It's not about the dope.

It's always about money and fighting for money.

They all dope.

wolfix said:

And when control of cycling is acheived by either party, we will not see positives nor will we see clean racing.

But we will see sponsors.

It's about winning. Some of these guys look like they just did a hot model after winning a stage. Well, with the dope in them can they do a hot model?

wolfix said:

I am in the group of people to wonder why Vino was picked out to be positive. It's beyond me to believe that the cycling powers do not know who is behind the doping program of every team. Omerta is not as powerful as the UCI wants the fans to believe.

We know cycling is headed towards a bigger problem then doping . It is at a crossroads in the power struggle between the ASO and the UCI.

The positive of Vino was a victory for the UCI.
The UCI would loved to have seen the TDF collapse. McSquid had to be all smiles when the news broke.
The RAZ situation was caused by the UCI. It could have very easily been averted by the UCI with the knowledge it had before the race started.
Who was damaged by the RAZ decision?
The ASO.

Next year the ASO says it is going to eliminate the UCI from it's connection to the TDF. "It no longer has the faith in it" , the ASO says. But this faith was never there when the troubles concerning the control of the ProTour began.

Look at the real players in this..... McSquid and Prudie. They are playing for much bigger stakes then just a few lousy racers who time will forget.

Your sport is on the line and it is not the dope that will bring it to it's knees. It's control over the money.

Watch this develope over the next year.

And when control of cycling is acheived by either party, we will not see positives nor will we see clean racing.

There may be some truth to your claim. Both Vino and Ras fit the profile of the famous "men in black" quote just before the start of the Tour, and the extra scrutiny might be payback. Both of these guys appear to have been ducking the dope controls, and this may be the UCI's way of saying "You mess with us by not complying with our system, and we'll go out of our way to make life hard on you."

so what I'm hearing is that some are saying that Kylling and Vino aren't responsible for what happened to them?

:eek:

I guess I need to find a ScapeGoatForHire.com affiliate in my area

Eilert Pilarm said:

so what I'm hearing is that some are saying that Kylling and Vino aren't responsible for what happened to them?

:eek:

I guess I need to find a ScapeGoatForHire.com affiliate in my area

No, if they cheat and get busted they ultimately have to accept responsibility for their actions. It's just that certain ones get singled out for special scrutiny (e.g., Ullrich, Basso, Jaschke, etc.) and thus are more likely to be caught than all the other dopers. While I agree that there is an element of "unfairness" about it, people who choose to earn their living by participating in a corrupt enterprise aren't in a strong position to expect honorable behavior by everyone else but themselves.

Eilert Pilarm said:

so what I'm hearing is that some are saying that Kylling and Vino aren't responsible for what happened to them?

:eek:

I guess I need to find a ScapeGoatForHire.com affiliate in my area

No....That's not whatI mean......
But everything points to the UCI and the ASO alllowing doping for so many years, that when the riders get busted, they wonder..."why now?"
What I am saying is the UCI is not communicating with the ASO in order to damage the TDF. I just read where Prudie agrees with this.......
If we look back to see how clean the TDF has been over the past several decades as far as positives go, and then we read how everyone in the peloton is doping......WTF.
When this is in front of them, a person has to realize that the UCI has looked the other way for decades.
Then we enter this TDF and we see a major instance where the UCI should have notified the ASO of RAZ's situation. The situation develpoes and the TDF gets a major blackeye. The UCI wins. The riders are pawns in this game.

wolfix said:

No....That's not whatI mean......
But everything points to the UCI and the ASO alllowing doping for so many years, that when the riders get busted, they wonder..."why now?"
What I am saying is the UCI is not communicating with the ASO in order to damage the TDF. I just read where Prudie agrees with this.......
If we look back to see how clean the TDF has been over the past several decades as far as positives go, and then we read how everyone in the peloton is doping......WTF.
When this is in front of them, a person has to realize that the UCI has looked the other way for decades.
Then we enter this TDF and we see a major instance where the UCI should have notified the ASO of RAZ's situation. The situation develpoes and the TDF gets a major blackeye. The UCI wins. The riders are pawns in this game.

If the riders are wondering "why now?" then they are not paying attention. Unfortunately the rest of the world is.

It's a year later, and the results of the last Tour are still tied up in (ridiculous) legal wranglings. They should have expected it to get rough this season. And if Vino and Ras were 'men in black' then they definitely should have seen it coming.........

wolfix said:

No....That's not whatI mean......
But everything points to the UCI and the ASO alllowing doping for so many years, that when the riders get busted, they wonder..."why now?"
What I am saying is the UCI is not communicating with the ASO in order to damage the TDF. I just read where Prudie agrees with this.......
If we look back to see how clean the TDF has been over the past several decades as far as positives go, and then we read how everyone in the peloton is doping......WTF.
When this is in front of them, a person has to realize that the UCI has looked the other way for decades.
Then we enter this TDF and we see a major instance where the UCI should have notified the ASO of RAZ's situation. The situation develpoes and the TDF gets a major blackeye. The UCI wins. The riders are pawns in this game.

You're correct in saying that the UCI allowed doping to go on for years.
We're now at a crossroads : the ASO have realised that sponsors are walking away from the sport because the grubby underbelly has started to be exposed.

I have it on good authority that the French goverment has instructed ASO to
get the races, under it's jurisdiction, sorted out.
They want races in which riders are clean (or as clean as is possible) and that means the ASO has to try to distance itself from the organisation (UCI) which created this mess and allowed rider/teams to dope freely.

The UCI's not going to win anything : I'm hearing that various national federations are unhappy with the UCI.

IMHO, great opening post/thread Wolfix. But I'm confused. I certainly don't want to see the races go back to everyone doping, no-one gets caught, and everyone starting from Liggett and Sherwen pronouncing that finally the peloton is completely clean. However, Lim's opinion seem's to be that an ASO controlled anti-doping program, or at least a non-UCI program would be better at catching the cheats.

Unfortunately, there always seems to be two possible directions. Catch no-one, and have doped competitors attacking and dancing on their pedals day after day in the mountains, and average viewers believing everyone is clean or going through hell and a lot of $$$ (both in lost revenue and added cost of testing everyone around the world more frequently) to eradicate (as much as possible) the doping disease. I hope they continue with the second strategy, so that cycling doesn't end up like World Championship Wrestling.

limerickman said:

You're correct in saying that the UCI allowed doping to go on for years.
We're now at a crossroads : the ASO have realised that sponsors are walking away from the sport because the grubby underbelly has started to be exposed.

I have it on good authority that the French goverment has instructed ASO to
get the races, under it's jurisdiction, sorted out.
They want races in which riders are clean (or as clean as is possible) and that means the ASO has to try to distance itself from the organisation (UCI) which created this mess and allowed rider/teams to dope freely.

The UCI's not going to win anything : I'm hearing that various national federations are unhappy with the UCI.

Lim and I are on the same page as this one........ but I think the TDF is as guilty. They too looked the other way. It's hard to believe that there has been no positives in the TDF to speak of until the ProTour was develpoed.

However, the UCI was the one with the power to have controlled this way back so many decades ago...

No one wants to see a doped up TDF. But that is what we have been watching since I can remember.

This years TDF has shown there is no cooperation among the ASO & UCI. The situation of RAZ not being addresssed in front of the TDF is the most obvious.
Then there is Prudie saying he will not honor the UCI next year. The riders will have to choose...... the TDF sponsored events [what are they?] or the rest of the year.

wolfix said:

Then there is Prudie saying he will not honor the UCI next year. The riders will have to choose...... the TDF sponsored events [what are they?] or the rest of the year.

TDF
Dauphine.
Paris-Nice.
Paris Roubaix.

They're the races that I can think of under the control of the ASO.
I'm sure there are more though.

limerickman said:

TDF
Dauphine.
Paris-Nice.
Paris Roubaix.

They're the races that I can think of under the control of the ASO.
I'm sure there are more though.

The ASO has some barginning power then...... This will be interesting. To be honest, I would love to see cycling go back where it was. Let the race sponsors determine who comes to their race.

Who cares if the Italians do not want to invite the Irish racers to their races? [Just kidding.......]

I fully understand why a race in a given nation would want to allow more of their countrymen in the race then the ProTour allows. Let's spice it up a few degrees. Maybe give automatic berths to race winners 1-5 and another type of point system that cannot eliminate the better riders, but allow some "no name guys " in too......
This is what the fans want......

Please point out where perhaps I'm naively wrong, but there seems to be a lot of indirect stake-holders in cycling, each with slightly different goals. ASO is concerned with the TdF Show. UCI is concerned with world cycling generally, right down to amateur level, but doesn't (it seems to me) really have any way of covering the huge costs of a comprehensive testing program. The team sponsors want a dope free public display and their team to do well and not test positive, but they arguably only have limited control of their own team. The TV just wants a good show for ratings. The French Government is stepping in because the image of the TdF is threatened. So they are saying either we want everyone clean and passing all tests, or the testing is designed to be [censored] and everyone doped or not passes all tests.

However you view it, world-wide continuous testing of all pros would cost a fortune. Which organization can be trusted to fund and administer it with integrity and also have some financial interest (and rewards) in it being done properly?

Crankyfeet said:

Please point out where perhaps I'm naively wrong, but there seems to be a lot of indirect stake-holders in cycling, each with slightly different goals. ASO is concerned with the TdF Show. UCI is concerned with world cycling generally, right down to amateur level, but doesn't (it seems to me) really have any way of covering the huge costs of a comprehensive testing program. The team sponsors want a dope free public display and their team to do well and not test positive, but they arguably only have limited control of their own team. The TV just wants a good show for ratings. The French Government is stepping in because the image of the TdF is threatened. So they are saying either we want everyone clean and passing all tests, or the testing is designed to be [censored] and everyone doped or not passes all tests.

However you view it, world-wide continuous testing of all pros would cost a fortune. Which organization can be trusted to fund and administer it with integrity and also have some financial interest (and rewards) in it being done properly?

You summed it up...... And I nominate you to take the job!!!!!! LOL
The best we can hope as fans as they figure out how to clean this up soon.

Crankyfeet said:

Please point out where perhaps I'm naively wrong, but there seems to be a lot of indirect stake-holders in cycling, each with slightly different goals. ASO is concerned with the TdF Show. UCI is concerned with world cycling generally, right down to amateur level, but doesn't (it seems to me) really have any way of covering the huge costs of a comprehensive testing program. The team sponsors want a dope free public display and their team to do well and not test positive, but they arguably only have limited control of their own team. The TV just wants a good show for ratings. The French Government is stepping in because the image of the TdF is threatened. So they are saying either we want everyone clean and passing all tests, or the testing is designed to be [censored] and everyone doped or not passes all tests.

However you view it, world-wide continuous testing of all pros would cost a fortune. Which organization can be trusted to fund and administer it with integrity and also have some financial interest (and rewards) in it being done properly?

OK : the three grand tours are owned by ASO (TDF), Unipublic (Vuelta) and I can't recall the name of the org. who own the Giro.

These org.'s are responsible for operating/financing each of the grand tours.
These orgs are separate from the UCI and countries national federations.
The UCI is the worldwide authority for the sport of cycling and is made up of affiliated national federations.
The national federations congress under the UCI.

You've highlighted the exact point : funding of dope controls.
Notionally, the national federations are authorised to conduct all dope tests
- using UCI directives on policy/procedure.
However, the funding for those tests differ from federation to federation and,
as we saw with OP, different federations implement different standards of
how to address doping cases.

Similarly, the race org's can implement their own doping checks.
For example ASO can and do random checks during the TDF.

But you're correct : funding for dope checks is limited and checks aren't uniform throughout all federations.

I also understand that while ASO slags off UCI for not informing them of Rasmussen's two missed tests, they legally were not supposed to divulge this info (perhaps this rule/law should change - why keep the info hidden unless you are trying to shield it from the press). And if they did let ASO know, would have risked being sued by Rasmussen himself if he had been subsequently disbarred from competing prior to the race.