Lance blah blah blah AFLD yadda yadda
AFLD might open disciplinary hearings because Lance took a shower while the testers sat on his stoop. Time for Lance to focus on the Vuelta?
about 3 years ago
Chris Fontecchio
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From the L'équipe story:
After the unannounced test performed on Lance Armstrong on 17 March…the UCI sent a letter dated 8 April to the AFLD…authorizing the latter to open disciplinary proceedings against the American. UCI president Pat McQuaid based his decision on a combined interpretation of the global code and the UCI antidoping rule, giving the AFLD the authorization to take disciplinary measures.
Ursula said it all in previous post - zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
OK so you got me, I am not at all asleep - The rule cited by the AFLD is:
5.4 Requirements for notification of Athletes
5.4.1 When initial contact is made, the ADO, DCO or Chaperone, as applicable, shall ensure that the Athlete and/or a third party (if required in accordance with Clause 5.3.8) is informed:
a) That the Athlete is required to undergo a Sample collection;
b) Of the authority under which the Sample collection is to be conducted;
c) Of the type of Sample collection and any conditions that need to be adhered to prior to the Sample collection;
d) Of the Athlete’s rights, including the right to:
Have a representative and if available, an interpreter;ii. Ask for additional information about the Sample collection process;
iii. Request a delay in reporting to the Doping Control Station for valid reasons; and
iv. Request modifications as provided for in Annex B – Modifications for Athletes with disabilities.
e) Of the Athlete’s responsibilities, including the requirement to:
Remain within direct observation of the DCO/Chaperone at all times from the point of notification by the DCO/Chaperone until the completion of the Sample collection procedure;Rule 5.4.1, International Standard for Testing, January 2009
myself in particular I like rule 5.4.1 d) iii
“the Athlete’s right to request a delay in reporting to the Doping Control Station for valid reasons”
I THINK THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT LANCE DID , ACCORDING TO LANCE ? (the shower)
Is a shower a valid reason?! Hahaha
Crashdan: "Veni Vidi Vici beats Wing Kong Exchange... … and I’ll change my signature to a backwards smile for a month."
Franzoi wins Parijs-Roubaix and I win a date with the VDS of Team Txirrindulariak..
Well it hangs on whether or not the guy informed LA
of all these things but especially of 5.4.1.e, the requirement to remain within direct observation. If he did, LA is farked. Still, if he didn’t, it could be argued that LA had to know the drill by now. Countered by the “First, we had to make sure he was legit” defense.
Could this (And about 2 million others)
be part of the reason that the Giro pulled out of France?
"Never swing a small stick. " Andy Hampsten
Nah
That wasn’t something that happened in the last couple days. I think whatever the reason there is, it has to go back at least a month.
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 9, 2009 2:22 PM EDT up reply actions
I think the reason is that the French authorities have declared the roads closed due to avalanche danger...
I’m not sure this is very mysterious at all. Too much snow that’s not going to be gone by May.
OK
this makes the most sense, by far. Not sure why this wasn’t the lead in the story, or maybe I just missed it. Snowpack levels and meltoff predictions I can understand. Something about radio contacts.. whuh?
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 9, 2009 4:46 PM EDT up reply actions
Sorry If I missed it
Is there a technical explanation of the benefits of 30 minutes and a shower in beating a doping test (a serious question and sorry if missed in other threads)
formerly known as cyclingchallenge
There is a NY Times column which discusses the incident and mentions part of the problems with the delay.
I’m not saying anything about Lance Armstrong," said Dr. Gary I. Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency. "But if somebody had half an hour to himself, that’s plenty of time to urinate and refill yourself with somebody else’s urine. That way, even if they witness you urinating, it’s not your urine. It happens a lot. It is the rationale behind the no-notice testing."
Allow me to say, ewwwww.
We haven’t heard the testers side of the story, but if the tester informed Lance that he couldn’t leave the tester’s sight, and Lance did it anyway, I’d expect to see that indicated on the testing form (if there really is a place for irregularities to be noted like Lance indicated).
Huh?
Okay I’ll bite. How do you refill yourself with someone else’s urine? I mean how is that physically done? You can’t drink the stuff and expect it to come out 20 minutes later. Is there a way to shove it back up the….. as a health professional.. Katiek has it right. ewwwwwwwww.
Ha!
You blocked some twitters for less than this!
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 9, 2009 5:04 PM EDT up reply actions
hahahahahahahahahaha ha ha HA HA ! !
hilarious ! and ouch ! (if gavia is correct below)
and ewwwwwww ursula has it AGAIN right on with the ewwww comment, now that we are all beyond the ZZZZZ comment she was so totally spot on with before, and maybe we should go back to ZZZZ ??
I've read speculation about this
but I still find it hard to believe that anyone would really do it. For a start you need a nice fresh supply of clean urine. It does go off so you either keep it in the freezer (and I suppose microwave it when you need it) or in the fridge but replace it a lot more frequently. Milk can last maybe a week in the fridge, so I guess that urine survives about the same time. In which case do you have a pint delivered every friday, in its own little sealed container?
And then if your partner is about to give birth, does she appreciate the little bottle of wee sitting besides whatever emergency snacks she has stocked up on? No matter how well sealed you promise it is.
And then the tester knocks, you are so scared that you are going to be caught that you are shaking. And you want to start poking around sensitive bits of your anatomy with sharp objects? I really have trouble with this, but.
But if the French do want to follow this up, there is something rather touching about Lance going down for the crime of being a bit pissy. One of those Al Capone moments.
For testing at an event, maybe
when you only have a period of a couple of hours or so when you have to have someone with some sort of medical knowledge, fresh urine and a tube, just in case one team member gets chosen to give a sample. But in those days you didn’t even need the catheter, just see Ghislain Lambert, or the old story about Sean Kelly testing positive because he got his supposedly clean sample from a mechanic who was taking amphetamines to help him stay awake and keep the bikes running.
But I can’t see it working with random, out-of-season testing, there’s just too much to go wrong, and too many others who are going to say yuk. A bit of soap on the end of the finger is a lot easier.
A little bit of knowledge in these things..may be helpful
I am a rare poster to this forum but enjoy reading it tremendously. Without trying to make a moral or political judgement on Lance the tester in question or France in general it is entirely possible to do the switcheroo with real urine (obtained for a price, on the internet: just google ‘drug test urine sample’) which can easily be kept in a fridge oh I don’t know, nearby where somebody who is quite organized can get access to it quite quickly and substitute it for said requested sample. Just a very quick analogy from clinical medicine: If I am to properly transfuse donated blood, an RN and myself meticulously review what amounts to a visual chain of custody before said bodily fluid is given to a patient. During the transfer of blood I sign my name several times on pieces of paper that will be around for years. Errors in this paperwork can (and have) lead to death. In the situation with doping testing (be it blood, urine, saliva or hair), issues with paperwork or documentation can obviously ruin a career. I don’t mean to compare the gravity of clinical medicine to the admitted passion I have for following bike racing, but I could not resist this time. Thanks for letting me contribute folks….terrific fan blog ! If i can be of any other assistance please PM me..Tony Verow, MD
Thanks for some proper knowledge
(although what would the internet be without useless uninformed speculation). And out of curiosity (and without wanting to turn this in to a doping masterclass), do you have any idea how long could urine be expected to stay fresh. And how much protection does the inside of the bladder provide against nasty bugs swimming around in there.
Not sure about the specifics....
It is not something that is in my area of expertise ! (random speculation follows…) However, with respect to testing urine only for excreted and or filtered drugs it would not be very difficult to do…one can imagine that Grandma Jones’ urine (sent via Fedex on ice, no joke this is how folks trying to beat drugs of abuse screening do it) could be expected to keep indefinitely for the purpose of beating a drugs test as long as the temperature was kept constant
Do the doping authorities do “quality assurance”, i.e. do they analyze for other biomarkers such as male or female hormones, DNA, etc ? I don’t know if they do, but if they did it would add tremendously to quality control, albeit at the cost of raising the price tremendously.
what
the … No, really? You can pee out something and it won’t contain traces of the things in your own body?
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 9, 2009 5:03 PM EDT up reply actions
OK
It might be time to close comments…
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 9, 2009 5:18 PM EDT up reply actions
OTOH, one would think that if it weren't his urine...
that would be massively obvious by simple comparison with the blood and hair sample results. Methinks this may well be mountain out of technical molehill territory.
Not that I can’t understand the reason for the rules, but it wasn’t just a urine test.
More educated guesses from moi
Vis – a – vis identifying bodily fluids and or specimens and correlation with one donor (or patient, depending on ones point of view !) It CAN be done, provided that some DNA is present in a given sample. I am NOT a forensic pathologist, but my understanding is that white blood cells, occasionally skin cells (preferably living dermis) and perhaps hair follicles all contain DNA, from which it may be possible to establish that all two, three or four samples came from one DNA source, otherwise known as a human being. If said samples were collected the same day under direct observation by ONE tester, AND had identical DNA analysis it would be reasonable to assume that the source was one human being. I am not aware of human urine that usually contains cells, as most of the time urine excreted by a normal kidney via the bladder does not contain any cells, living or dead. IF the donator of said urine has bladder or kidney cancer, living cells containing DNA are occasionally shed in the urine. Didn’t want to bring up the cancer angle, but there it is. Thank you gentle reader for hanging on so long. Tony Verow MD.
Ok this I did not know.
But it suddenly makes sense of the importance of chaperoning. TYVM.
Thanks for that insight.
"...if you're not going to pull through, I'm going to attack you." ~CVV (ToBC Stg 4)
Thank you for the compliment
Don’t want to drag this out too far, but I just did a quick search and found a web site called testclear.com , ugh they offer powdered urine that you reconstitute just before your pre-employment drug screening, along with plenty of tips on how to beat drug screening tests !….sigh….
Yeah I'd just assumed that urine and blood...
could both be correlated to an individual by DNA methods if nothing else. I’m very surprised that urine, at least, cannot usually.
Good points
I am not saying that these things can’t be done (i.e. definitively tagging each sample taken for its endogenous DNA then comparing it to DNA of a rider taken at the beginning of the season) rather that the cost of doing so would be prohibitively expensive, at least at the present time. It is relatively cheap however to assert that the collection process and chian of custody are sufficiently robust to then screen he samples for presence of PED’s. These tests are quite cheap to run, at least for the usual abused substances.
wow maybe I should not have let the AFLD know about Lance's secret?
Remember before the Tour of California: Liz Kreutz snapped a secret photo of Lance ?
here
for more on that story go here
thanks for the compliment (I think?)
am I indeed Master P, Sui? if so I am humbled thank you.
caption being: “The Secret Revealed” ?
Ya know
I don’t think you have to be a naive simpleton to believe that THIS time, there’s no way Lance would risk the whole LAF, and his still intact (in the USA) reputation, by using PEDs. THIS year.
I also think TdF and AFLD officials really have it in for Lance, THIS year . They really don’t want him sullying their race, as they see it.
They would never manufacture evidence, but they would chip away at every opportunity, and seize on any violation possible. And this is what they have done.
I don’t believe Lance has used PEDs this year, and if he is not allowed to participate, I’ll cancel my TV package that has Versus. I’m boycotting the TdF.
And me, I never was a Lance lover, but I just suspect the French do have it in for him, THIS year.
mm hmm
Doesn’t make much sense. Of course, neither did Floyd’s case, and I have sworn off even pretending I know what really happened there. But really, why would he come out of his happy, wealthy retirement only to use PEDs in the face of the new anti-doping regime, with some undefined (possibly remote) chance of winning even if he isn’t caught?
Seriously, someone stop me before I post on this topic again. Please.
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 9, 2009 6:43 PM EDT up reply actions
true enough
but what would this look like if it were happening to another, lesser, rider? Say you’re Pedro Horrillo, training in northern France for P-R. One day as you’re getting back from a ride there’s a doctor waiting for you. You hum and haw about credentials, say his papers don’t look right, say your DS has to make a few calls, and then disappear for half an hour. I bet if we read a story about that we’d be pretty quick to assume, or at least think that maybe, something fishy was up.
by plinytheelder on Apr 9, 2009 7:08 PM EDT up reply actions
Nah, it's simple
A rules violation is a rules violation. A rider never ever leaves the sight of the chaperon. This is fundamental.
The only question is if the AFLD wants to open a case or not. Two footballers received a year each in a similar case.
Yeah, but 24 out of competition tests this season?
They were UCI/WADA , not AFLD. But still… you keep at it, you can get anyone to slip up.
*sigh*
I still think, as per above, that the likelihood of him actually getting away with or even trying anything as a result of this is vanishingly small.
But every time someone brings up this point, I have to agree, and also have to agree that there is no way on God’s green Earth that LA and JB did not know this. In which case, LA by opening himself up to this has just entered terminal dumbass territory and basically deserves whatever the French authorities want to do to him. I mean seriously, reality check Lancey-poo. If you’re this stupid and hubristic and convinced that the rules just don’t apply to you, then tant pis, ’cause guess what, they do.
yeah...
Nikki pointed this out in another thread, but if nothing else this is incredibly un-savvy by Armstrong.
by plinytheelder on Apr 9, 2009 9:49 PM EDT up reply actions
All these previous test, then one test by AFLD and we have this controversy.
And you want to say it’s simple, a rules violation. OK, sure, I see no reason to think there’s anything amiss here. I like gossip minded gavia better than simple-minded gavia.
Hmm, someone who calls people who difer in opinion from him
such things as bitchy whiners is probably not the best judge on what’s simple minded.
First place in monuments so soooooo overrated, 2nd is were it's at.
For the record... I'm in love with gavia
I’m even in love with Phil. I still think PdC rocks. It’s the subject of LA that tends to bring out the worst commentary and opinions from people. My point is that the ELPMO’s lose objectivity and fairness when LA is talked about and they are all hell bent on his demise or disappearance from the sport. This is not a matter of me objecting to other’s differing opinion’s, more that I’m pointing out the behavior behind the opinions. In this case there certainly has been a lot of bitching and whining about LA hogging the headlines since his return as if it’s unwarranted. The guy won seven fucking Tours so that kind of seperates him from the pack. Also, it’s not simply a rules violation and therefore he’s suspended, that’s why we may or may not see a hearing and why he may or may not be penalized, there are other factors in the case that have to be examined. I know and others know even better that gavia is far from simple-minded, I’m not calling her simple-minded, I was pointing out what I saw as an abnormal behavior for her, where she just drew a hard line because she doesn’t like Lance. It’s not simple as she declared, I think she knows better than that, they may ultimately decide that way, but that doesn’t make it simple to decide. And no it doesn’t matter what he did out of sight, but was he actually given permission or not?, did the tester make a mistake here?, was the complaint written up at the time of the test and does that matter?, does it matter that the test was signed off? Rules can be clear, but there are circumstances that create exceptions and that’s what is left to be determined.
PS No kidding, gavia and Phil, I love you guys. And gavia, I consider you a member of the ELPMO’s, so I don’t dislike everyone in the ELPMO community. But there are some major whiney bitches out there.
You love me? I....I've never been loved before
Ok, I’m snapping out of it. Look, you can have your opinions, and please continue to share them, but my problem is that you often have to throw in, what at least to me, seems like a personal attack. Maybe I’m misinterpreting what you are trying to say, but you can make your point without name calling. By saying people are being bitchy whiners you really are just bitching about them. Just let them whine, it’s not like they can take away his Tour wins. For the most part, I’ve seen intelligent discussion about the situation. I personally think it isn’t Ok to the break the rules once because you’ve held to them so many times in a row. But I don’t think it’s a big deal, the thing I find the weirdest is that Lance took a 30 minute shower, what guy takes half an hour to shower?
First place in monuments so soooooo overrated, 2nd is were it's at.
I agree.
It’s not too difficult to make points with a bit of respect.
by plinytheelder on Apr 10, 2009 2:19 PM EDT up reply actions
Yeah right, you're adored by all, don't be so humble.
That’s my bit of hypocracy, I bitch and whine about the bitchy whiners. But I wasn’t pointing a finger to anyone about being a bitchy whiner. Besides, I think my anger management has come a long way dealing with this site, and I haven’t made personal attacks and I steer clear of the major idiots (not naming names, see) and their comments.
Ha!, adored by all....please, I don't believe I am
an I don’t need or even want to be adored by all, although if you say you love me then you must be one of those who do..
PS. I believe your anger problem has gotten better as well, but there are no major idiots who post here, a major idiot is someone like Ann Coulter..too political? Ah well, sue me.
First place in monuments so soooooo overrated, 2nd is were it's at.
oh well,
go inside, maybe get a glass of water, get undressed, take a shower – enjoy the hot water on tired muscles for a couple of minutes, get out, dry off, get dressed – could take about 30 minutes. Most everything takes longer than you think.
oh yeah,
forgot about put saline solution in blood, take other substances to mess up urine sample, etc
Umm right, well my comment was meant more as a joke
not as a question of suspicion.
First place in monuments so soooooo overrated, 2nd is were it's at.
yeah,
i pretty much took it that way but it seemed i’d seen this expressed a few times and i couldn’t stop my anal-serious side from responding seriously. Well then the 2nd comment was joking too, althuogh obviously, that’s the point of the rule.
I'm just glad
that if you google “ELPMO” we come up fifth, and the first four hits are basically garbage.
CQRanking.com, you complete me.
by Chris Fontecchio on Apr 10, 2009 4:04 PM EDT up reply actions
that could just as well
be due to lance’s attitudes towards those “french guys” as due to the french guys. 50/50 either way.
Well...
I didn’t write it to make you like me.
But you missed my point, which was a more narrow one than you interpreted, I think. That is, it doesn’t matter what could have or even did happen during the 20 minutes Armstrong was allegedly outside the sight of the tester. What matters is whether he was out of sight. The rules are very clear on this point.
But whose responsibility is it to ensure that happens?
From the regulations listed above, the tester is supposed to tell the rider that he can’t leave. If in fact the tester said “sure, go take a shower” and didn’t tell the rider he couldn’t leave, is it a rules violation (even if the rider knew better?)
Of course I’m sure the tester’s view of what happened may vary from Lance’s, but it seems like a legitimate factual question ( and I’m not certain the AFLD will be very objective in determining if the AFLD tester messed up in a very high profile fashion).
I still think regardless of what the tester did, Lance should have known better, but that’s different from determining if there was a violation of the actual rules.
The only way it could happen
would be if Lance were a psychopath.
The psychopath is defined by a psychological gratification in criminal, sexual, or aggressive impulses and the inability to learn from past mistakes.[citation needed] Individuals with this disorder gain satisfaction through their antisocial behavior and lack remorse for their actions.
Not saying that couldn’t be the case. It would have to be, if he were actually using PEDs this time around.
Stepping away from the pee thing
- very very far away thank you – 30 minutes is a long time for anyone who wanted to mess a result up to do so. Isn’t it documented that guys would wipe soap from their wrists and that would contaminate samples? I’m sure there are things that can be applied that would go into the sample. I think the time frame of 30 minutes is long enough to do simplistic silly stupid moves to cause a test to bonk. Just saying this as the topic above involves planning and work, and I just think there’s simpler things to do to toy with it. The main thing is remaining in site of the tester. No idea how accurate hair samples are but show history maybe? And I’d think in 30 minutes, things could be injected to offset something funny in the blood. Inject and wait.
I don’t think (almost don’t care with this one) he did anything but again, I give him the dumbass award, for leaving site of the tester, permission or not, as it has shown, has opened up such chatter. The man knows rules better than most and he simply knows these rules. Ugh.
"...if you're not going to pull through, I'm going to attack you." ~CVV (ToBC Stg 4)
Interesting debate about what can be done in twenty minutes time to tamper with test results, but...
Again, how many tests have occurred without incident? I think it’s like other’s have said, it’s not what he did in the time out of sight, but that he was out of sight. Who’s to blame, if the tester warned Lance not to leave then he’s screwed, if no warning was given and it was only noted after the test that Lance departed then he’s probably still screwed, if he was given permission (highly unlikely, and would show the incompetence of the tester) then LA might have a prayer. Maybe I’m naive about doping and masking agents, but all the talk about what he could have done in 20 minutes sounds so Mission Impossible-esque. I agree that no cheating and covering up was taking place, but it’s seems highly possibly LA will be going down on a breach of protocol.
I'm trying to stay away about Lance himself.
I was more just trying to state that in 20-30 minutes, many things could be done by a rider if they wanted to mess with results. And more than just the switching of urine. If one cheats, they have things to do to help soften getting caught.
I don’t like doping, and I admit I am not as knowledgable on it as loads of others, especially those directly in the sport at those levels. But, in my opinion, knowing and reading the things I have, there’s a lot that riders (and other athletes) do to get away with things. I’m afraid if I read even more about it, I would be extremely sad to know people go to serious extremes for a win.
"...if you're not going to pull through, I'm going to attack you." ~CVV (ToBC Stg 4)
in that article that was posted recently,
and the guy was talking about this before this incident came up, he clearly thought it was possible to alter both blood and urine samples if the rider had 30 minutes of unsupervised time – he was complaining about the fact that in the past after a race the winner was not chaperoned to the test but was alone in the team car for a good amount of time before the testing was done. So at least from that guy’s point of view, it’s clearly possible.
That would be the reason for the rule, i would think.
Uhmm... yeah
No longer that I call them tights, I call them freedom ware.
by TheFigurehead on Apr 10, 2009 3:54 PM EDT up reply actions
75 comments later
I can’t help but think that Chris had this pretty well summed up in the title of the original post.
However Jens (how many howevers can I type?)
I do not see in many places these important I think points:
1/ Until the drug-tester is legally documented as a drug tester (verified by UCI etc) has drug test legally been inititated?
2/ even if urine switched, “cleaned” or something by soap etc, blood and hair testing goes far above level of urine testing so irrelevant even if urine not Lance’s – and as said above DNA of blood and hair would show that urine DNA is not Lance’s (unless I read incorrectly above)
Oh, let's belabor this a bit more...
Both points are good, in regards to the 2nd, I didn’t think there was enough masking that could take place in a 20 minute period to alter hair, blood and urine samples. Some people seem to think that Lance disappeared for 20 minutes and came back and handed the tested the samples, seriously, that’s the impression I’ve gotten from some comments.
It’s your 1st point where I think Pat McQuaid has sided with Lance.
Also, with all these clear rules and protocols for testing, why isn’t there a requirement to have at least two people (tester and a witness) for these testings? That doesn’t just seem logical but ethical.
I don’t know what to make of LA’s comments that he feels sure that they are going to ban him from racing in France. This whole thing wreaks to me.
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