Doping

Anglers are well doped. How else could they stay awake?

JTL is sticking by his story: either he has a point, and the process is flawed, or he's lying through his teeth.
Hailing from Plymouth, I suppose I have a slightly personal interest, but you might be right - there are only so many angles we can pontificate on.

^^Up to the gills, I heard

Fails multiple blood indicator tests, banned, loses appeal because excuse is bullshit.

That's sounding pretty cut and dried guilty to me.

Would be nice if he coughed up.

'cos Andy said so..

I wouldn't trust him, andyp still has Lance posters on his wall.

slander!

My wife has a livestrong running jacket in lance colors. It was discounted for some reason here in europe. #istillbelieveyoulance

Over 200km or so into the 260km race* climbing the Cauberg beside Bert whilst having not eaten or drunk for 48 hours previously.

Who looks fuckered in this pic?

*and never ridden that distance ever before.

It was by a very long way his best performance ever on a bike.

Cracks me up this is even being discussed when younger, more gifted riders with an actual visible trajectory of development like Sagan or Majka still get eyebrows raised if they perform well.

Approaching his later 20's he did what he felt he needed to do to get a contract at Sky, with all the kudos and cash that entails, then thought that the improved training and resources would compensate for the rest. Clearly he's just overestimated whatever natural ability he thought remained untapped, and not been able to pull off the cover up either, that's too bad-I doubt he'll ever be getting a pro contract again.

That's not the story:

"According to a doctor presenting evidence on behalf of Tiernan-Locke, he consumed around 33 units of alcohol in a period of six hours on the evening of 20 September, which then resulted in dehydration ahead of the sample being taken on the morning of 22 September."

He could have spent the rest of the 22nd, after giving the sample in the morning, re-hydrating and eating in preparation for the Words the next day. I don't know about you, but if I got pissed up on the Friday, spent the Saturday feeling sorry for myself, but then made an effort to recover on the Sunday, then I'd be absolutely fine come Monday.

I guess JTL was lucky that his drinking binge didn't elevate his testosterone level as well, a la Floyd Landis

That's not the story either; the doctor was unable to counter the evidence presented that

a)he wasn't actually dehydrated at all
b)even if he was there is no biological mechanism for the dehydration to boost RBC and quickly shut down production of new blood cells in a way even the most toxic chemotherapy cannot.

... if I got pissed up on the Friday, spent the Saturday feeling sorry for myself, but then made an effort to recover on the Sunday, then I'd be absolutely fine come Monday.

A fry-up and a Lucozade later "Bring it Bertie"

I'm just doing a bit of Devil's advocating, you understand.

33 units in 6 hours?

That's only 15 pints in one evening, so even if he is a pro cyclist who is built like a wendy house-what a pussy.

Unfortunately in the great pantheon of doping false positive explanations this is demonstrably the worst.

he could at least have pulled a boonen and used some colombian masking agent.

Oh, I don't know, the Tyler Hamilton chimeric twin 'I have two different types of blood in me naturally' argument had a certain B-movie awfulness to it.

http://www.runnersworld.com/general-interest/how-does-epo-work

EPO
General Interest
Runners

#justsaying

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/aug/22/chris-horner-vuelta-espana-withdraws-cortisone

Horner out after using steroids for a lung problem, now his cortisone level below healthy and out according to MPCC rules

^ Filthy doper.

(Horner, not Jimmy)

Aussie rugby slowly imploding