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OBE may not be winning the TdF but they've been winning monuments, one-day races and stages in the TdF from the get-go. They have been extremely successful but simply don't receive the same teeth-grinding aggression that Sky do from corners of Twitter. And now they are developing into a GT team with the Yates bro's and Chaves, but they seem to get a mostly free pass.
As far as Wiggins goes, 3 TUEs in how long a career? Did he win any of his Olympic medals with a TUE? He's been a world-class athlete throughout his career, mayhap they pushed the limits to get him the TdF win, but he didn't have a TUE in 2009 when with Garmin when coming third, unless you think Vaughters and Millar ran a dirty team and were doping him back then. He was winning stage races before he had the TUE in 2011, 2012 and 2013. I've said before allergies are an utter arse and if they affected him badly in 2010 when he was poor in the TdF I can see why they went down the TUE route. Was it an abuse of the system? Maybe, but then that is a fault of the system.
No TUEs for his hour record, ITT world champs, recent track achievements. I don't think they should over shadow his entire career. Unless you are of the opinion that they are the tip of the iceberg and he's been doping his entire career, just like his Da.
Jimmy_Fingers-
Look, I don't think he's been doped to gizzards his entire career. However, we're trying to make what was once probably the dirtiest sport for doping into the cleanest.
To get there, this is all part of the process in my opinion. Great strides have been made, but people are still getting popped for doping now. It's not gone away. I do worry that the ability to go back and re-test samples when the tests get better is going to find more and more stuff even as we go forward. Just look at the mess that is the 2012 Olympics.I also agree that it appears he's not broken any rules. However I still come back to his book. Why lie?
On OBE being a decent team, I don't dismiss this. Most of the world tour teams have been pretty good at some point in the last 5 years. However, since Lance you've got a handful of cycling superstars, of which Froome and Wiggins are two. They ride for the team which bleats the most about being transparent and super clean, but then mess up when put under even mild scrutiny.
It's also not irrelevant that Team Sky and British Cycling are so closely related. This makes Sky as close to a state sponsored team as any "private" professional team out there. As such, taxpayers and lottery players who help fund this relationship are allowed to hold them to account IMO.
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And now they are developing into a GT team with the Yates bro's and Chaves, but they seem to get a mostly free pass.
Can you imagine the furore if Sky signed Kreuziger?
Scrabble
andyp
Fair enough points all round. However Froome and Wiggins are not on the same level of anyone from OBE. If you look at Wiggins in particular this is a chap who is our most decorated Olympian, a multi discipline world champion, tour winner and now a knight of the realm. In terms of success he is on a similar level to Lance.
As soon as he lied in his book about the injections, everyone was suspicious and rightly so. The whole saga has been managed appallingly, but that makes you more suspicious. If there was nothing to cover up, why was it so difficult to manage? Also, as a result of all this, I expect the TUE system will be improved and tightened, so some good has come of it, even if "no rules were broken". Hopefully it has made the rules "better".
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This.