[Jayhawk]

What I'm most curious to see is if "The Complete List" will ever come to light -- footballers, tennis players, runners included.

[crockett]

Jayhawk, on 23 November 2011 - 06:05 PM, said:

What I'm most curious to see is if "The Complete List" will ever come to light -- footballers, tennis players, runners included.

My crystal 8-ball says...."no". Dare to dream!

[sweatpea]

Hah....Berlusconi will be back in government before that "sacred" list ever gets published.....

[micomico]

sweatpea, on 23 November 2011 - 07:36 PM, said:

Hah....Berlusconi will be back in government before that "sacred" list ever gets published.....

Bunga Bunga parties may make it to the starting line before the list does get published, but whatever the very remote chance that the list would make it to the light of day, that possibility has improved.

If any of the gang of 7 request it as part of their defense strategy that list, it will be a judicial call, one whose denial would be complicated by Fuentes directing doping, if it is the case (just in case), to more than just cyclists.

He may want the list to show a larger pattern of behaviour that favours his defense: keep in mind, however, that this could be risky, on a personal basis to him. You may remember from a while back that he said his life had been threatened. Publicity stunt or not, there are powerful interests that make cycling look like boy scouts who want those names out of the limelight.

If even one of those names was associated with the heroes/saints of the World Cup....

This post has been edited by micomico: 26 November 2011 - 04:50 PM

[Burkni]

Fuentes is bound to enter the Cycling Hall of Lame Excuses with these brilliant responses ...

[Jayhawk]

He is a strange bird. I wonder if any cyclists had a strange gut feel & decided not to use his services? I got the impression from Tyler's book that Fuentes was a bit scatter brained.

[Strategy]

Interesting confession coming out of the Fuentes Trial.

The President of Real Sociedad (a Football Club in Spain), has admitted that the team purchased doping products from Fuentes in the time period 2002 - 2008 (it's prior to his period as President, so he isn't worried about getting nabbed for this personally). He also states that he wouldn't be surprised to find that other teams have used doping - which would certainly be no surprise, when we recall that FC Barcelona repeatedly tried to sign Fuentes on a permanent basis.

I have to wonder how much money Fuentes really has made from his business. With his presumed circle of customers, it has to have been a huge amount...

[adker]

Cycling could use a scandal of magnitude in another major sport to make it look less like the Dirty Bunch. I believe lots of other sports could get nailed if someone went looking, Soccer and Tennis being at the top of the list.

[micomico]

adker, on 04 February 2013 - 04:37 PM, said:

Cycling could use a scandal of magnitude in another major sport to make it look less like the Dirty Bunch. I believe lots of other sports could get nailed if someone went looking, Soccer and Tennis being at the top of the list.

There is some tennis being played now where, at the end of 4 hours, they seem as fresh as in the first. In high heat. Makes me wonder.

You make a sad but true point. It would serve to deflect, and put the frequency of positive findings in context.

If you check more pants pockets than any other profession (by far), then you will find loose change more often.

Rarely do I see the media give cycling a lot of credit on this issue.

[ludwig]

Strategy, on 04 February 2013 - 11:13 AM, said:

Interesting confession coming out of the Fuentes Trial.

The President of Real Sociedad (a Football Club in Spain), has admitted that the team purchased doping products from Fuentes in the time period 2002 - 2008 (it's prior to his period as President, so he isn't worried about getting nabbed for this personally). He also states that he wouldn't be surprised to find that other teams have used doping - which would certainly be no surprise, when we recall that FC Barcelona repeatedly tried to sign Fuentes on a permanent basis.

I have to wonder how much money Fuentes really has made from his business. With his presumed circle of customers, it has to have been a huge amount...

Fuentes must be really good at what he does if so many sportsmen continued to use his services after Puerto. I imagine he zealously guarded whatever trade secrets he discovered.

[The Rake]

adker, on 04 February 2013 - 04:37 PM, said:

Cycling could use a scandal of magnitude in another major sport to make it look less like the Dirty Bunch. I believe lots of other sports could get nailed if someone went looking, Soccer and Tennis being at the top of the list.

There is one building in European football.

Jacques Rogge has called match-fixing and corruption as big a threat to sporting integrity as doping. 680 matches have been flagged globally as fixed by some kind of global syndicate

http://www.bbc.co.uk...otball/21319807

[adker]

I agree on Tennis, look at Nadal's wind after 4 hour match (longer then typical marathon run) and Soccer seems to never get scrutinized. Do they have testing in those sports?

[TheMight]

adker, on 04 February 2013 - 04:37 PM, said:

Cycling could use a scandal of magnitude in another major sport to make it look less like the Dirty Bunch. I believe lots of other sports could get nailed if someone went looking, Soccer and Tennis being at the top of the list.

You don't think the biggest records in baseball being held by dopers isn't a bigger scandal? It really is.

5 major differences here: 1) Baseball is one unified body. 2) Baseball took actions and convinced the public that they're handling the issue and taking it seriously. 3) There is some sort of 'punishment' in Hall of Fame membership and it happens to be enough to satisfy the fans and the media. 4) Maybe the biggest, with Lance is wasn't just obvious (post dated TUE, actovegin, differing SCA testimony, medical waste found in France, re-tested samples, etc...) but he attacked others who tried to bring him down. If he didn't have beefs with the Andreus, didn't chase down Simeoni and maybe hooked Landis up with a team (not even his own) would we be talking about this at all? Were there aggressive baseball guys that really damaged the lives of their teammates who threatened to out them? 5) Baseball hasn't acted in ways that show bias for some players and against others, not like UCI; they slapped Manny Ramirez hard. Riddle me this, so according to USADA, Lance's comeback blood values showed a 1:1000000 of naturally occurring, where was the UCI suspension?

I'd love for some of the damage to be shared elsewhere but cycling does this to itself. Has a single Spaniard not called Jesus Manzano come out on any of this? I mean these guys all live in Spain, for multiple reasons. Spain doesn't push the issue with cyclists, no way in hell they let Nadal go down or any team in La Liga. There will be a fire and the evidence will be destroyed before that happens.

[adker]

I agree and disagree. Yes the complicit nature of the governing body has helped dismantle cycling credibility but the much bigger issue is the perception that all of cyclist are dirty. Where in baseball it is more a select few with so many still perceived to be clean. Outside of these walls most casual fans believe that Lance, all his teammates, everyone else who has won and by proxy all of their teammates are all guilty of cheating. Football, and Baseball of had a select few, they got caught and punished (again in the eyes of the public). Same with Olympic sports.

Have you watched a hockey game, tell me they would not benefit from EPO? Soccer? Basketball? I am not saying they are doing it but I do not think A-Rod is the only guy in his declining years who has mentally struggled with fan disenfranchise and decided there is another way to keep his reputation as a great player by crossing the line.

I do think Cycling has been more aggressive with testing. something tells me Bio Passports in other sports may show a different side to them. Even Lance who hatted them said they did change the tide.

[The Rake]

TheMight, on 05 February 2013 - 05:41 PM, said:

You don't think the biggest records in baseball being held by dopers isn't a bigger scandal? It really is.

Sorry. Not a major sport

[TheMight]

adker, on 05 February 2013 - 08:30 PM, said:

I agree and disagree. Yes the complicit nature of the governing body has helped dismantle cycling credibility but the much bigger issue is the perception that all of cyclist are dirty. Where in baseball it is more a select few with so many still perceived to be clean. Outside of these walls most casual fans believe that Lance, all his teammates, everyone else who has won and by proxy all of their teammates are all guilty of cheating. Football, and Baseball of had a select few, they got caught and punished (again in the eyes of the public). Same with Olympic sports.

And yet baseball has had a culture whereby it was known that it was so boring to play that the players had to take speed and they called it 'greenies.' I think it's more dirty than cycling, it's just so much bigger and they've done enough to pacify the media and the fans both. How many sports have their own slang for drugs? How many have their own slang for drugs that pervades the public knowledge, random baseball fans on the street know what greenies are. It's an open secret that some pitcher pitched a no hitter on LSD in the 70s, baseball is infested with drugs, heck a local player just got a DUI. I think it's really how the sport manages itself to a large degree. They've done enough to change the subject and perception. If you turn in a dirty in baseball, you get suspended, there isn't a lot of wiggle room and I haven't heard of these "unintentional ingestion" suspension reductions or back dated suspensions.

Quote

Have you watched a hockey game, tell me they would not benefit from EPO? Soccer? Basketball? I am not saying they are doing it but I do not think A-Rod is the only guy in his declining years who has mentally struggled with fan disenfranchise and decided there is another way to keep his reputation as a great player by crossing the line.

I do think Cycling has been more aggressive with testing. something tells me Bio Passports in other sports may show a different side to them. Even Lance who hatted them said they did change the tide.

No question, and with the amounts of money involved it's a really easy thing for those guys to do. The financial incentive in those other sports to dope is incredible compared to cycling, I suspect that a proportional amount happens there because of that. If you applied olympic testing, I don't think you could field a hockey team or and NFL football team after a few weeks of the season. They openly use cortisone and other "medicines" to get back in to the game, and who knows what they don't openly admit to. The circumstances are just different though. It might not be fair but it is what it is. I think if there is a second wave of baseball guys getting nabbed for drugs it might change but that hasn't happened and I don't think baseball will let it happen. They had designer undetectable drugs.. A company was started and they made custom doping products because just a couple players were dirty? No way... Somehow, they've got the fans to switch gears though.

By contrast, the Lance era was supposed to be clean by virtue of cleaning up after the dirty 90s and Festina, they now had an EPO test. "Tour of Redemption," UCI called it that. There were also maybe more organized and sophisticated team programs going on in this most recent era than ever before.*** Doping may have stopped for the French, but it appears that it just got more organized elsewhere. It's just repeated scandal after scandal and UCI doing nothing to change it all. They need to institute a life time ban policy and they need someone like Rodger Goodell who has the authority to swing that sword around at will. Just try to explain why Valverde was racing around racking up wins when his DNA was sitting there; we all knew he was dirty, knew there was DNA evidence against him and he's winning pro tour titles... I love the sport but it just boggles the mind.

I hope the bio passport is making it harder, I really do. Sure does seem selective who has been nabbed and who hasn't though and then with Ashenden and others speaking out about it, it's hard to be optimistic. Also, don't let it be lost, UCI and everybody involved is now calling this a "new clean era." Bummer AC and FS both have turned in dirties... but they were accidental ones, right? I'm not a UCI apologist by any stretch and I think they are really playing with fire with a TRC, they risk getting more dirt out and losing more credibility.



*** I started listing off teams that either had a known program of have all the hallmarks of one, it's an ugly list. It's harder to do for older teams, I might be full of it, but I suspect there weren't as many organized team programs until the EPO era. Much before that, the programs consisted of blood bags and street drugs. I'd say an organized program of team doping with medical drugs or blood bags is a program and a team dealer of pot belge is not.

[Burkni]

http://m.cyclingnews...ks-with-fuentes

Beloki and Nozal should just try to get an exemption from testifying on grounds of being too dumb ...

This post has been edited by Burkni: 12 February 2013 - 11:07 PM

[Strategy]

Fuentes has been sentenced to a year of jail for "crimes against health laws", and is disbarred from practicing as a doctor for four years. Ignacio Labart will also go to jail; Saiz and Belda are acquitted.

[Strategy]

Unfortunately, he will be allowed to keep his secrets, and no blood bags will be passed on to WADA. the bags will be destroyed.

This post has been edited by Strategy: 30 April 2013 - 08:41 PM

[Burkni]

Strategy, on 30 April 2013 - 08:38 PM, said:

Fuentes has been sentenced to a year of jail for "crimes against health laws", and is disbarred from practicing as a doctor for four years. Ignacio Labart will also go to jail; Saiz and Belda are acquitted.

Suspended, right?
What an absolute joke and a mockery of the Spanish system of "justice". Money talks, I guess.