I am Zapatero

Wrote about this in another thread. Hopefully, someone has the courage to blow the whistle on the organization behind doping.

Sacrificing a couple of riders while allowing any teams, management, doctors, etc., to walk away free will be a disgrace.

Looks like things are starting to gain a little momentum?..

TrekDedicated said:

Looks like things are starting to gain a little momentum?..

I agree and was surprised to read that none of the original 50+ names identified in OP are riding in the Giro.
Now we'll await the fallout of the next 40+ names.

cPritch67 said:

I agree and was surprised to read that none of the original 50+ names identified in OP are riding in the Giro.
Now we'll await the fallout of the next 40+ names.

Question still remains, will all implicated Puerto riders be mossing from the Tour de France's start lists - and in particular I mean Valverde and Vinokourov?

Rolfrae said:

Question still remains, will all implicated Puerto riders be mossing from the Tour de France's start lists - and in particular I mean Valverde and Vinokourov?

[font=Verdana]I get the feeling they are building behind the scenes to Vino and Valverde.... they had to go after Basso first.... although CONI and not the UCI have been doing all the running... not sure the Kazakh or Spanish federations will be as keen to lock up Vino and Piti.... [/font][font=Verdana][/font]

whiteboytrash said:

[font=Verdana]I get the feeling they are building behind the scenes to Vino and Valverde.... they had to go after Basso first.... although CONI and not the UCI have been doing all the running... not sure the Kazakh or Spanish federations will be as keen to lock up Vino and Piti.... [/font][font=Verdana][/font]

If they are suspected to be in the original list of OP names, I would bet that they are excluded. If Prudholme is pushing for Basso to be banned, as he warned several weeks ago, (before Basso's announcement), then I'm not sure how other riders would be allowed to ride the TdF.
I'm not sure how Valverde has side-stepped this whole issue for so long, and he just keeps on racing without fanfare.

Rolfrae said:

Question still remains, will all implicated Puerto riders be mossing from the Tour de France's start lists - and in particular I mean Valverde and Vinokourov?

I thought Vino wasn't implicated? The only reason he didn't start last year's TdF was due to the fact that most of his teammates were, so he didn't have enough riders?

whiteboytrash said:

Looks like Scarponi has given a lot more information than Basso....

"He was able to detail the 'system' of doping and how the riders come into contact with this web of easygoing doctors, teams without scruples and traffickers."

This could be a real breakthrough. Contrary to Basso, this guy deserves some credit, ie. reduced suspension time.

They need to slam the teams and the directors who make the doping possible. The riders are responsible, but its not like the directors have no idea.

azdroptop said:

They need to slam the teams and the directors who make the doping possible. The riders are responsible, but its not like the directors have no idea.

Unfortunately, that's the big joke about all the internal testing that T-Mobile and CSC have as part of their own doping controls. The teams have a huge incentive to see their riders win. They can not therefore be impartial in the battle against doping. I would say (for now at least but maybe not for long) it's easier to appease a sponsor than to find a rider who has a shot at winning a grand tour.

The reason for all the internal testing is to ensure that if a rider's hematocrit numbers, testosterone ratios, etc. get a little out of whack, the rider can come down with the flu and miss the race. Sure there are out of competition tests but you're lessening the risk of getting caught significantly if the rider isn't racing. And since the teams know what their giving the rider, and how that particular PED is being tested for, they can easily control it with their own testing.

Another joke is the non-Spanish teams are pushing to have Puerto opened wide. As if the Germans, Russians, etc. haven't demostrated their own expertise at doping in sport. They just buy their drugs elsewhere and have their own experts.

The coruption runs very deep!

jonjungel said:

This could be a real breakthrough. Contrary to Basso, this guy deserves some credit, ie. reduced suspension time.

Indeed, of course, the entire peloton will spend all of its energy ensure his time riding is hell. If he can find someone to give him a contract of course...

jonjungel said:

This could be a real breakthrough. Contrary to Basso, this guy deserves some credit, ie. reduced suspension time.

Zapatero has less to lose than Basso but on Monday we all thought Basso had confessed all..... so I'll hold my breath..... I hope he does because he will save cycling and be remembed for that reason....

Ironically, Scarponi has less to lose because he has been generally less successful as a cyclist than Basso. Hah, hah 😉

musette said:

Ironically, Scarponi has less to lose because he has been generally less successful as a cyclist than Basso. Hah, hah 😉

Giro d' Italia 2006 - first part
By: Michele Ferrari
Published: 22 May 2006

At the Giro d’ Italia, absolute domination of Ivan Basso on all his rivals.

After the victory in the TTT, Ivan strongly climbed over the Maielletta (940m of difference in height, gradient of 8.4%) in 31’48”, expressing a VAM of 1775m/h.
Paolo Savoldelli, in rather evident respiratory troubles, climbed at 1642 m/h, that is about 8% slower than Ivan.

In the ITT a few days after, Basso rode the flat 50km at an average speed of 50.6 km/h, Savoldelli at 49.9km/h: supposing a similar aerodynamic efficiency, the difference in power output is about 3% in favor to Basso.

On the tough Colle di San Carlo (10.5km at 9.8%) Ivan bettered himself: VAM = 1820m/h, equal to 6.27 w/kg, notwithstanding the rainy conditions and the almost 2000m of altitude.
Paolo lost more than 3 minutes, with a VAM of 1670 m/h (5.75 w/kg), approximately 9% slower than his rival.

Since Savoldelli conceded an additional 5-6% in climbing performance, we can deduce a difference in body weight between the 2 riders of about 4 kg.
If this is the case, imagining a weight of 67kg for Ivan Basso, his average power output on the climb was 420 watts. Savoldelli, with a weight of 71 kg, pushed 408 watts.
A difference of 2.9% that would confirm the result we saw in the Time Trial.