Landis

[dd74]

Originally posted by SGB
He had a great inyerview in last months "Bicycling".
rats!

I read part of the interview (couldn't get through the whole thing); it was just as Armstrong decribed the two: "dumb and dumber." Landis and Zabriskie sound like frat boys giggling it up after the night's before kegger. Landis sounded foolish, and he dressing up like Kid Rock was just stupid IMO.

I do agree, though, with the diet of cappuccinos and chocolate - it's like rocket fuel. Although have too much of that ***** and you'll barely be able to stay on your bike.

[dd74]

Originally posted by nostatic
I think GL is just bitter becuase he's fat.

or fat beause he's bitter.

or fat because of butter.

mmmmm, butter....

LeMond just wishes he could win four, five, six, etc., TdFs, like Lance, Eddy and Bernard.

LeMond has no right to be bitter. Hell, LeMond is making millions from the Trek parent company for his line of bicycles (damn good bicycles - I have one - you just need a longish upper torso).

He makes as much, if not more, for appearances.

You're right though, he's fat. After being a pro cyclist, I guess the only thing a person can do is get fat. It's what Armstrong said as to what he'd miss most about pro cycling:

"No longer being 140 pounds."

[einreb]

Originally posted by SGB
I hate to read this.,,,

is there really no pssibility that he was clean? He had a great inyerview in last months "Bicycling".
rats!

Its easier to just believe that they are clean than to face reality.

Fan fovorite Marco Pantani was a cycling pharmacy, was banned 2 years form the tour, and died in a hotel at 35 in a pile of cocaine. In 2004, the tour 'honored him' by dedicating a stage to him after his death. WTF?

Even Merckx tested positive for amphetamines (the drug of choice in his day).

Its a dirty sport.

[svandamme]

speaking of Merckx

he was just as much hated then as Onenut was during his reign,
Merckx even got death threats, and in 73 was officially asked not to participate by the TDF organisor.... in 75 he even was punched in the gut by some bystander....

Onenut wasn't getting any different treatment because he was an American...

[Flatbutt1]

Onenut? thats harsh! Funny, but harsh.

Face it, whether taking T was for the purpose of long term growth with no impact immediately to the current tour or not...it is illegal...and he's an idiot for using it. Like it or not, fair or not, he's busted, its over.

the tour is dirty , probably has been for decades. If past champions doped in some way , using substances that at that time were not banned then their titles are legal amd legitimate though perhaps not ethical.

Pro sports, especially here in the US, are out of control because of the almighty dollar.

I'd love to see a man to man , head to head TDF. No teams.

[sand_man]

I think someone should lobby for a team of misfit cyclists to race in the next TDF. Include all the usual suspects (some old timers, some has-beens, some dope fiends, etc)...maybe even give GL or Bob Rohl some saddle time.

I so wanted to believe that these charges against Landis were a crock...how foolish of me!

[Laneco]

I went from not believing this was true, to condeming Landis (synthetic hormone) to now having very serious doubts about the chain of custody in the drug sample.

First - hitting the juice for one day does NOTHING. Unlike a stimulant or EPO it offers zero advantages for short term results.

Second, the guy was tested EIGHT times during the tour. Four times prior to the positive, then the positive, and three times after. Including three blood tests. None of the other samples and NONE of the blood tests showed this problem.

So - there's plenty of doctors on this site.... Somebody tell me two things:

1. How the hormone disappeared so quickly from his system that none of the other tests including the blood tests showed positive?
2. Why anyone would take a hormone hit for one day on 3 week race?

angela

[asphaltgambler]

One of my co-workers is a semi-pro cyclist. He says that Landis probably used a T-patch on his sack-O-beans for that next stage where he overcame unbelieveable odds.

According to him It absolutely would help Landis in that stage. He may have left it on for too long though. At the end of that kind of endurance race your body should be completely depleted; that if anything his Levels should have lower than normal.

[dd74]

Originally posted by asphaltgambler
He says that Landis probably used a T-patch on his sack-O-beans...

I think I'm correctly translating this. Is it like a nicotine patch on one's arm?

[svandamme]

lol , googled for T patch

http://www.aerztekammer-bw.de/25/15medizin04/B20/4.pdf


at least it's not some horse medicine ...

[asphaltgambler]

Yes, but these guys put it on their bean bag to hide it while racing.

[svandamme]

Originally posted by asphaltgambler
Yes, but these guys put it on their bean bag to hide it while racing.

these guys would go on a steady diet of raw dog testicles if there was only a hint that it would make them better/faster, and not get busted for doping

[dd74]

Originally posted by svandamme
these guys would go on a steady diet of raw dog testicles if there was only a hint that it would make them better/faster, and not get busted for doping

Well there are Rocky Mountain Oysters from what I understand. Only it ain't dog...

[Harold_89_911]

Originally posted by Laneco
[First - hitting the juice for one day does NOTHING. Unlike a stimulant or EPO it offers zero advantages for short term results.
[/B]

I'm not an expert and have been struggling with the same questions. From talking to different people, T would have helped to speed up muscle recovery and would have helped his mental state, making him a more agressive rider.

So, assuming he did it, how did he think he could get away with it? My theory at this point is that he never expected to win the stage, let alone the tour. Maybe you remember Pantani the day after Lance gave him the stage win on Mont Ventoux. His ego was so hurt that the next day he went all out to prove himself to the world, hoping that Lance would try and follow him and compromise the rest of the tour for Lance. I think Landis' purpose was to hurt his opponents (he said before the stage that he was going to make them work for the victory, not that he was going to try and win) and he already had given up on a victory. He must have been really surprised that they did not try to follow him and suddenly he was a contender again, with a urine sample at the end of the day.

I know this is just a theory, but it is the only one that makes sense to me so far. I don't tend to believe in big conspiracy theories, even though blaming the French for all that's bad in the world seems to be the PC thing to do.

[einreb]

Originally posted by Harold_89_911
My theory at this point is that he never expected to win the stage

Its a popular theory. If someone had been able to stay with him, he could let them have the stage.

They test the stage winner, the yellow jersey and two at random. Its very likely that he would not have been tested until after the time trial.

[Scooter]

Sorry Harold, but I can't agree with your theory that he didn't think he could win. He and his trainer both were very confident after stage 16 that Floyd was going to come out an win stage 17. If you read Robby's blog written prior to stage 17, he even came out and said he expected Floyd to win stage 17.

[dd74]

Originally posted by Harold_89_911
I'm not an expert and have been struggling with the same questions. From talking to different people, T would have helped to speed up muscle recovery and would have helped his mental state, making him a more agressive rider.

So, assuming he did it, how did he think he could get away with it? My theory at this point is that he never expected to win the stage, let alone the tour. Maybe you remember Pantani the day after Lance gave him the stage win on Mont Ventoux. His ego was so hurt that the next day he went all out to prove himself to the world, hoping that Lance would try and follow him and compromise the rest of the tour for Lance. I think Landis' purpose was to hurt his opponents (he said before the stage that he was going to make them work for the victory, not that he was going to try and win) and he already had given up on a victory. He must have been really surprised that they did not try to follow him and suddenly he was a contender again, with a urine sample at the end of the day.

I know this is just a theory, but it is the only one that makes sense to me so far. I don't tend to believe in big conspiracy theories, even though blaming the French for all that's bad in the world seems to be the PC thing to do.

Landis said in an interview Monday that he believed he was the strongest cyclist at the beginnng of Stage 17, and by the first hill, attacking it as he did, and with no one else following, he knew he was the strongest.

His opponents hurt themselves by not trying to stay with him. Whether Landis was doped up or not, it was a great tactical move on his part.

[jyl]

I'm inclined to believe the reality is close to what this article says:


Doping on Tour down to a science
T.J. QUINN
New York Daily News
NEW YORK - Every evening as their bicycles zipped across the day's finish line, drained Tour de France cyclists with gaunt faces and sweat-soaked hair matted under their helmets would slide off the seats they had been riding through the French countryside.

Their bodies were drained of liquid, their muscles depleted of potassium and filled with carbonic and lactic acid.

While support staff from the teams gathered bikes and equipment to get ready for the next morning's run, the riders would stuff themselves with food and liquid, then retire to another phase of the race.

Some cyclists would take sterile bags and syringes out of packs and drain some of their blood to store overnight. They would take testosterone patches and place them on the scrotum to quickly absorb the rejuvenating hormone. Some would take a daily dose of growth hormone, or insulin, or insulin-like growth factor, or T3 thyroid medication, or epinephrine, all of which are nearly impossible to test for.

After a few hours, the testosterone patch comes off. Seven to nine hours later, the drug will be at peak effectiveness, and after 14-18 hours, it's out of the system altogether. Then a night's rest, pump the blood back into the body, back on the bike.

And off to do things the human body should not be able to do. If the system is followed to the letter, none of these performance-enhancing tactics should ever be detected.

"When you get to that level, you know how to play this game," says sports medicine physician John Sonzogni, the former team physician for the New Jersey Nets, assistant team doctor for the New York Giants and the medical director for both a men's and women's World Cup. "It's the same with the NFL, same with Major League Baseball: they know when to bring (their drug levels) back down."

The nightly drug routine was provided to the New York Daily News by a former steroid dealer who spoke on the condition of anonymity, and several physicians who looked it over say it makes perfect sense.

But as Tour de France winner Floyd Landis prepares to appeal his failed drug test, his saga has again exposed how easy and pervasive cheating is in cycling, just as sprinter Justin Gatlin's failed test has done in track and field.

Landis and sprinter Gatlin may have screwed up and been caught, anti-doping advocates and medical experts say, but they are hardly the only ones to cheat in their sports.

"One other thing that's happening now is that people are realizing the tests are not all that great," says Don Catlin, the director of the UCLA Olympic lab and the man who more or less invented anti-doping tests. "I know that, but I don't walk around advertising it."

He doesn't need to. The athletes know it all too well.

Simply put, medical experts say, the body cannot recover on its own quickly enough during a competition as grueling as the Tour de France has become and not at the speeds the cyclists now race. To keep the body from breaking down, they need drugs such as testosterone, growth hormone and insulin for repair, and drugs like erythropoietin to increase red blood cell production.

The steroid dealer interviewed by the Daily News, who has not worked with Landis, says he suspects that Landis was wearing a testosterone patch and forgot to remove it after a night of drinking, which could explain "why his number would be through the roof like that."

Maharam said it is also possible that Landis was using both testosterone and epitestosterone to beat the ratio test. The magic of BALCO's famous "cream" was that it contained both hormones, so the athlete would get additional testosterone but his or her testosterone to epitestosterone ratio would remain the same. Some athletes using testosterone inject themselves with epi-t just below the nipple, where the needle mark won't be noticeable. It's possible, Maharam says, that Landis was using both drugs but simply ran out of the epitestosterone.

"It's needed for added recovery and to get some killer instinct and aggressiveness," he says. Maharam says he thinks Landis may have been "arrogant and stupid and thought he wasn't going to be tested."

Most sophisticated cheaters know the testing protocols and have adapted their doping regimens as needed. In the Tour de France, the tour leader, stage winner and three random riders are tested, and Landis may not have expected to actually win the stage.

Not all steroid testing programs are identical, but they share some basic features. A league collects samples and sends them to a lab such as Catlin's. The lab puts the urine into two vials, an "A" and "B" sample, and begins testing the "A" in a mass-spectrometer. The machine looks for all known steroids - each has a distinct pattern - and compares the amount of testosterone to epitestosterone.

Because the average person's body produces both in the same amounts, if the testosterone level is four times greater than the epitestosterone, it is considered a positive test. That 4-1 t/e ratio, as it is known, is the test that both Landis and Gatlin failed. (The same steroid dealer the Daily News interviewed says it is likely that anti-doping was tipped off about Gatlin's regimen, so agents would know to test him when the levels were at their maximum.)

Once the t/e level is tripped, most sports leagues and federations - including almost every one of Catlin's clients - then have the lab do a carbon-isotope ratio (CIR) test, which can determine whether the athlete has used synthetic testosterone. Landis failed that test, too. The NFL and Major League Baseball opt for the CIR test only if testers think there is something fishy with the sample.

Catlin says the sagas of Landis and Gatlin might influence the press and public to push for more testing. It's a slow learning curve for everyone, he says.

"One of the things that's going to happen from the cases that are floating around out there is, I suspect, more requests for CI ratios. I can feel it already," Catlin says. "Everybody sort of understands what a drug test is for marijuana, or the layperson has an idea, but when you start talking about carbon-isotopes and atoms, they really tune out, and it happens with clients as well. These organizations are not run by chemistry professors. The world would be a different place if they were."

[Laneco]

After reading the above post - I am well and truly disgusted. Is this what cycling is really about at that level?

angela

[sand_man]

Originally posted by Laneco
After reading the above post - I am well and truly disgusted. Is this what cycling is really about at that level?

angela

Agreed...that's disgusting!