Training or Doping - UK track cycling

poulidor

Like Thunder, I do think he doped

How?
My thought :EPO and then saline IV to decrease hct level. Probably the testing were longer than predicted. Too much saline had already left his blood when he was tested... and so caught!

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Let Astana and McQuaid whine !

plectrum

Just a few points of view!

plectrum

Although I'm interested in discussing Hayles that was really not the point of this thread, i'm more interested in whether it points towards a doping program. There are certainly reasons as to why we are having a good show such as home crowd and a few stars in the camp but the dominance during the races is scary. Chris Hoy just looks immense for one!

I very much hope this is a dope free team performance as if so it really is something to be proud of.

El Loto

Damiano Cunego is 52-52. I believe his father has a high level also.

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rob of the og

Good question. A couple of points:
1. I don't know any of the sprinters, but some of the endurance guys I saw win under-12 cyclocross races!! They've been groomed for this since a very young age and there have been no big jumps in performance. Phenomenal from day 1 and surrounded by a good back up team.

2. Track is a limited sport, taken seriously by a small no of countries. GB is one of the only countries that bothers much: our guys get lots of funding and lots of time together.

3. Nationality is no indicator whatsoever when it comes to determining whether someone is doping. Neither is whether they are a 'nice guy' or not.

plectrum

Rob 1 & 2 fine but point 3 is disagree a little bit with. USA athletics and various other USA sports have serious doping issues which cut to the core. They are systematic be it Baseball, Athletics or Discovery team ... I mean cycling. UK has never had this issue spread throughout, sure there have been individuals, training partners etc but I struggle to remember any sports wide or generational doping issue. Also there are many other countries who have run systematic programs such as China, East Germany, Russia, Greece.

My issue is that whenever any team dominates now in cycling I am suspicious.

poulidor

Just have a look to rugby... who were the first huge players who took 3-6kg in less than one year?
Why are the football players of UK clubs running the most in the world?

But for track cycling, I do think that most of them are clean. When the French were on top of track cycling, other nations were suspicious so "we" invited them to come in France and see how we were working. After copying our methods, they improved their results too.
I hope they didn't copied doping methods!

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Let Astana and McQuaid whine !

plectrum

I don't understand your Rugby point but he SA and NZ are physically much bigger than European stars and there is speculation certainly about the SA. For football, our league is the best because it pays the most for players and so attracts the highest quality.

rob of the og

Fine. But if you asked anyone in the 80's they'd have told you that the Eastern Bloc guys were all on steroids but the Western guys were clean. Now we know that the US was covering up doping positives as well. Trying to base conclusions on politics/nationalities doesn't work

As I've tried to set out, there are some good reasons to think that the GB team is clean, but the idea that Brits are naturally an honest bunch is not a good reason. To buy into that national stereotype you need to ignore a lot of evidence, from the guy at the bottom fiddling his benefits to the guy at the top sexing up his dodgy dossier - and probably some cyclists doping in the middle.

poulidor

Of course for rugby the first to become huge were from south hemispher... and then England.... Since we, french, have found how to become huge rapidly too !

For football, sure there is few english players in the league, probably less than frenchies. Despite we are all surprising that all those players are able to run so fast, so long and so often!

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Let Astana and McQuaid whine !

plectrum

I hear what your saying but we arn't talking about benefit fraud or WOMD, this is pro sport. We have a pretty good track record interms of honesty in performance.

Interms of helping cyclings global image I think UCI could do no better than getting this group of cyclists to publically talk about the merits of clean cycling. If these performances by these UCI world gold medalists is clean then there is little better messages as to what can be acheived through clean training regimes, talent and guided development.

To be honest this is what cycling needs, and interms of road cycling stars such as Cancellara if clean to be used in a big PR push.

plectrum

Poulidor,
The rugby players are certainly big but also this increase in power is also associated with Rugby Union becoming fully professional i.e. more dedicated training and gym time. In a past life Union players were lawyers working 9am-7pm and training at lunch and weekend!

For football, it is very much training and some of the best players in our leagues are also French such as Evra, Henry, Flamini. Also speed in football has little to do with doping, if you look at youngster Theo Walcott, he has been incredibly quick since 13 years of age.

For stamina I think there is a possibility that doping of kind is present in football and certainly Italy especially AC Milan have run systematic medical programs but whether it was illegal or not is a different matter.

Saying this in the mid 90's Italy dominated european football and in the early 00's Spain dominated but since Operation Puerto and Italy corruption charges British football has become the power. Maybe this is just because others have stopped cheating rather than we have started?

Drongo

I would be very surprised if steroid use is not fairly common in top-flight rugby. Even individual players who were less than 12 stone in 1996 were two stone heavier at the end of their careers. John Kirwan was considered a beast in the 1980s because he weighed 15 1/2 stone; I've played against a team where only the halfback weighed less than that.

EPO would also be handy, as rugby requires endurance as well as explosive power. After an hour of running your guts out, I'd want all the oxygen my body could handle.

One minor example: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sp...ticle382090.ece

Crankyfeet

I have a theory that Woodward's great England team at the early part of this century were on a superior endurance doping program. The new rules of rugby introduced in 1993 to quicken the pace of the game just made power and endurance more advantageous. Watching England play during their peak, one couldn't help but notice that they often finished the last 15 minutes of the game looking as fresh as they did in the first 15 minutes, in stark contrast to their opposition. But it's only speculation. It wouldn't seem that implausible though... because rugby PED's in the past were nearly all geared around steroids and other "strength" enhancers.