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@blue_fleet
This thread is a good read today. It does'nt need to be in doping as the web of deceit in cyclings distant and recent past makes the two topics indistinguishable.
The TUE thing is jokes, are the numbers of them in the TDF peloton published or is it top secret as its personal 'medical' info? I don't know how many there are but rumours are its enough to make you think the race was a dying hospital ward being granted their final wish, akin to mass Great Ormond St trip to Disneyland. Lance having a TUE for saddle sores (I know that excuse was bollocks but it was still granted) sounds just weak sauce to me, what happened to a large measure of HTFU. It seems the TUE part of the regs is being abused, by all the teams, and I think the UCI needs to look at it, but we all know they're not exactly a paragon of virtue so I'm not holding my breath on that.
As for TV's query of it being 'fair' that 1 team has more resources than others, HA!, welcome to the modern world. There's a lot of shit that ain't fair. We don't want a procession with 200 riders all on the top step of the podium, who'd watch that? Its like soccerball, there is big teams and little uns and on whole the big teams prevail but there remains a chance of a giant killing and surprises, and thats what makes it exciting.
.I remember a few years back now DB saying that he had gone to visit the UCI to 'explain' their methods and demonstrate they were above board. I've just tried a brief google to find links for this but my google-fu is weak so no dice, Am I imagining it or did that happen? I remember at the time alarm bells going off for me thinking, cough Sysmex machine cough , access to holiday homes in St Lucia, suitcases of cash etc. Why is a team getting an exclusive audience with the UCI? Now that shit stinks as being unfair, and if I was a manager from another team I want to know exactly what was going on and where my invite was to visit those swanky offices in Aigle.
At the top levels of sport its very small margins that makes the difference between winning and losing. I recall a programme with a old Formula 1 boss, I think he was from Lotus in the olden days, who said that it is their jobs to push the envelope and to sit down with the rules and regs and go through it with a fine tooth comb and find areas they can exploit, and this is still the case with F1 today. Sky and DB seem very meticulous and part of marginal gains is surely to do just this. So be it a new wonder drug, colonic beetroot irigation or cherry flavoured nicotine patches or whatever, they will be trying out all sorts of shit. Does it sound sinister and not really in the spirit? To me, yes it does, but I think its naive to think it does'nt happen. They are sure as shit not doing it on bread and water alone. I know its the UCI's job to put any new performance enhancing stuff on the banned list, but they are, and always will be (irrespective of who is in charge) behind the curve on those new developments, so it seems we are destined to forever be adjusting the history books as new transgressions are discovered.
As Will says the performances are raising eyebrows but so far there is NOTHING, NADA, ZILCH to suggest any wrongdoing at all. If we start getting leaks from big pharma or ANY Lance-type evidence then sure, release the hounds and I'll join the queue of condemnation, but until then the guy deserves the benefit of the doubt. Despite what the raving loons in the Clinic think, Froome's performance yesterday was not totally alien and was in the realms of possibility. So why should Sky have to justify it? Sounds like sour grapes to me. I think DB has realised that it will help if they are a little bit more open and there must be some way of doing this without compromising the teams desired outcomes, so well done him.
However I do think Froome lives on a moon made of cheese if he thinks its out of order to question him and Sky about doping. The new era of cycling is supposed to be cleaner and slower but the stages so far have been anything but slow. So just as we've got to accept we can't be sure any rider is clean, they've got to expect some us to be doubting of their performance. The end.
TL:DR - pro cycliing still seems a bit fecked to me. I'll still watch it though, so meh.