"thick in the blood"...
I think you are "thick in the head" like most gullable saps and doping
apologists.
The very best cyclists, cross country skiers and biathletes have
roughly the same hematocrit as the rest of the generally population.
When they are in periods of intense competition or training their
hematocrit tends to be lower by 5-10% (i.e. 5-10% of 42% it we take 42%
as an average). What you find with doped athletes (and all the top guys
are doped) or specifically what Banfi and D'Onofrio as part of the
Conconi trial into organised doping found was that there were seasonal
variations of greater than 20% or more in hematocrit. They showed that
there were peaks in hematocrit for cyclist in May,June and July and
troughs during out of season. Of couse the cross country skiers peaked
in Februrary each year and the biathletes in December. No known
pathology could have casued these variations in an individual, let
alone a group of individuals.
We know definitively that Armstrong was doped as a result of this
positive EPO test and Andreu from his own admission. As a group all US
Postal riders had inexplicably high hematocrit levels coming up to the
99 Tour. They were all rEPO doped including Vaughters - that "hall
pass" or note from his mother is just a smoke screen.
carpediemracing wrote:
> mrsixtypercent Wrote:
> > B. Lafferty wrote:
> > Straight from the horse's mouth...
> >
> > "I'd never tested (at a race) above 50 percent, except before the
> > start
> > of the '99 Tour," he said. "I told the team doctor 'don't worry, I've
> > got a certificate, I've got a hall-pass for this'," he recalled. "But
> > the doctor said it wasn't me they were worried about, it was that the
> > whole team was very close (to the 50 percent limit)." - Jonathan
> > Vaughters
> >
> > So the natural average hematocit is low 40's yet here we have a whole
> > team close to 50 percent - what a coincidence!. You also have to ask
> > why this team had its own blood spinner to test hematocit when there
> > should be no reasonable need to do so. The only explanation is that
> > they were systematically doped and that they needed to check they
> > were
> > under the 50% limit.not a pro-doper but it would make sense, as a team, to check things like
> hematocrit levels and bike weights/measurements to make sure that things
> are legal. if teams had accurate scales they wouldn't be rushing around
> bolting wrenched under bottle cages to bring up bike weights. and a
> centrifuge is apparently not a complex machine and would allow the team
> to take measures if a rider is a bit "thick in the blood".
>
> Vaughters was naturally 50-52% if I recall correctly so he was
> "excused", hence his "hall-pass". he proved this by undergoing tests
> proving his higher hematocrit.
>
> I'm no super rider, I get dropped pretty quickly in the hills, I'm
> close to my max in races all the time, but my hematocrit has always
> been in the upper 40's. my last three checks were at 49%, 48% and 47%.
> it's not uncommon to have a 45% hematocrit or higher. even the form
> says the "normal range" is up to 52%. I have to believe that pros have
> a naturally higher starting point than most of us. it wouldn't make
> sense if the average ProTour pro had a lower hematocrit than an average
> "joe".
>
>
> --
> carpediemracing
