspension for the supplement. If the sentence had been handed down by the Spanish ADA, in early 2011, he would have missed that year and never won the Giro. He could have ridden the TDF the following year, but based on his performance in the Vuelta that year, barely winning it, I doubt very much that he would have beaten Wiggins or Froome in the TDF. So ironically, getting two years probably helped his palmares, by forcing him to ride a GT he could win.

 

[Jspear]

Your memory is excellent. Yes, they had to argue for two transfusions, because of the timing of the CB and DEHP positives. That did complicate their case, and made it appear a stretch, though I always felt it was quite possible, even what a rider would likely do (the plasma being used to lower HT following the red cells).

However, the part about another blood (plasma) donor. This was put forth because the prosecution bought (or feared) the defense’s argument that Contador would not have withdrawn blood right after a large dose of CB, which had to be the case for enough CB to appear in a transfusion to trigger a positive. But this is debatable; Contador would not have known at that time that such a sensitive CB test existed.

In the end, I think the decision was intended to satisfy two criteria: 1) it couldn’t be meat, and 2) the transfusion scenario was too complicated. Ruling that it was a contaminated supplement was one of those worst of all possible decisions except the alternative. The irony is that if Bert had argued supplement in the beginning, he might have gotten a reduced sentence. But au contraire, he insisted he didn’t take any supplements.

It's interesting to speculate what would have happened had he been given a one year suspension for the supplement. If the sentence had been handed down by the Spanish ADA, in early 2011, he would have missed that year and never won the Giro. He could have ridden the TDF the following year, but based on his performance in the Vuelta that year, barely winning it, I doubt very much that he would have beaten Wiggins or Froome in the TDF. So ironically, getting two years probably helped his palmares, by forcing him to ride a GT he could win.

Yes, I think him being forced out of GT's has helped his palmares a couple of times. He wasn't allowed to ride the 2008 Tour allowing him to win the Giro and Vuelta.

 

[RobbieCanuck]

Can you take off you defence lawyer hat and tell me - do you think Contador did or didn't take a blood transfusion on that tour? If you had to honestly assess it on a scale from 0% to 100% likely? Transfusions/EPO is up there with the cheatiest form of cheating we know of for an endurance athlete - nobody cares much about clenbuterol.

As a person/rider I think he may have transfused. I would say 49%. This guess is biased because I am an AC fan. I agree that transfusions are one of the "cheatiest" ways to cheat.

As any good defence lawyer would say, wearing the defence lawyer hat "What can they prove?" and the July 21, 2010 TDF test can only prove infinitesimal amounts of clen that under any scenario had no performance enhancing effect on the 2010 TDF results.

 

[RobbieCanuck]

I suggest you try and understand the difference between being spanish and being based in Spain. Why do you think Pharmstrong and Hamiliton were based in Girona ? As Hamiliton said the testing was easy to avoid, as opposed to being based in France for example.

WADA and the UCI tested in Spain as much as they did anywhere else. On the other hand the Spanish ADA (REFC) did not vigorously test in Spain and the REFC only have jurisdiction to test Spanish riders or any rider who competed in Spanish races (e.g. the Veulta).

So Armstrong, Hamilton et al went to Spain not because they wouldn't be tested there, but because a positive finding and/or possession of doping products in France is a criminal offence for which you don't just get suspended, but you can go to jail.

Recall Lance had a house in Nice, so it is clear he would have rather been in France. But Girona was close to France and off the beat and track. I don't think Hamilton said it was easier to avoid testing because they were in Spain but rather because they were in Girona, an out of the way town.

 

[LaFlorecita]

It's interesting to speculate what would have happened had he been given a one year suspension for the supplement. If the sentence had been handed down by the Spanish ADA, in early 2011, he would have missed that year and never won the Giro. He could have ridden the TDF the following year, but based on his performance in the Vuelta that year, barely winning it, I doubt very much that he would have beaten Wiggins or Froome in the TDF. So ironically, getting two years probably helped his palmares, by forcing him to ride a GT he could win.

It seems a bit weird to me to say that stripping his Tour and Giro title and forcing him to ride the Vuelta helped his palmares. Who cares about the Vuelta anyway.

 

[RownhamHill]

Your memory is excellent. Yes, they had to argue for two transfusions, because of the timing of the CB and DEHP positives. That did complicate their case, and made it appear a stretch, though I always felt it was quite possible, even what a rider would likely do (the plasma being used to lower HT following the red cells).

However, the part about another blood (plasma) donor. This was put forth because the prosecution bought (or feared) the defense’s argument that Contador would not have withdrawn blood right after a large dose of CB, which had to be the case for enough CB to appear in a transfusion to trigger a positive. But this is debatable; Contador would not have known at that time that such a sensitive CB test existed.
.

At the time I thought the double transfusion explanation did sound a stretch, but writing it down now it doesn't seem so far fetched. But the stumbling block for me was always the assumption either Berti or a donor would have been dosing up on clen just before a withdrawal, it just always sounded kind of off. In all honesty, leaving blood transfusions aside, I still wouldn't be surprised if there was something fishy about that positive still to be revealed.

 

[ChrisE]

Some people are simply clueless.

Yeah, and it is good they have a short memory on just how clueless they were in the past, so they can post gems like this in 2014:

And yes of course he was always he doper, he rode for Saiz duh

 

[LaFlorecita]

Yeah, and it is good they have a short memory on just how clueless they were in the past, so they can post gems like this in 2014:

nobody is allowed to change their mind?

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Does Contador need to take anything this year? Froome is going kabom more than vroom recently?

 

[Ferminal]

Probably not, top5 a GT clean is ez.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

About time we started talking about the "old clean generation".

 

[hrotha]

CAS rejected the blood transfusion theory based on a report we haven't seen written by the defense. WADA disagreed. In my opinion, CAS decided to ignore that issue because they didn't need to pursue it in order to ban Contador. It might have been tricky to base their suspension on that, which might have let their flank wide open to an appeal at a regular court.

Also, few people here speak Spanish and have regular access to Spanish-speaking media, but believe me, Contador has said Sky-ish things about his being clean often enough.

 

[ChrisE]

nobody is allowed to change their mind?

Of course people can change their mind. Until then, they are clueless. Right?

 

[Netserk]

Contador goes full nuclear!