Sky TUE saga. Is it some sort of witch hunt?

Am I being too sceptical or does that Wiggo quote read a bit like “they told me it was OK to do it”?

The “a big boy done it and ran away” defence?

Oh the one had he does say that, but then goes on to defend Freeman, who’s alleged poor record keeping is supposedly the root of all this trouble.

Until a body is found there’s no murder, or something like that

I don’t know, maybe the fact its a banned substance might have something to say about it… But I’m sure it doesn’t really do a thing…

You could have just said that without the sneering sarcasm. It makes you come across as a bit of a bully.

“they told me it was OK to do it”

Not sure that is so implausible, in itself.

Assuming he has a bit of asthma (I don’t know and I suspect none of us does)

Doc says, “wiggo, we’re going to give you a drug to make sure you don’t have any asthma during this tour – it’s not just an inhaler so we need a TUE for it. oh, by the way, it might even help you drop a couple of pounds while we’re at it, so it’s all good !”

If I were wigggo, I’d say “is it dangerous? Is it legal?”

Doc might say (in good faith) “yeah, it’s safe as a one-off. We do use the stuff in patients, even if it’s not for asthma and we use inhaled versions of the same stuff all the time for asthma. It’s not allowed unless you have a TUE but if you do have one then, yeah, we can use it”

Yeah, he might then ask “why not an inhaled one?” but for all we know he’s already used those before and has still had occasional problems. “we think this is more effective and should guarantee no wheezing in the race”

Course they could all be in the know on the whole game from the start. Who knows ?

If I was wiggo I’d be insisting that they release all my medical files, (GP, consultants etc, not just the lost Sky ones) so that we can have confirmation that I’ve been diagnosed asthmatic for years, I’ve tried conventional management and it hasn’t worked in extreme circumstances and that relevant questions were asked & answered as part of the multiple TUE processes)

You could have just said that without the sneering sarcasm. It makes you come across as a bit of a bully.

Nah, condescending more like… and stating the bloody obvious 😉

Seriously, you didn’t know it was a banned substance? Did it not make you think (even a ittle) that maybe they had a reason for banning it?

Plus, didn’t you ask the exact same question about 8 months ago on this thread? Somebody certainly did, and then basically said so what if Millar and Rasmussen say it works they’re both cheats and liars (I paraphrase, but you get the gist). I’d you pegged as just another sky fanboi…

metalheart, I suspect the banned status is probably originally from a rider protection standpoint. Multiple doses, prolonged use are probably VERY bad for an individual (joint injections to help you keep competing and worsening damage while you do so) and also maybe that they can mask presence of other steroidal agents in testing (especially years ago when tests maybe weren’t very sophisticated)

Yeah, I know it’s banned without a TUE, but then until a few years ago, so were a number of inhalers, which are now legal, which is one of the reasons that the number of TUEs has dropped.

Condescending? Sneering? Patronising? Take your pick, none of them are anything to be proud of.

If I were wigggo, I’d say “is it dangerous? Is it legal?”

You’re assuming a degree of intelligence that most bike riders (and in fact a lot of elite sportspeople) simply don’t have.

In the background of most elite sports are people who’s job is to look for loopholes, examine data in minute detail, manage situations and people and logistics and generally (with a few exceptions), they’re very good at it bar occasional human errors.

At the front end is the actual famous athlete and they are, almost invariably, the weak link.

That time that Lewis Hamilton tweeted a picture of a load of data readings from the car and all the other teams went “ooh, thanks very much!” However in the background, some of the engineers and designers had found a loophole that enabled them to split a diffuser (was that Mercedes or Red Bull??) while still staying just about within the letter of the regs.

Idiot up front, genius in the backroom.

It’s the same with most sports. You’d be amazed at how many athletes don’t actually know a good percentage of the rules governing their particular sport, they just get coached/told to do x y and z and assume that the back room crew have done all their work properly.

Not sure that is so implausible, in itself.

It doesn’t sound that implausible but would be an incredibly naiive view of it. In the climate of the sport at the time Wiggins would have known exactly what he was being given and the benefits and abuse within the peloton would be common knowledge.

Yeah, I know it’s banned without a TUE

IIRC its only banned during racing (hence the issue that if it was triamcinolone administering it on a race day would lead to a 2 year ban (and his Tour and OGM being removed)).

Condescending? Sneering? Patronising? Take your pick, none of them are anything to be proud of.

Who said I was proud? I’m ****-ing exasperated. Fanboi’s fanboiing is so 2011/2 😀

Don’t get me wrong, MrB – it’s not what I suspect was the case. I’m using plausible in the sense of arguable in a court

Conversation equally could’ve been “wiggo, I think we should put you on triamcinolone for the Tour”
“- yeah, good one. I’ve always fancied a ban!”
“no, honest, I think we can claim TUE for asthma and I know this consultant who’ll sign anything”
“really? What are we waiting for?”

Ultimately it doesn’t matter if he was a willing participant or duped by his team – their record-keeping should be sufficient to explain the situation

I suspect the banned status is probably originally from a rider protection standpoint.

tbh, I’m relying on the hearsay of known (convicted?) dopers (Millar & Rasmussen). They seem pretty adamant that it works…

Pro road racing has hardly changed, they’re just more subtle with PEDs now.

Just to be pedantic, it’s not ‘now’, it was six years ago. Since then the number of TUEs issued in elite cycling has fallen drastically, so I’d be a little wary of using 2011 events to paint a picture of the current situation.

For context, some of those will have been issued in extreme circumstances when riders undergo emergency operations – Luke Rowe after he shattered his leg recently for example – when the anaesthetics, pain killers etc breach doping regs but are clearly needed.

Just providing some context.[/quote]
Sure, realise it was ‘then’ rather than now but this story never changes does it. Clean isn’t clean in the sense that you or I would train and race. And I was being a bit flippant, as I think many are about the farce that pro racing and athletics seem to be. In this case ‘then’ was under the same team management, the same purer than pure marketing line – and the same Froome who’s now winning 2 grand tours in the same season. I hope Froome is clean but he’s in a world where ‘then’ says trust has to be earned. Many take the default position that the dominant performers year after year are on some form of sauce and the Sky/Wiggins/Dr the dog ate my notes etc story has just added to the reasons why.

TBH I don’t think we need to rely on hearsay or give Millar any more axe grinding opportunities.

The evidence as it stood was already enough to take the shine off Wiggo – and Sutton has just confirmed what they’d left us to assume anyway.

No need to make any more of it IMO. People understand Sky better now and can make their own minds up as to whether they deserve any sympathy.

Sprinkled in the timeline

2010 Wiggins has disappointing first season with Sky
2011 Sky sign up ex Rabobank doctor Geert Leinders
2011 Jiffy bag delivery to Dauphine
2011 Wiggins TUE for tour
2012 Wiggins TUE for tour
2012 Wiggins wins tour and Olympic TT
October 2012 Sky suddenly discover Leinders might have skeletons in his closet, let him go
2013 Wiggins TUE for the Giro. A race famous for it’s pollen problems, iconic pictures of Andy Hampsten riding through banks of the stuff, always a worry the sheer amount of pollen might shut those mountain passes.
2015 Leinders gets lifetime ban for being a doping doctor. Honestly, who knew?

Anyone thinking Wiggins wasn’t 100% in on it is either charitable or naïve. He’d worked with Sir Dave B for years at BC. He was publicly so vehemently anti doping he’d want to know everything about everything he took.

I don’t know, maybe the fact its a banned substance might have something to say about it… But I’m sure it doesn’t really do a thing…

I’m totally undecided on this case but you do know that as a rule then drugs are banned, being banned does not make a drug performance enhancing.
Or should I be getting stoned and coked up to steal all the local koms?

is there objective evidence that triamcinolone is a PED?

Yes

A race famous for it’s pollen problems, iconic pictures of Andy Hampsten riding through banks of the stuff, always a worry the sheer amount of pollen might shut those mountain passes

😀 (although cold air can do it too)

Sprinkled in the timeline

2010 Wiggins has disappointing first season with Sky

not sure his career started in 2010

Or should I be getting stoned and coked up to steal all the local koms?

I believe tramadol is the drug of choice for that these days. As used by Sky… 😉

you do know that as a rule then drugs are banned, being banned does not make a drug performance enhancing.

Tell Mr Sutton that. 😛

not sure his career started in 2010

Correct, I believe he was being trained by BC whilst still at Garmin though… (but where he wasn’t being prescribed triamcinolone for his asthma…)

Or should I be getting stoned and coked up to steal all the local koms?

In the right doses and the right sport it is likely to help.
Alcohol for example was used in shooting to increase performance and it does seem backed by evidence. In the right quantity it would help admittedly its quite easy to “overdose” and watch performance drop.

I would think things are a bit more sophisticated than there being just a single drug of choice. Different drugs for different situations and purposes, surely?

I watched about 5 stages in and around the Pyrenees in 2007. Bradley wasn’t troubling the front of the race in any shape or form. I have a photograph of him well down in the autobus on one of the climbing stages.
And he went home after the Aubisque stage when the whole team was withdrawn due to a failed test.
Bradley, sky and BC are coming across as shifty, evasive, and unreliable – well done guys.

An interesting article with Matt Lawton the journo behind the ‘jiffgygate’ story…

The story behind the story: The journalist who exposed Team Sky

Interestingly confirms that the allegation was that it was triamcinolone… oops!

Also, reinforces my previous points about the sky bullshit excuses…

I still can’t take this expose seriously when it was broken by that beacon of truth and light the daily mail.

When all you report is lies and misdirection, all day everyday, about everything. when you hate cyclists.when you hate public funding. When you hate murdoch who sponsors successful publicly funded cyclists, and your chief sports writer suddenly come across a national scandal in cycling!!! …and 2 years later it all fades away to nothing due to lack of evidence. funny that.

goes to put tinfoil hat back on. makes you think etc.

Shoot the messenger.

TUE ‘scandal’ broken by Russian hackers… can’t be true either (except of course they’ve been forced to admit it).

Lack of evidence produced by sky is why it fizzled out. No medical records 😯 . Breach of protocol and maybe subject to GMC investigation. Doc ‘too ill’ to give evidence and retired out. Drug supply company refuses to cooperate (isn’t licenced and supplies other sports).

And don’t ask about Lieanders role in all this, especially now he’s been banned for life.

If you are comfortable with all the lies and admissions of pushing TUE for marginal gains (as opposed to medical need as intended use), then sure it’s all because the daily mail hates Murdoch.

More Koolaid anyone?

Doc ‘too ill’ to give evidence

This for me. How ill would you have to suddenly become?

Interestingly confirms that the allegation was that it was triamcinolone… oops!

But not one shread of evidence that it was !
I’ve no idea what the truth of the matter is but without proper legally verifiable evidence its all just blah blah.

The basic problem is can you really believe that any sports person is 100% clean? If you look under enough rocks there are problems

This for me. How ill would you have to suddenly become?

Not ill enough that you can’t attend a World Cup event in Manchester:
road.cc link

TUE question: Rider A gets a TUE and lets say there’s 50mg of an otherwise banned substance in it.
surely that for that substance to have performance gains much, much more over a course of time would need to have been taken than the amount noted in the TUE?

‘Whistleblower evidence’. An interesting read, not as damning as expected… 😆

http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/culture-media-and-sport-committee/combatting-doping-in-sport/written/69004.html

Not much of a whistleblower. Blowing the whistle on perfectly legal practises and that “no rules were broken”.
😆

TUE question: Rider A gets a TUE and lets say there’s 50mg of an otherwise banned substance in it.
surely that for that substance to have performance gains much, much more over a course of time would need to have been taken than the amount noted in the TUE?

If that 50mg dose helps you quickly lose a couple of stubborn kg just before a grand tour then it’s a huge gain. And if it sticks around in your system for a few weeks providing an inflammatory effect then all the better for recovery during the race.

“never had an injection, apart from I’ve had my vaccinations, and on occasion I’ve been put on a drip, when I’ve come down with diarrhoea or something or have been severely dehydrated”

LOLOLOLOL

perfectly legal practises

And yet they just had to send a courier and lie their arses off. For perfectly legal? 😯

Yeah, yeah, we’re all cleanz now… with our needles, TUEs, doping doctors, strategic triamcinolone use and zero tolerance…

And yet they just had to send a courier and lie their arses off. For perfectly legal? 

You seem to have a bee in your bonnet about all of this ? Like me you know absolutely “nothing” apart from what is already in the public domain, all you do is keep on regurgitating the boring same old same old as if its some startling revelation. Why are you so desperate to believe the whole Wiggins Sky doping conspiracy ? And even if it was all proved to be true….. So what !!

So, turns out I’m not the only one that thinks it was dodgy practice….

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2018/mar/05/bradley-wiggins-and-team-sky-accused-drugs-in-damning-report