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Funky Papa said:
They spend a great deal of time outside. It could happen.
Landis doping scandal looming over Tour de France
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They spend a great deal of time outside. It could happen.
Kung Fu Jedi
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Espn is reporting that Landis isn't testing for high levels of testosterone, but instead a high testosterone to epitestosterone ratio. They are also saying that it could be beer that he drank the night before, as others have noted, or possibly a cortisone shote that he took for his hip pain. There may be a reasonable explanation after all. I'd hate to see such a great tour clouded by something like this.
blood-doping, same thing that Ullrich didKung Fu Jedi said:
you do high altitude training or take EPO, while you cannot be tested, then donate the resulting "high-power" blood, only to get it (or plasma) re-injected during actual competition
this cannot be detected by any means
PantherLotus
Professional Schmuck
No?
Kung Fu Jedi
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woodchuck said:
I was wondering the same thing when I wrote my blog on this earlier. Carbs from the beer perhaps? But still, this is the evening following the staget that he bonked on, and that doesn't seem likely.
Well, here are more factors to consider.
- The T:E ratio was 11:1
- However, T is not abnormally high; E is abnormally low.
- Alcohol can affect T:E ratio.
- So can cortisone, which Landis has been treated with to cope with pain from his blood-starved, disintegrating hip.
I think this will blow over.
- The T:E ratio was 11:1
- However, T is not abnormally high; E is abnormally low.
- Alcohol can affect T:E ratio.
- So can cortisone, which Landis has been treated with to cope with pain from his blood-starved, disintegrating hip.
I think this will blow over.
sonarrat said:
Unlikely this will blow over and that alcohol and his cortisone affected the T:E ratio that much. According to the cbc, the limit is 4:1 ratio. If the 11:1 figure is true, he'd have to drink a lot of beer and dope up on a lot of cortisone. I'm assuming the cortisone was approved or he wouldn't have been allowed to race.
Having a beer or two the night before isn't such a bad thing as long as you don't drink too much. Of course, no athlete in the world would get smashed the night before a big race. All that alcohol leads to dehydration, an athletes worst nightmare.
sonarrat said:
Well, obviously he tested for higher than normal testosterone levels, or this investigation wouldn't have been promopted.
In an analytical lab, you test the sample as a baseline, you try to calculate the concentration of a particular analyte (testosterone). If it's higher than what is deemed nominal, then concentrations of naturally occuring analytes(epitestosterone) are tested to see if it is nominal. If it is, then something is artificially inflating the first value and further tests are conducted. This is my take on it.
It has to be more than just ratios of hormone levels since lower concentration of epitestosterone would make no sense.
Summary: If epitestosterone has at nominal concentrations (comparable to other biological components) and testosterone was at a higher concentration then that would prompt for further investigations.
Anyways, Landis has requested tht sample B be tested, so we'll see what happens.
It seems a lot of American officials are giving "No comment" comments.
Kung Fu Jedi
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djkimothy said:
Actually, ever report I've seen say that the testosterone levels are NOT testing as high. That's not what set off the alarms.
If this is a natural thing, I can't help but wonder if the condition he was in after Stage 16 didn't play into the odd ratio.
sonarrat said:
Do you have a link?
See, working in a chemistry lab you get a sense of what chemists would say is "abnormal"
If his E levels were low (along with every other biological component) and his testosterone levels were found to be nominal concetrations of a man of his age and athletisism then this wouldn't be an issue. but because this is an issue leads me to believe that his testosterone levels were higher than normal. A low E rating doesn't make sense unless any drugs, approved by the governing body, lowers it. So far i have yet seen any reports that any drugs can lower it to levels as to create a T:E ratio of 11:1.
Chemists can easily calculate the absolute concentrations of testosterone in a body. this can be had in any 2nd year biochem lab. Do you really think all the lab techs just calculated integration ratios of his blood sample? No, they would calculate the concentrations of the constituents of his blood, and compare them with standard values. This is easy analytical chemistry here folks.
I hope it blows over, but athletes dope in EVERY DAMN SPORT! There were more than a few football and baseball players in my high school doing roid cycles during the season. It might come to a point where leagues will just have to allow the stuff in limited quantities, b/c otherwise they're just creating a black market for the stuff that will cater to people willing to pay the price (ie. professional athletes with disposable cash).
Oh, and Lance probably doped too. Let's be reasonable. Barry Bonds is getting burned at the stake despite being one of over a hundred guys clearly on the juice. Lance Armstrong trounced other athletes who later tested positive for doping, and he did this after cancer. Let's put it in perspective a bit. Does it matter? Not really. I naturally assume everyone is doping, so Lance is still the shit.
PEACE.
Oh, and Lance probably doped too. Let's be reasonable. Barry Bonds is getting burned at the stake despite being one of over a hundred guys clearly on the juice. Lance Armstrong trounced other athletes who later tested positive for doping, and he did this after cancer. Let's put it in perspective a bit. Does it matter? Not really. I naturally assume everyone is doping, so Lance is still the shit.
PEACE.Instigator
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Now we got the beer hypothesis out of the way, how about a conspiracy? Landis was set up! Someone switched his urine/blood sample!
Escape Goat
Member
Wasn't there a big scandal about the French ice skating team in the Olympics?
Damn, Frenchies, you can't win legit can ya.
Damn, Frenchies, you can't win legit can ya.
Pimpwerx said:I hope it blows over, but athletes dope in EVERY DAMN SPORT! There were more than a few football and baseball players in my high school doing roid cycles during the season. It might come to a point where leagues will just have to allow the stuff in limited quantities, b/c otherwise they're just creating a black market for the stuff that will cater to people willing to pay the price (ie. professional athletes with disposable cash).
Oh, and Lance probably doped too. Let's be reasonable. Barry Bonds is getting burned at the stake despite being one of over a hundred guys clearly on the juice. Lance Armstrong trounced other athletes who later tested positive for doping, and he did this after cancer. Let's put it in perspective a bit. Does it matter? Not really. I naturally assume everyone is doping, so Lance is still the shit.
LOL, I don't doubt a lot of people are on roids. And although results show otherwise, I am skeptical on Lance's performance shortly after a bout of cancer.
I don't think leagues should accpet any amount though, cause then the sport becomes a farce and it is no longer a competition between athletes, just chemistry experiments.
Willco said:
It's so easy these days to design a drug that would enhance athletes performance. Most analytical findings are done on GC with a variable amount of detection methods. All you need to do is design a drug that is thermally unstable under GC conditions, voila, not detectable.
Of course, new methods are being developed to obviate the need to run GCs, however, there is yet to be a chromatographic techniqe that can rival the GCs ability to separate compounds.
Sorry for DP btw...
Ratios are merely a standard to screen whether or not an athlete may have doped. If the ratios are high then more detailed investiagtions are prompted. As in, determining the absolute concentration of T compared to standard values.
I don't think this would be newsworthy if his blood sample was merely above the 6:1 ratio for his T:E. That's bad science and you don't usually report something unless you know in the most unambiguous manner that, yes, performance enhancers were involved. They most likely found his T:E higher than 6:1, then found that his testosterone levels were higher than normal. The allegations would have to have been reported after determining his T levels were high, cause it's the credibility of the scientist that are on the line for analytical level QA/QC.
sonarrat said:
Ratios are merely a standard to screen whether or not an athlete may have doped. If the ratios are high then more detailed investiagtions are prompted. As in, determining the absolute concentration of T compared to standard values.
I don't think this would be newsworthy if his blood sample was merely above the 6:1 ratio for his T:E. That's bad science and you don't usually report something unless you know in the most unambiguous manner that, yes, performance enhancers were involved. They most likely found his T:E higher than 6:1, then found that his testosterone levels were higher than normal. The allegations would have to have been reported after determining his T levels were high, cause it's the credibility of the scientist that are on the line for analytical level QA/QC.
djkimothy said:
In cycling, everything is newsworthy. The European media in particular are so hungry for doping scandals, especially concerning the much-hated Americans, that they will jump on anything. And the anti-doping federations seem perfectly content to feed that hunger, regularly crucifying athletes before there's any real reason to do so. They haven't even tested Landis' B sample yet!
Whether this ratio is indicative of doping or not is apparently not of concern. Just the fact that this number has come out has indeed been enough for all of this hubbub. No record of elevated levels - just a ****ing number.
castle007 said:
Well, sometimes it's by accident. But yah, if there's a designer drug out there that claims to be undetectable, then why wouldn't an athlete use it? Little do they know, scientist are not limited to detecting the substance itself but levels of natural constituents in the body.
sonarrat said:
Now that's just ridiculous...
Broad sweeping generalizations ftl.
They are in the process of testing his B samples. Do you have any idea how long it takes to analyze a sample while maintaining high integrity of QC/QA? My girlfriend is in an analytical lab right now and it take more than a day to find the concentration of a single analyte.
This is not ****ing CSI
djkimothy said:
Why is it ridiculous? You realize the stage that this positive is from was just a week ago, right? What makes you think they could have enough data? If it was an EPO positive, that would be another thing. But this takes time to analyze, and it is horrendously irresponsible to hang an athlete on insufficient data.
There shouldn't be a PEEP of this until the B sample is finalized.
sonarrat said:
According to the cycling governing body all it takes is a positive result from the A sample. This is why they went public with it. Landis only requested sample B to be done, as far as the officials are concerned, sample A holds unless B proves other wise. And if science has any integrity, Sample A and B are merely an original sample allocated to two different bottles. Or blood samples taken within a short amount of time.
It doesn't take time to analyze, you have no idea how easy Microsoft excel makes it. The only time consuming process is the wet lab part, preping the blood sample for analysis takes about 1/2 to 1 whole day. Analytical detection through whatever means takes 1.5 days. Analysis can be done over lunch. If these guys are credible, then two teams are probably doing the same thing simultaneously to see if the results are similar.
The reason the experimental takes so long is cause they have to run the sample at least 3 times each with a column wash between each runs. And each run takes about 20 minutes depending on what they're looking for, in rare cases it can take longer. Then they have to calibrate it which takes forever to do.
And BTW, this is the ridiculous statement.
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Sonarrat, cheer up. There's a silver lining in all this. Landis is living in the shadow of Armstrong, despite his win.
However, if his second test is positive, he will forever be known as the first (and only?) Tour de France winner to be stripped of his title. That kind of notoriety lives on for ages.
However, if his second test is positive, he will forever be known as the first (and only?) Tour de France winner to be stripped of his title. That kind of notoriety lives on for ages.
djkimothy said:
You're wrong. A positive B sample is also required before any sanction can be taken. The option that Landis had was to either have it tested, or tell them not to test the B sample at all, which is an automatic guilty plea. (Ullrich did that when he tested positive for a recreational drug a few years ago.)
Here's Landis' statement.
Cloudy said:
:lol
djkimothy said:
As I've said for years, I wouldn't give a damn if doping was made legal in all sports. Floyd's performance wouldn't be any less incredible in my eyes even if he was a walking chemistry set.
For his sake I hope he's able to get off...but if he doesn't, I'd be lying if I said it wouldn't make me chuckle. Fans and the media are still hopelessly naive about performance enhancements.
MrSardonic
The nerdiest nerd of all the nerds in nerdland
every winner for the last 15 years was doping...and the guys finishing in 2nd. Armstrong has old samples retested for drugs they now know exist and he was found to be using them in his previous wins.
Vaandaviii
Member
Willco said:
"Viva la Armstrong!" is like saying armstrong is a woman. You have to improve your Spanish. He is only half a woman.
Vaandaviii
Member
Paper: Landis Had Synthetic Testosterone
"Tests show that some of the testosterone in Floyd Landis' system at the Tour de France was synthetic and not naturally produced by his body as he claimed, according to a newspaper report.
The French antidoping lab testing the American cyclist's samples determined that some of the hormone came from an external source, The New York Times reported on its Web site Monday night, citing a person at the International Cycling Union with knowledge of the result.
The finding undermines the defense that Landis has stood behind since he tested positive for an elevated ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone following the 17th stage of the Tour de France, where he staged a stirring comeback in the Alps to make up for a poor performance the day before.
Looking and sounding defiant, Landis said Friday that his body's natural metabolism -- not doping of any kind -- caused the result, and that he would undergo tests to prove it.
''We will explain to the world why this is not a doping case but a natural occurrence,'' Landis said at a news conference in Madrid, Spain.
But after determining that Landis's ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone was more than twice the limit of 4:1, the lab performed a carbon isotope ratio test on the first of Landis's two urine samples to determine whether it's natural or synthetic, the person told the Times.
Landis officially requested the testing of his backup urine sample Monday for an elevated testosterone ratio, and results were expected sometime this week. If the ''B'' test is negative, Landis would be cleared. If it's positive, which Landis' lawyers say they expect, he could be stripped of his Tour victory and banned for two years.
But the result showing synthetic testosterone does not need to be confirmed with a second test, said Dr. Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and a spokesman for the American College of Sports Medicine.
''The rules say that it is a violation, but if you can show that the athlete had no fault or no significant fault, there could be a mitigation of the sanction,'' Wadler told the Times. ''No matter how it got there, the athlete has to show how it got into his or her body. It could have been sabotage or contaminated dietary supplements, or something else, but they have to prove how the testosterone got there.''
The Times said Landis was in New York on Monday night and could not be reached for comment.
Testosterone is a naturally occurring male hormone that is banned when it is found in a ratio greater than 4:1 to another hormone, epitestosterone.
Oscar Pereiro of Spain, who finished second overall in the Tour de France, would be declared the winner if Landis loses the Tour de France title. It would be the first time in the history of the Tour of France that the winner has been disqualified for doping."
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/sports/AP-CYC-Landis-Doping.html
D'oh!
"Tests show that some of the testosterone in Floyd Landis' system at the Tour de France was synthetic and not naturally produced by his body as he claimed, according to a newspaper report.
The French antidoping lab testing the American cyclist's samples determined that some of the hormone came from an external source, The New York Times reported on its Web site Monday night, citing a person at the International Cycling Union with knowledge of the result.
The finding undermines the defense that Landis has stood behind since he tested positive for an elevated ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone following the 17th stage of the Tour de France, where he staged a stirring comeback in the Alps to make up for a poor performance the day before.
Looking and sounding defiant, Landis said Friday that his body's natural metabolism -- not doping of any kind -- caused the result, and that he would undergo tests to prove it.
''We will explain to the world why this is not a doping case but a natural occurrence,'' Landis said at a news conference in Madrid, Spain.
But after determining that Landis's ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone was more than twice the limit of 4:1, the lab performed a carbon isotope ratio test on the first of Landis's two urine samples to determine whether it's natural or synthetic, the person told the Times.
Landis officially requested the testing of his backup urine sample Monday for an elevated testosterone ratio, and results were expected sometime this week. If the ''B'' test is negative, Landis would be cleared. If it's positive, which Landis' lawyers say they expect, he could be stripped of his Tour victory and banned for two years.
But the result showing synthetic testosterone does not need to be confirmed with a second test, said Dr. Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and a spokesman for the American College of Sports Medicine.
''The rules say that it is a violation, but if you can show that the athlete had no fault or no significant fault, there could be a mitigation of the sanction,'' Wadler told the Times. ''No matter how it got there, the athlete has to show how it got into his or her body. It could have been sabotage or contaminated dietary supplements, or something else, but they have to prove how the testosterone got there.''
The Times said Landis was in New York on Monday night and could not be reached for comment.
Testosterone is a naturally occurring male hormone that is banned when it is found in a ratio greater than 4:1 to another hormone, epitestosterone.
Oscar Pereiro of Spain, who finished second overall in the Tour de France, would be declared the winner if Landis loses the Tour de France title. It would be the first time in the history of the Tour of France that the winner has been disqualified for doping."
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/sports/AP-CYC-Landis-Doping.html
D'oh!
TSN is reporting that the B sample results should be in by Saturday.
http://tsn.ca/oln/news_story.asp?id=172964
But in light of the NYTimes article, there's not much good going for Landis.
http://tsn.ca/oln/news_story.asp?id=172964
But in light of the NYTimes article, there's not much good going for Landis.
Kung Fu Jedi
Member
Read that this morning as well. Not looking good at all, and I'm not sure how the B Sample can save him at this point. So disappointing.
Just chuck out all the rules and let them juice on whatever they want. So much cheaper and no scandals. We know they are on the something because nobody can bike up a mountain everyday at top speed for a month, but now they can advertise it. Just like pro wrestling. Everyone knew it was fake, but they changed it to sports entertainment to save the PPV costs.
Instigator
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sonarrat said:
How many reported cases of doping in sports have been the results of mistakes or tampering in the lab? I know the principle you are defending, but Landis was guilty at 99,9% certainty with the positive result of the A sample.
He cheated and he got caught. It would have been nice if he admitted it when the news first came up, but the vast majority of known doped athletes just deny everything.
Wax Free Vanilla
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