Viva Espana

[Chuffy]

Ah, now, y'see Indurain I found it harder to believe than with the others. Partly because of his style of riding - he flattened his opponents, I mean trounced them over 3 weeks, not so obviously explosive as we're led to believe PEDs do. But also partly because he was so quiet, unassuming etc But then I ask myself well his main adversaries were all on the juice so he MUST have been. His reaction to Riis' "confession" smacked of guilt too although I can't recall exactly what it was, just that I was suspicious at the time.

Got to remember too though that everyone reacts differently to EPO. Some respond better than others, so it's not necessarily fair to say "look at how Zabel's performance improved, ergo whoever beat him must have been on it".

For me it's more about the organisation of it, the culture of it, the Festina affair, the fact that from top to bottom riders were and are still now being caught.

Indurain, yes. Really he should have got as much flak as LA ever got, after all, he was almost certainly on the sauce and nailed 5 straight Tours. But he was too nice, gave away many gifts (salving a guilty conscience perhaps?) and just didn't do the whole Patron/peanut thing.

 

[Tetedelacourse]

Yep. That's why I was happy to see team sanctions last year. Seems to have fallen by the wayside this year though - and NO Saunier Duval were not sanctioned as a team!

Having just read In Search of Robert Millar (thanks to JTM!), there's a bit in there about a certain doctor (sorry name escapes me) who at one point "looked after" the bulk of the peloton, and that doctor wrote about his practices in stark terms with some pretty strong arguments for what he was doing.

In his view it was not cheating as he wasn't enhancing natural levels of the chemicals involved in oxygen consumption etc, but merely redressing the savage imbalances inflicted on the body by the enormity of the physical exertion that a 3 week tour placed on its participants. If, he said, these imbalances were presented to a doctor who had no idea as to what the "patient" was doing, or what caused the imbalances, most if not all doctors would prescribe the exact same treatment as he was providing.

This is all pre-EPO by the way (for the newer readers) which as we know revolutionised the use of PEDs.

 

[Chuffy]

Indurain was a patient of Conconi IIRC, "the limits of this athlete are unimaginable" etc... And paid for the good doctor out of his own pocket during at least one Tour (again, IIRC).

Wasn't Indurain odd because, despite being absolutely huge, he could still climb with the best, including Pantani...

 

[itisaboutthebike]

A freak of pharmacy ?

 

[itisaboutthebike]

I've never really understood why teams would want or need 'doctors'.

Jeeze, I used to race in chippers and I never needed a doctor ! (i sometimes had a bag of post-race chips tho - proably explains why I never won nowt)