Looking forward to the TDF

I have watched some great racing this year, the Spring Classics, the Giro d’Italia, and the lead up races to the Tour de France. The Paris/Niece, the Criterium du Dophine, the Route du Sud, and the Tour de Suisse. I have not written a single word about any of them here on my blog.

The reason, whenever I do it turns into a discussion on doping, and quite honestly if I am in the middle of watching a race, or I have just watched it, it spoils it for me. It is not that I am in denial, or that I am so naïve to believe that doping doesn’t still go on, but I do believe that the sport is in a better place than it has been for a long time.

The fact that no one rider is dominating the sport anymore, I feel is an indication of that. It makes for better and more interesting racing. Here we are approaching the Tour de France, with four favorites. Contador, Froome, Quintana, and Nibali.

The winner will be whoever hits peak form during the race, so don’t rule out Tejay Van Garderen. Sure Froome beat him in the Criterium du Dophine, but only by 10 seconds. And if Tejay peaks at the Tour that could change. Nibali did nothing in the same race, but then again he did the exact same thing last year but appeared to peak at the Tour.

The same goes for French riders Thibault Pinot and Warren Barguil, and young British rider Simon Yates. Any of these could peak at the right time and cause an upset. All are in with at least a chance of a podium place.

Froome has a good chance of winning if he doesn’t fall off his bike. But I would take bets on him falling off over winning. I read a quote somewhere, that Chris Froome’s riding style is like “An octopus falling from a tree.” Not a pleasing rider to watch. Sure he gets the job done, but Contador climbing out of the saddle is more like watching a ballet, and a joy to behold.

Contador has the Giro d’Italia in his legs, which could either help or hinder his chances, depending on whether or not he has taken all the right steps to recover. On the penultimate stage of the Route du Sud that included three category one climbs, Contador looked extremely strong, but Quintana was able to meet his every attack. In the end it was Contador’s superior bike handling skills on the final descent that won him the stage and the overall race.

I would like to see Contador win, if only to see him pull of the Giro/Tour double. He will almost certainly retire at the end of this year if he does. He is a joy to watch, and tough as nails, remember he dislocated a shoulder in a crash in this year’s Giro, and carried on to win. Quintana could win too, Froomey and Nibali I could care less really.

So let’s have all the anti-doping rhetoric now while I have a week to forget about it. Then I can sit back and enjoy the racing. It promises to be a great one.  

 To Share click "Share Article" below 

Amgen to stop making EPO

Amgen the company that manufactures Epogen, otherwise known as EPO is to scale down and eventually stop production of the drug over the next twelve months.

Epogen is a legitimate medical treatment that increases the red blood cells in patients with certain cancers and kidney disease.

Used illegally by pro cyclists and other athletes, it also increase red blood cells, thereby carrying more oxygen to the muscles, resulting in a huge boost in performance.

I have always found it interesting and fascinating that Amgen sponsors the Tour of California professional bike race each year.

Is this a mere coincidence? At what board meeting did someone suggest that a company that makes medication for very sick people would benefit, and boost sales by sponsoring a professional bike race?

Amgen, based in Longmont, California is shutting down production of Epogen because of a steady decrease in sales over recent years. Figures went from 2.6 billion in 2009, to 2.5 billion in 2010, to 2 billion in 2011. (Note that is Billion with a “B.”) The decline in sales is still falling with current quarterly earnings down 3% on last year’s sales.

I am not speculating as to why Amgen’s sale of Epogen is declining, I am simply asking why? Are there less sick people needing the drug, because that is not how patterns in a population’s health usually go. There may be fluctuations up and down from one year to the next, but not usually a steady decline.

Is it yet another coincidence that sales have declined since 2009, over the same period that professional cycling started to clean up its act? And is it possible that illegal sales of EPO could run into Billions with a “B?”

These are simply questions I am asking. I do not have the time or resources to follow up on this story. But it would be interesting to go into Amgen’s financial records and follow the money trail, and find out where all that Epogen went.

Here is the link to the Amgen closure story. 

 To Share click "Share Article" below

Profiling

The dictionary definition of Profiling:

The act or process of extrapolating information about a person based on known traits or tendencies. The act of suspecting or targeting a person on the basis of observed characteristics or behavior.

There is a word there that I had to look up in the thesaurus: Extrapolating. It means, inferring, generalizing, deducing, and to draw conclusions, which pretty much sums up the whole crux of profiling.

Chris Froome was favorite going into the Tour de France, the press and the rest of the media all agreed he was the man to beat. So what happens when he lives up to everyone’s expectations? These same journalists are now questioning his performance, and it is not just journalists, but every amateur armchair analyst in the world.

He blew everyone away last Sunday on Mont Monteux, but barely had time to get from the finishing line, change his shirt, and get to the podium, before Twitter and all the Internet chat rooms were ablaze with cries of “Doper.”  I heard that one site crashed within minutes of the stage finish, they had so many people online.

This is profiling, pure and simple. Like saying, “Here is a black man, he might be a criminal.” Or, “Here is someone who looks like an Arab, he might be a terrorist.” People are saying, “Here is a professional cyclist, and he is going faster than everyone else, he might be on dope.”

I can understand being skeptical after all that has happened in the sport of pro cycling, but if a person is so skeptical that he goes on line to question a rider’s performance, just because he blew away the completion. Why is that person even watching the Tour de France? If one doesn’t believe what they are seeing, they might as well watch Professional Wrestling.

Chris Froome did not suddenly appear out of nowhere. He has been on form all season, which is why he earned the title of “Favorite” going into the Tour. He won the Tour of Oman, was second to Vincenzo Nibali in the Tirreno – Adriatico. He won the Criterium International, the Tour de Romandie, and the Criterium du Douphine, all multiple stage races. I suspect many of the armchair experts never followed those races, but have just come on board for the TDF. And I’ll bet most have never raced a bike, or have a clue what it takes.

Throughout history there have been cyclists who have stood head and shoulders above the rest. Fausto Coppi, Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx. Why do some soccer teams, and football and baseball teams do better than others? It is the organization, the managers, and the coaches. Who gets fired when things go bad? Team Sky have the money and they can buy the best athletes, managers, and coaches, simple as that.

Team Sky have gone out of their way to be transparent in their organization, they fired a bunch of people who were suspect of previous dealings with dope. I believe pro cycling has an opportunity to get itself really clean like never before.

I am now reading that the Professional Cyclists Association (CPA) is telling the media to leave Chris Froome alone. So his fellow riders in the Tour de France are satisfied he is not doping. That is good enough for me, I can enjoy the rest of the Tour.

With everyone across the board saying they are clean, it would take one hell of a conspiracy if everyone was still doping as before. Anyone who has worked in an office knows that all people do is talk about stuff they were supposed to keep secret. If a team were doping, a mechanic or laundry boy somewhere would be sure to spill the beans to the press.

   To Share click "Share Article" below.

Just go away

I wish Lance Armstrong would go away; I am tired of looking at his face. I’m even tired of being tired of looking at his face and reading about him…. At this point I hesitate because here I am writing more about LA, adding to the shit pile, so to speak.

But I always find writing is great therapy; better to write the shit out, than to hold it in. To hold it in is emotional constipation. So this is simply an exercise to release my own frustrations, and possibly you will release some of your frustrations with a comment at the end.

I am frustrated with people who still say, “Lance doped in an era when everyone doped, therefore it was okay, and the playing field was level.” It is not okay. If the old cliché, “Two wrongs don’t make a right,” has any truth to it, then everybody and his brother doping sure as Hell doesn’t make that right.

It means that anyone arriving new to the professional ranks has two choices. Take dope, not necessarily to win, but to keep from being shot out of the back of the peloton. The other choice is, not participate, and don’t become a professional cyclist.

In my teen years and early twenties I had dreams of one day being a professional cyclist. I made it to the top as a Category One amateur, it never entered my head to dope, and I never knew any other amateurs who doped.

It later became clear to me that I was never going to make it to the professional ranks; I simply did not have what it took. Also at the time, the mid to late 1960s, if I was really serious about a pro career I would have to move to France or Belgium, and that was not going to happen; I was married and had a family to support.

I continued to race for the competition, for the exercise, but mainly for the pure fun of it. There was always a great sense of friendship and camaraderie among British riders. There was always a great deal of humorous banter, and light hearted ribbing and joking going on in “The Bunch.” We never called it a Peloton; that was a French word reserved for races like the Tour de France. Not amateur races limited to 40 riders held on English country lanes.  

Because the races were held on open roads with normal motor traffic, each rider looked out for everyone else; shouting out a warning if the was a car approaching, etc. No one made any dangerous moves that would jeopardize the safety of other. If they did they would be ostracized by the other riders.

There was an occasion when my chain came off during a race, and two other riders, complete strangers to me, grabbed my jersey and towed me along while I reached down and put my chain back on the chainring. Those riders knew if I were dropped from the bunch for something as stupid as an unshipped chain, my whole day would be ruined. Plus by being forced to stop in the middle of a bunch. I could have caused a pile up.

When I arrived in the US in 1979, the racing was no longer on open roads with real hills to climb, but were Criteriums, races round a city block that had been closed to traffic. A lung bursting sprint, 100 yards down a city street, then brake, followed by another sprint. I was now in my early 40s and this was not for me.

Also gone was the sense of camaraderie and looking out for each other, instead there was a nasty, mean-spirited competiveness. People making downright dangerous moves in an attempt to win at all costs.

Worst of all guys were openly snorting cocaine before the race; I mean passing it around on the start line. I was no slouch, but there were guys riding touring bikes with pannier racks and fenders riding past me in the finishing sprint. I quit because racing was no longer any fun.

Some of these races were piddling little club races with no prizes, which in my book made winning at all costs even more pathetic. I would never race as a veteran; you can be sure there are those out there using Testosterone, and Human Growth Hormones, because these can be readily prescribed by any family doctor.

In any race, or in any sport for that matter, there are only a handful of competitors capable of winning; the rest make up the field, and without them there would be no race, or no game. There would be no Tour de France if there were only 20 top riders, there has to be a field of 150 riders for the top 20 to emerge from.

Back in Roman times, Gladiators fought to the death. Fun for the spectators; not so much for the competitors. Modern sports are combat without killing, or war without tears. Sports should teach children that life is a struggle, and it takes hard work and dedication to get ahead. But you can still have fun doing it.

It should also teach children about fair play; it is not okay to cheat, or bully your way to the top, with a win at all costs attitude. People who do that in real life are called “Assholes.”

Right now Lance Armstrong is King of the Assholes, and people who say what he did is okay are saying it is alright to be an asshole. Thanks for allowing me to vent.

                        

Too good to be true

There is an old adage: “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” As I reflect on the whole Lance Armstrong saga, in retrospect that old saying should have been applied but wasn’t.

The Fairy Tale story of a young athlete who almost died of cancer then came back to win the Tour de France seven times, has now been proved to be just that, a Fairy Tale.

The thing is I knew it was too good to be true; which is why now I feel pretty stupid. Not because I really bought into the Armstrong story, but because I sat safely on the fence, not having the balls to take one side or the other.

Had I taken the stand that Armstrong had doped; (Which is what I suspected.) back when I started this blog in 2005; LA was just coming off his Seventh TDF win and I probably would have made far more enemies than friends. However, I would now have the satisfaction of saying, “Told you so.”

On the other hand had I preached along the lines that Lance was the greatest cyclist ever who never took dope; I would be looking even more stupid now. So like many others I took the safe neutral ground and said nothing.

It is easy to speak out against the “Big Tex” now that everyone else is, but it brings little satisfaction. We should have all spoken up years ago. When I say “We” I mean everyone who writes about the sport of cycling.

I am just an old guy who used to be in the bike biz, with a blog that gets a couple of thousand hits a day; I am not pretending to have a huge influence on anything. But anyone who writes about cycling has a responsibility; from the independent blogger all the way up to the mainstream media.

It is usually the mainstream media who expose wrong doing; it is their duty to keep people honest. From Watergate to more recently the Catholic Church and Penn State, the media did it.

But Armstrong was different; he manipulated the media. He shut out those who asked tough questions, and silenced others by suing them. It took a government agency to bring LA down.

Those who spoke up about Lance Armstrong doping before this story broke; good for you, you are a hero. If you are a blogger or journalist who supported Armstrong over the years; it is not enough that you jump in the band wagon now and condemn him along with the rest.

There needs to be an apology to the few who did speak up but were ignored even vilified. And if like me you sat on the fence; we are not much better because we did nothing. This is by way of my apology.

This weekend Five major European newspapers – The Times, Belgium’s Het Nieuwsblad and Le Soir, French title L’Equipe and Italy’s La Gazzetta dello Sport – have today joined to launch a ‘Manifesto for credible cycling’

This is huge; these big national newspapers have a real influence on sports, and can hold governing bodies like the UCI accountable.

If I did not speak up about Armstrong, I have always said here that the UCI has failed the sport. (Click on the UCI tag and scroll down to read previous articles.)

The nature of any sport’s governing body is that the mini-politicians who run a sport, are often former failed or at best mediocre athletes who once in office are hard to remove, and become entrenched in their own importance and power.

Pat McQuaid, the current President of UCI, and “Clown Prince” of Cycling, is a typical example. The media was split when USADA report was first released, with many coming out on Armstrong’s side. Most have since recanted, but a few stay on LA’s side.

But through all this I have not read a single article that supports McQuaid or says he is doing a good job; there are calls for his resignation from every quarter. In spite of this McQuaid refuses to step down.

This just goes to show the arrogance and ego of the man, that he would refuse to step down when there is practically a unanimous call for his resignation.

Pat McQuaid (Picture top on right.) and his predecessor Hein Verbruggen (Top left.) looked the other way as Armstrong and others doped; they cannot say they didn’t know.

Like many who have been caught in recent years doing things they shouldn’t have, those who knew they were doing wrong but did nothing are just as responsible. McQuaid and Verbruggen must resign if cycling is to move on from this.