You are reading a single comment by @andyp and its replies.
Click here to read the full conversation.
London Fixed Gear and Single-Speed is a community of predominantly fixed gear and single-speed cyclists in and around London, UK.
This site is supported almost exclusively by donations. Please consider donating a small amount regularly.
@andyp
Armstrong is currently under investigation by the Federal Drug Administration (the FDA) in the USA, and the investigation is being led by Jeff Novitzsky, who was the lead investigator on the BALCO investigation.
Armstrong dominated at a time when drug use was widespread in the professional peleton, but very few riders actually failed tests, partly due to the testing regime and partly due to the employment of controversial Doctors like Michele Ferrari, who were expert in administering doping substances whilst avoiding positive tests.
There is a lot of evidence against Armstrong, including a long association with Dr Ferrari (who was convicted by Italian courts of doping athletes but was cleared on a technicality), lots of testimony from former team mates and team helpers, and, most damning of all, a number of failed tests for EPO from a scientific research project conducted by a French laboratory who were doing work to validate the EPO urine test.
Armstrong consistenly cites the fact that he never failed a test, but convicted dopers like Ivan Basso, Jan Ullrich et al never failed tests either, and most of them were caught due to investigations by the criminal justice authorities (as drug trafficing is considered a serious crime). He also claims he's the most tested athlete ever but data available from the USADA shows he was not even the most tested cyclist called Armstrong, female cyclist Kristin Armstrong was tested more regularly.
Floyd Landis, a former team mate of Armstrong, made a series of allegations against Armstrong, the most serious of which, in a sporting sense, is that the UCI covered up a failed test by Armstrong at the Tour of Switzerland in 2001. Hamilton has repeated this allegation. This could explain why Armstrong was able to dope (and I'm totally convinced he did) and get away with it for 7 years. There have also been rumours that his team recieved notification of where and when they'd be tested, so were able to avoid detection.