Tour de France?

cjnicolai

cjnicolai

Messages
702
Edit My Images
Yes
What the hell is going on in the tour? or in cycling in general, for that matter?

I had hoped last year's Floyd Landis debaucle would be rock bottom, but apparently not.

And really, Michael Rasmussen's sob story about his career being ruined? Honestly, what did he expect when he's refused to submit to all drug testing, particularly after years of suspicious behavior?

Sheesh.
 
cjnicolai said:
What the hell is going on in the tour? or in cycling in general, for that matter?

I had hoped last year's Floyd Landis debaucle would be rock bottom, but apparently not.

And really, Michael Rasmussen's sob story about his career being ruined? Honestly, what did he expect when he's refused to submit to all drug testing, particularly after years of suspicious behavior?

Sheesh.
Click to expand...

This is nothing a few years ago probably 90% of the riders were on some sort of drug, this is the best its been for a number of years.
 
All bloody dope-heads & mass transfusers. It seems like collective madness all round - such a shame as although I'm not into cycling I actually enjoy watching the tour. All just seems a waste of time now.
 
Phil, exactly. I do love watching it (with my husband, who's taken some fabulous Lance Armstrong shots during a few Tours) but these days, it's feeling rather pointless.

I realize that a few years back a higher percentage of riders were doping. Thing is, that's why SO many tests and checks have been put into place. These guys have to know that there is no conceivable way they're going to get away with it, so why do they intentionally bury their careers and embarrass themselves for nothing?
 
So, doping only occurs in Cyling? I think not...... how long has there been testing in other arenas? Years? Why did they test if there weren't any drugs around? How about Finland's Lasse Viren's blood doping escapade more than fifty years ago? Why is that only fairly common news now?

Why is cycling in the spotlight yet again? I believe passionately that this is the ONLY sport that is making more positive moves than any other to stamp it out once and for all time! To do that it has to be in the Spotlight and very publicly at that.

You don't hear of other sports taking such strong and positive steps do you? Why not? It can't believe for one minute the drug taking doesn't happen. Do the suppliers of "dope" only supply cyclists? It's an industry.... and a bl$$dy big one at that. There are 1,000s $ £ € thrown at perfecting and developing stealth drugs.... just for cyclists? Do they get away with it.... moot point. Trouble is, sometimes they do...... :(

I don't condone it for one moment.... but I heartily endorse the UCI's efforts to eradicate it. There are more people to be penalised for doping than just the athletes... can you administer a blood doping transfusion yourself? No, of course not. So, shouldn't they go after the doctors, soigneurs, masseurs? Swingeing penalties, life bans, struck off lists..... there are no end of things that can be done. Who enforces these? I'm not too certain. In France ANY form of drug abuse is energetically enforced by the Gendarmerie which is why it (TdF) receives so much publicity throughout the rest of the world by the media when something like this happens.

It would be so good if the rest of the sporting governing bodies took a leaf out of the TdF's book. Get their own house in order and stop hiding their own actions, bring it out in the open. I just hate hypocrisy with a passion.....

3.gif
 
So, doping only occurs in Cyling?
Click to expand...

Uh..... who ever said that?

I will say that I was a gymnast in my younger years. In the Olympics one year, a girl was stripped of her gold medal because her doctor gave her Sudafed for a cold.

I believe that's a pretty definitive statement.

- CJ
 
Uh? ...... nobody ever did as I recall! Not as a definitive, objective statement at least ..... but there again whatever happened to reasoned argument through implied logic? What did you want me (anyone) to comment on? Just this year's tour? I just reasoned upon what you'd written...... (My thoughts were, "but this is not just limited to cycling, it's rife in most sports")

I was a racing cyclist in a previous life and a have listened to people moaning on about this year's TdF (and the other bad [druggy] one of 1998) to the point of annoyance. I'll not re-iterate my words because they encapsulate my ire reasonably well.

I'm afraid your statement about the "Sudafed" incident says nothing at all definitively about doping in other sports. If anything it highlights just how chaotic the whole drugs farce is. To me it shows how the particular governing body to which you refer is so wide of the mark of fully comprehending the sublime and the ridiculous.

It was the same in cycling in the UK at amateur level when a guy took some over-the-counter medication. He received a 2 years suspension and stripped of any titles he'd gained. It served to put on record that medication and drugging were two distinct and separate things. Actually, if memory serves correctly, both this incident and the one to which you refer changed how drug tests are handled today.

Don't want to get into a futile, ranting argument but would rather let this thread bubble along as a reasoned debate..... :shrug:
 
It's simple, surely. There are rules about what you can & can't do/take/consume in all areas of life, not just cycling & not just sport either. The rules are mostly black & white. Human nature drives a small minority to want to be the best - to win that medal or whatever - at any cost, and makes them prepared to cheat, along with all the cohorts required. There may be a "grey" area in which these people think they have "wriggle room" - if they are found out someone else will decide whether they were right or wrong. End of.
 
Phil T said:
It's simple, surely. There are rules about what you can & can't do/take/consume in all areas of life, not just cycling & not just sport either. The rules are mostly black & white. Human nature drives a small minority to want to be the best - to win that medal or whatever - at any cost, and makes them prepared to cheat, along with all the cohorts required. There may be a "grey" area in which these people think they have "wriggle room" - if they are found out someone else will decide whether they were right or wrong. End of.
Click to expand...

But it's never that simple is it? What about those who don't cheat? How is it fair to them that dopers get all the prizes and accolades? It's incumbent upon the governing bodies' to end it, the UCI are going about this publicly and energetically.

How about the Governing Bodies who don't want their sport in the limelight, to come under such close scrutiny? How are they protecting those that don't cheat? What if those who do the "finding out" are corrupt? Hardly a case of "end of" is it?

Drugging, doping, cheating is too BIG an industry against which to turn a blind eye but because it is a big industry people do. I think it falls into the other deplorable aspect of the human psyche, "what's in it for me?" Something does need to be done and I applaud any body which does it.

It just doesn't make sense to condemn an organisation and it's participants for not supplying the lack of spectacle it usually does just because it's fighting against cheats - au Tour de France.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top