Blood doping test nears implementation

[Steve Austin]

I meant red!! 'giggles'

 

[Chuffy]

So its not fact then As you were. any more gossip? Or unfounded speculation?

You're quite right. What would Andreu and Vaughters know about doping within USP/Disco?

 

[Steve Austin]

Chuffy, they would know lots. but unless you can link to a direct quote from either one of them, then its a load of old tosh. isn't it?

 

[andy_wrx]

Yeah good point Keith and Landslide.

I'm curious about how wide-spread the practice of Autologous BTs is. I read somewhere (can't recall where) that it's far less favoured for the pros because the practice of extracting blood when you're at your peak means a dip in performance at that point. So it'd have to be off-season, when you're not going to be at your peak anyway?

Can anyone enlighten a baffled moi?

Its to do with white red blood cells. If you take blood when you have been altitude training, they will have a high white red cell count. Then if you inject this back in, when needed, you have blood with more white red blood cells, than you had before. This gives you more oomph apparently.
If they develop a test to detect your own blood going back into your system, then thats all very clever, but how accurate will it be?
I doubt it will ever be 100% accurate

Altitude will do it, but so will EPO.
Take a course of EPO, boost up your haematocrit (amount of red blood cells in the blood), extract some of that blood and store it, then reinject it halfway through the Tour.

You could do this in the off-season and store that blood in a fridge in Spain, where it would have to be labelled so as not to get mixed-up with everyone else's.

Or you could do it a few weeks before the Tour, giving enough time for your body to recover. A good place for this would be in Italy, but telling everyone you've gone to Mexico.

Allegedly.


But a test for it would be that if you had blood tested after every stage and your haematocrit went 50%,49%,48%...down to 40% on day 10 as your body basically breaks down under the strain of racing every day, but then magically went back to 50% on day 11
- something would clearly be up !

 

[gavintc]

Sadly, I think it is rather like the military concept defined by Gen Fuller as the "Constant Tactical Factor". When a superior weapon or tactic is invented, the opposition will work on overcoming this tactical advantage. It is impossible to continually have the upper hand. Drug testing and riders inclined to cheat will play a long war on developing doping systems and testing regimes continually leapfrogging each other. I propose that possibly the tactical advantage is swinging in the favour of the testing systems, but I can guarantee that by the next Olympics new cheat systems will be in place to nullify this short term advantage.

 

[Noodley]

Chuffy, they would know lots. but unless you can link to a direct quote from either one of them, then its a load of old tosh. isn't it?

what kind of quote would you like?

I can get you a few...

 

[andy_wrx]

Seen this ?
http://www.cuttingedgemuscle.com/Forum/showthread.php?threadid=20320

Getting how-to-doping advice off t'interweb seems alarmingly easy.
Dunno why they need pay dodgy gynaecologists...

And there's a quote in one of the posters' sig lines

"Everybody dopes. Good guys, like Tyler, dope... and bad guys, Like Lance, dope" there are plenty of good people who dope."
Prentice Stephan, Ex USPS Team doctor, current Slipstream doctor.

Dunno where he got that one from - I've Googled for it but the only place I can find it was this guy's sigline on that forum...

 

[Chuffy]

Chuffy, they would know lots. but unless you can link to a direct quote from either one of them, then its a load of old tosh. isn't it?

<sigh>
Ok, no problem. The transcript (given to Walsh by Andreu's wife, Bettsy) featured in the court case between LA and SCA Promotions where a subpoena was issued to obtain it.

This link has lots of information. Vaughters was forced to issue an affidavit after the transcript was released in which he says that he has no personal knowledge of the validity of what was said in the messaging session. Frankly I hear the sound of big and expensive lawyers clearing their throats and a relatively minor ex-pro pulling on a very big pair of pants to cover his arse...

Transcript also referenced here

I can't find a copy of the transcript online but, courtesy of my own fair fingers, here is the relevant passage.

Cyclevaughters: i don't know - i want to trust George but the thing is on that team, you think it's normal or at least i did.

FDREU (Andreu): i guess. anything with blood is not normal.

Cyclevaughters: yeah, its very complex how (to) avoid all the controls now, but it's not any new drug or anything, just the resources and planning to pull of a well devised plan. it's why they all got dropped on stage 9 - no refill yet - then on the rest day - boom 800ml of packed cells

FDREU: they have it mastered. good point

Cyclevaughters: they draw the blood right after the dauphine

 

[Crackle]

Right but the only person not dropped was LA. So if he didn't get the gear either...........

ps. Someone might need to explain that to Tete because he's tall and the blood doesn't get to his brain properly

 

[Chuffy]

ps. Someone might need to explain that to Tete because he's tall and the blood doesn't get to his brain properly

Us stumpies have to stick together against these oversized freaks.

 

[Crackle]

Seen this ?
http://www.cuttingedgemuscle.com/Forum/showthread.php?threadid=20320

Getting how-to-doping advice off t'interweb seems alarmingly easy.
Dunno why they need pay dodgy gynaecologists...

And there's a quote in one of the posters' sig lines

Dunno where he got that one from - I've Googled for it but the only place I can find it was this guy's sigline on that forum...

Blimey! That links a bit of an eye opener Andy. I had to use Google more than a few times to understand what they were talking about and so staggeringly openly as well

 

[John the Monkey]

http://www.cuttingedgemuscle.com/Forum/showthread.php?threadid=20320

Getting how-to-doping advice off t'interweb seems alarmingly easy.
Dunno why they need pay dodgy gynaecologists...

Bloody hellfire..!

 

[Chuffy]

Ho.Lee.Fuk

<considers possibility of sending Noodley on a forum raiding mission>

 

[maurice]

Looks like there truly is a forum for everything, they look like they know what they're doing too.

 

[John the Monkey]

Looks like there truly is a forum for everything, they look like they know what they're doing too.

Yeah. I'd always assumed this sort of thing to be the province of soigneurs and dodgy team doctors - to see it out in the open like that...