As for quoting scientists, you yourself have spent a lot of time and effort on here demonstrating that the sold-out scientists claiming climatic change is just a natural cycle rather than man made are not making objective use of the evidence. Scientists are rarely impartial or objective. Everyone in France had non stop tour coverage from which to calculate climbing rates and many did. They all came to the same conclusion; Voeckler, Froome and Wiggins were climbing faster than is physiologically possible unless… .

Try Googling “Voeckler doping” with your Google settings changed to French. You’ll find that every serious media source in France carried stories about Voeckler’s improbable performances. French media doubting a French cyclist. The articles only mentioned Froome and Wiggins to say they’d done even better and ultimately won.

Robert Millar tested positive for testosterone. (cyclimsme-dopage.com)

jesus wept Edukator is there a conspiracy you dont want to include in this thread? as for scientists not being impartial they work with data have you actually got any ? that is rhetorical BTW
What about moon landing fakery what does that have to say on this …we know the bbc are corrupt and scientist cannot be trusted what next??

No failed tests – but to be fair this isn’t necessarily indicative of being clean.- YOU CANNOT PROVE A NEGATIVE AND IT CERTSAINLY DOES NOT MEAN THEY CHEAT. WHAT ELSE CAN THEY DO BUT NOT FAIL TESTS?
Wiggins, Thomas, Rogers, Siutsou etc all ranked very highly in UCI suspicious list based on performances and blood data. VERY HIGHLY IS OVERSTATING IT BUT WIGGO WAS SUSPICIOUS IIRC ALSO THIS WAS 2010 AND ,ILLER WAS A 4 AND WIGGINS A 5 CONTADOR WAS 5 ARMSTRONG 4 – USADA CLAIMED HE DOPED THEN SO THE LIST MAY BE ERRATIC
Overall performances are pretty dominating (both individual and as a team), and are very reminiscent of USPS’s train AGAIN SO WHAT PROOF OF NOTHING EXCEPT BOTH TEAMS WON
Regularly beating doping riders, often comprehensively- WHO ARE THESE DOPING RIDERS THE CLAIM KEEP BEEING MADE THAT EVERYONE THEY BEAT IS DOPING IT IS, TOO BE AS POLITE AS I CAN, UTTERLY FABRICATED YET YOU AND OTHERS KEEP REAPEATING IT
Hiring ex dopers and doping doctors – either Sky are very naive or they turned a blind eye to their staff’s past. POOR DECISION FOR SURE I OFFERN NO DEFENCE BUT IT IS NOT PROOF THEY CHEATED BUT THEY DID HIRE CHEATS – I ASSUME EVERY TEAM HAS TBH BUT YES VERY POOR
Sudden improvements to their rider’s performances upon joining, which seem to drop off as soon as they leave Sky – YES LOOK AT THAT CAV FELLOW HE WAS NOWHERE THEN AWESOME AND NOW BACK TO SHIT

NAME THE RIDERS PLEASE TO WHICH YOU REFER PLEASE- SHOULD KEEP YOU GOOGLING FOR A WHILE I IMAGINE

Not shouting just easier than quoting

Junky, step away from the keyboard. Leave the blinkered omniscient one alone. He is so wise, you can never know as many FACTS as him.

FFS, it’s like the bad old days in here.

Did any of you read the article about the sportive rider who took EPO? He said it wasn’t so much about extra power but the ability to keep working at maximum power for a long time, day after day.

So looking at individual climbs is probably less useful – what is useful is how often a particular rider goes on a huge attack in the mountains.

I seem to remember last year’s tour being a rather cagey affair with people banking on gaining seconds at a few key points. Almost as if, I dunno.. maybe they knew they only had enough energy for a couple of big efforts…

To be fair to Edukator he was telling us LA was a cheat for more years than I care to remember whilst I believed in his cleaness. I do prefer to think good about people unless proven otherwise so that was very disappointing. Ed is well placed to provide accurate assessments but I’d stll prefer to believe the alternative views.

What do any of us really know…. Bugger all really, but I have to believe our Brits are clean including Froome.

The other factor that has not been discussed is motivation, effort and fitness. You need all three to do your best so we can’t compare every performance as if each rider is achieving 100% of those three aspects.

FFS, it’s like the bad good old days in here.

FTFY

1. I put the No Failed Tests bit in as that’s the usual defence from Sky fans – I’m not saying no failed tests = doping, I’m just stating that it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re clean.
2. You (or someone) asked for evidence – I provided some which implies that certain riders may not be as clean as they’d have us believe. Totally agree it’s not conclusive, however the riders I quoted were all considered in the top 20% of suspicious by the governing body.
3. USPS train’s performances were very suspicious – the way they blew away dopers such as Vino, Ullrich, Valverde etc. Sky are now doing a similar thing to the newer generation of GC riders.
4. Known dopers include Basso, Kloden, Vino, Basso etc – as per most years there were a lot of dopers riding last year’s TDF, all of whom got dominated. In smaller stage races Contador has been comprehensively beaten by Froome a couple of times. A clean rider beating the almost certainly doping and arguably most talented stage racer of his generation at his own game doesn’t really add up.
5. n/a
6. Look at Rogers this year – amazing in the mountains last year, rubbish now.

Appreciate we don’t agree on this – all I’m saying is to automatically assume Sky are clean is very naive, especially given the history of cycling. A lot of Lance’s fans were using the “no proof” line for years, despite the highly suspicious performances.

The only person talking sense who’s still involved in professional cycling is Vaughters. Check cyclingnews forum for user jv1973 for his opinions / answers to cycling fans.

I seem to remember last year’s tour being a rather cagey affair with people banking on gaining seconds at a few key points. Almost as if, I dunno.. maybe they knew they only had enough energy for a couple of big efforts…

Exactly my feeling too – less exciting surges for victory on major climbs.
Bring back the dope! 😉

One more thing to consider.

A doping rider isn’t necessarily always getting his doping spot on. It could be that at some point he almost gets rumbled or runs out of syringes or something and that cocks up the programme.

Doping isn’t just popping pills, after all – it’s a carefully managed process just like training is. If you overdo or under-do it at a critical time, you could be left well down on your possible best, as with normal training.

FWIW, re Sky, seems to me they’d be acutely aware that the British public would far rather them lose clean than win doped. So there really is little point in them doping. Wiggo said as much too IIRC.

Junky, step away from the keyboard. Leave the blinkered omniscient one alone. He is so wise, you can never know as many FACTS as him.

FFS, it’s like the bad old days in here.

CTRL C

CTRl V 😉
what molly said- short burts many of us could exceed 6 watts per kg [seconds for me to be fair] it is pointless to look at one short bit
I thought they were all cheats from that era as well as no way was he beating a cheat of the quality of Pantani – who never failed a test [ over 50% for haemacrits only]. Anyone who followed it closely knew it was obvious tbh. Now I dont know but I do beleive many are clean – what % who knows
It is poosible the top riders all cheat but the only evidence here seems to be they did in the past

Compare Lance’s cool over-the-shoulder glance with the faces on last year’s Tour. They were all visibly **** knackered.

Anyone who followed it closely knew it was obvious tbh.

So why isn’t it obvious now when Froome matches Pantani?

I just get fed up with the line we get fed from the riders after every doping scandal.. “We’re the new clean generation etc” and every single time up to now it’s been proven otherwise.

The only solution is as Vaughters said, an external and completely impartial body to handle the testing and punishments – cycling has proven it can’t govern itself.

…if there’s a level playing field and it’s entertaining, why do you care? I don’t care if Daniel Craig was up to his eyes on coke or teetotal when he filmed the last Bond film, I just wanted to see an entertaining film. Why do you treat sport differently?

Personally, I care because it is a sport that I participate in, and the same rules apply to everyone, from pros to weekend warriors. Racing is all about trying to win within the boundaries of the rules. Without those boundaries, competition becomes meaningless. The “level playing field” scenario that people keep referring just opens up an unregulated mess where riders will take increasing risks as they explore the limits of performance enhancing drugs. I don’t want a sport where I need to take drugs to compete with my peers, and if you fail to keep fighting pro cheating, that culture will trickle right down through the sport:

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/493401/british-rider-dan-staite-banned-after-testing-positive-for-epo.html

Pretty much every one of my cycling heroes has been directly or indirectly implicated in doping over the past 25 years. I think we are at a point where that culture could change, but I’ve yet to be convinced it is really happening, so I still can’t take pro cycling completely seriously.

Personally the only person in cycling I trust is Vaughters

Hmm…the man who established a team with a high profile anti-drugs position, but who didn’t admit his own doping career until last year?

So why isn’t it obvious now when Froome matches Pantani?

EVIDENCE?

he matches him for short periods- how many times do you need to be told that average times and average wattas are dropping – see th etimes for alpe D huez I linked to where pantini is literally 4 minutes ahead of Cadel – it is just not true so please stop saying it see alpe d’Huez climbs for example 🙄
To keep repeating short burst of peak [ ish watts] as a reply is to fail to graps the subject matter at hand or what is being said.

It is really quite daft to keep doing this and it isjust not true average watts, speeds, times and watts per kg are all dropping

agrees with CPt leaves it to molly

Just a reminder that Dave Brailsford is in charge of SKY Professional cycling team and runs it in the same way as British Cycling…..so if the sky riders are doped and so are the rest of the British Cyclists from the last three olympics by implications.

IMHO Wiggins….Cav…Froome…Thomas…Swift….Kennaugh are clean….have you not read or realised that the attention of detail they go to in diet…..and structured coaching which has been revolutionary to what has been done before ie no coaching just pump them with drugs…has improved the riders legally….Team SKY arenot infallible they got it wrong for the classics…and other teams have been attacking them differently in the stage races I have seen.

Do you really think that Wiggins is the same as LA I dont think so for one minute……and would Brailsford want to jeopardise the sky funding for British Cycling as well whilst running a doped professional team …er I don’t think so….

Keep an eye on David Walsh articles upcoming he’s with Team Sky for both the Giro and TDF and he defo doesnot like doping !!

Ok then, look at the Peyresourde times for the complete climb despite a lazy start to it. Research has been done on the physiological limits for various durations of effort. 470W for 7mins is well into the suspicious zone.

I’m convinced riders have been warned off setting records for whole climbs as it proves doping. Why did Sky order Froome to slow down? Wiggins was quite happy on his own.

In this particular debate I don’t think either side are going to convince the other. My main point is that in virtually every instance where a team or individuals have dominated a grand tour like Sky did, it has subsequently been proven to be down to doping. I hope Sky are clean, and hope that cycling has turned over a new leaf. But it has claimed to have done that after Festina, Ullrich, Basso, Landis, Contador etc and call me cynical, but I can’t see it being any different after Lance.

..have you not read or realised that the attention of detail they go to in diet…..and structured coaching

Old hat presented as something new. Renault Gitane had dieticians, ergonomists, the Renault wind tunnel and a highly “scientific’ approach to training that was carried through to La Vie Claire with Lemond and Hinault.

How was the doped rider able to attack the other doped rider is surely the question you should want to ask

Are you really asking why the support guy was asked not to attack the team leader and winner and concluding that the ONLY reason was drug doping – comedy gold

TBH why on earth would they dope if they were then just going to take it easy ? Now that is as daft as your argument tbh

PS 470 watts for 7 mins is short term effort so can you show me that for say I dont know an entire tour like what that LA fella did …of course you cannot.

Deffo going now but that has made me chuckle

he actually failed a drug test as well for glenbutorol iirc in a race but got a prescription for it. I did expect a reaction to that one but from Edukator.
tbh I would not be surprised to discover he doped – frankly given what has happened in Spain re blood doping and Bertie I would not be surprised by any Spanish rider, now or in the past saddly.

It was actually Salbutamol (ventolin), which has absolutely no performance enhancing effect whatsoever on a trained athlete. It’s effect is only really measurable in asthmatics where it helps dilate the bronchial passage. This only works where they’re constricted and if yours are already dilated (a non asthmatic for example), then Salbutamol will not help.

Apparently, it only got on the banned list due to it being on the French banned list. I’m yet to see any evidence of salbutamol providing any performance enhancement; it can only level the playing field. Put simply, if you don’t need it, then it will not do anything for you.

Where are these calculations Ed? You’re convinced they’re correct (obviously) but what if they’re way off, aerodynamic drag is still a factor on climbs and Froome is possibly the skinniest stick like thing I’ve ever seen (behind myself possibly). Maybe he’s just uber aero 😛

Wiggo is clean, he’s got far too much to loose. If not then Weller and Gallagher would probably be his only mates.

Un bon coureur de 70kg peut développer 1.200 watts pendant 15 secondes, 450 watts pendant 6 minutes, 400 watts pendant 30 minutes. Sur le triathlon d’Hawaii, la puissance sur la portion de vélo a déjà été évaluée pour le vainqueur à 300 watts pendant cinq heures. Plus la durée d’effort est longue, moins la puissance moyenne est élevée.

I don’t think that needs translating. When guys that have been riding for several hours, have been at around 400W for half an hour then put in 7 minutes at 470W, questions need to asked. Nearly every media source in France was asking questions anyhow. At the point they should have been showing signs of fatigue they accelerated.

Wiggo is clean, he’s got far too much to loose.

Like Ulrich, Armstrong, Cantador and every other rider that already has a few wins.

Tall riders make lousy cyclists because they take a lot of wind and have a lot of bones and muscles in relation to their heart and lung capacity. Before blood doping the most successful riders had builds like Hinault, Lemond and Merckx, they could time trial well and get up the mountains fast enough to hold off the specific climbers for GC. Climbers were shorter. EPO changed all that and gangly things like 60% Riis and 550W Mig could suddenly climb better than the short-arse specific climbers..

I don’t think that needs translating

Patronising asshat.

yes and wrong as well whihc is more important

Without boring you too much with the technicalities I averaged 456 watts for 55 minutes at the Worlds last year against Tony [MARTIN} and still finished 1min 20sec behind.

Wiggins speaking

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/cycling/9442119/Bradley-Wiggins-hopes-cycling-in-a-higher-gear-will-help-him-to-emulate-hero-in-Olympic-time-trial.html

http://www.cyclingpowerlab.com/OlympicTimeTrial.aspx
this claims slightly lower FWIW and Martin @ 481 for 50 ish minutes so your figure for an hour seems way off as top ten were all over 400 for basically an hour [ ok 10 th was 399 for clarity]@ 57 :14 time not sure where you get to have 300 watts – I can only assume you take this as yet more proof of widespread cheating and part of the global conspiracy 😕

I love you too, Flash. How about putting a counter argument together rather than insulting me. I really don’t think those numbers need translating. I’ll remove the text and just quote the self-explanatory numbers:

70jg
15s 1200W
6min 450W
30min 400W
5h 300W

Thank you for the evidence that riders are still producing as much power as at the height of the Festina doping programme, Junkyard.

You now seem to be agreeing that riders haven’t slowed down having spent most of the thread caliming they are now less powerful than before.

481W for 50min is firmly in the highly suspicious zone.

You cannot even follow an argument can you – is that deliberate ?
To repeat
They are as powerful for short bursts as they always were because the PEDS improve recovery or stamina on long tours with day after day of activity – you do know hamecrit drops dont you on tour for example as does testoreone etc without doping and therefore perfomance?
A TT is not a great example of endurance what with it being short and one day 🙄 there will be no difference and it is not suspicious at all it is used to show your wattage figures are just wrong – as i suspected proving this to you just fuels your conspiracist view rather than make you question the actual basis or foundation on which your view stands
SO lets see your evidence for the grand tours then and how much faster they get you have none for they are slower, average less have lower watts per kg. go up mountains slower though they can off course hit LA levels for short periods but not the whole tour which is the point you miss as well as giving a very low [ polite for wrong]watts threshold for “proof” of doping

It is clear facts wont alter your view and you cannot follow what is being said

Not sure how much you can read into this, but the average speed of the last four TDFs (2009-2012 inclusive) works out at 39.87km/hr.

The average speed for the EPO era of 1990-99 works out as an average of 39.151km/hr

So overall, today’s race is faster than the dirtiest period in cycling history. Maybe that’s down to equipment, maybe not.

back to the original topic, i reckon the outcome of fight between froome and wiggo will depend on the temperature when they come to climb Ventoux a blistering hot day could be bad news for Brad.

I get 39.5 – 2009 – 2012 which includes cheating contador BTW
Why do you think the EPO era was pre LA and the Dirtiest time and started in 1990 ? Le mond won that year – everyone accepts he was clean – very odd choice of dates and i would say a bit of cherry picking not to mention odd

Full data here FWIW i could nto be bothered doing the maths but a quick glance shows it has slowed but clearly not significantly

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/jul/23/tour-de-france-winner-list-garin-wiggins

470W for 7mins is well into the suspicious zone.

481W for 50min is firmly in the highly suspicious zone.

What do you make of 462W for an hour? Possible by a clean athlete?

I was using data from here, and used the 90’s as it is widely considered the dirtiest era – virtually the whole peleton was using EPO, and there was no test for it – it was basically a free for all.

1. wiggo vs froome? makes a good story, get’s people ranting on forums, classic sports psychology at play
2. is wiggo clean? Pointless debate, only time will tell.
3. spanish judge ordering doped blood to be destroyed? smells like football and boxing cover up, sports even more corrupt than cycling

Sorry, just realised left out two of your questions – chose 2009-2012 as 2009 was Wiggins break through year (4th since upgraded to 3rd) – before that he wasn’t considered a contender.. Chose 1990 onwards just so there was a large enough group not to be skewed by one or two results. For example, pretty sure there were longer time trials in the early 90’s, favouring Mig, which would have pushed the average up slightly.

Sadly, and IMO, the most sensible view is to be highly cynical about all pro sports and especially cycling. That is the legacy of the LA (and others) era. Read Tyler Hamilton’s description of how they rode hills and the watch out heros last year and difficult not to note the similarities!?! Sad, but it will take a good generation of clean riding not a few nice young Brits before I will remove my cynical blinkers.

The current Spanish cover up (football, tennis, athletics) etc hardly fills one with confidence.

Any way back to the OP. Beware the scorned girlfriend/fiancée. Handbags on the web. Classy!! I hope Wiggo wins the Giro, that they compete at the start of he tour and then go with the better rider mid way thru the TDF. Lets have some combat, fully juiced or not!

Sorry, just realised left out two of your questions – chose 2009-2012 as 2009 was Wiggins break through year (4th since upgraded to 3rd) – before that he wasn’t considered a contender.

Ok fair point tat

Chose 1990 onwards just so there was a large enough group not to be skewed by one or two results. For example, pretty sure there were longer time trials in the early 90’s, favouring Mig, which would have pushed the average up slightly.

As above but I would have included the LA era tbh as that was clearly a time of doping as well

Cheers for the link interesting how the stuff differs!
FWIW the difference in average speed is negligible tbh so probably better to look at Watts per kg
As far as that goes the peak of LA was circa 6.5- 7 and it is assumed that 6 watts/kg is the best natural- Niballi for example was doing about 5.7 in the BBC link I gave and the others tend to not publish the data so the Wiggo would have been the same ish – I assume under 6.
FWIW given Wiggos weight this would give us 414 watts – this is an average edukator not a TT one @ 6 345Watts@ 5, 4.3 gives 303.6

I have no idea why Edukator insits that 300 is the norm as it is a pretty low value tbh and to assume anything above this is proof of cheating would mean every single cyclist since the 60s say in all disciplines is and was a cheat

Handbags on the web. Classy!

What here or elsewhere 😉

I agree the legacy is what leads to us all being supicious but I really do believe we have turned a corner in cycling and some are clean now. I do agree many other sports are still in the dark days of turning a blind eye as the UCI were doing [ IMHO] and that some are still cheating.It does not seem to make sense to just assume that every winner must a be a cheat anymore that it makes sense to assume Bolt cheated beacause Ben Johnson did – iirc every sprinter in that race has tested positive at some point in their career so it wa snot just cycling that had issues then or now