Right to be cynical about Sky

ianrobo wrote:This story says

ianrobo wrote:

This story says why people are cynical

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest-news/faster-than-lance-richie-porte-smashes-madone-record-again-162797

faster than LA ?? you have to query if you can be after what he did

If Quintana matched it would you say the same thing?

In 2013 Froome climbed Ax-3 Domaines quicker than Armstrong had done. Does that mean he must therefore be doping? If only it were that simple.

He was not fastest up Alpe d’Huez in the Tour that year so were all those in front doping?

This article discusses Nibali’s similarly high w/kg climbing in the 2014 Tour, so was he doped?

Boardman and Obree both eclipsed Moser’s (blood-doped) Hour record set at altitude. Boardman later beat records set by Indurain and Rominger. Nicole Cooke raced against and beat dopers. Does that make them all guilty? I’m sure it’s happened in other sports too.

It’s fine (and healthy) to be sceptical and I understand being cynical but your ‘evidence’ doesn’t even qualify as flimsy IMHO.

On a bad day on my CAAD10,
On a bad day on my CAAD10, I’m slower at climbing than I have been on good days on an old, late-70s, mid-end steel racer, which weighs nearly 3 kg more. On the flats and even mildly rolling roads, the 70s bike was pretty much as fast as the CAAD10. E.g. on a 7ish minute rolling road segment, the 70s racer was within 24s of the CAAD10 – and I had many more attempts on the CAAD10 to get lucky with the wind. The 70s racer also had a front wheel that likely hadn’t had its front hub regreased in one or two decades!

I’ve since got a high-end v early 80s Italian steel race bike, which (amazingly) weighs only 1.2 kg more than the CAAD10. It’ll be interesting to see how it compares to the CAAD10. Shouldn’t be anything in it on the flats, and probably only a little behind on climbs.

Don’t discount the old bikes! 🙂

ianrobo wrote:It is possible

ianrobo wrote:

It is possible he could do it naturally, that is why I am cynical but not saying they dope. He may have been at peak form then, all going for him etc.

However LA had that extra 10% or so from EPO etc in his system to help him.

’99 was when they were getting the jitters about testing and the power was going down (for a bit), he potentially had more distance to cover, as mentioned by others it was not ‘timed’ in any accurate sense, he was probably carrying over 15% more weight on a different bike, different day yadda yadda yadda. I’m cynical about a lot of things – this, not so much.

ianrobo wrote:good question

ianrobo wrote:

good question on weight but Porte in Paris to Nice looked very thin and thinner than before.

OK – but to go back to the original point; do you really think that there is something deeply suspicious about a modern, climbing oriented (normally shorter) professional rider, who is local to the climb and can pick when he rides, possibly starting from further down the road and weighing (as near as I can find out) about 10kg less actually going about 65 seconds than Armstrong did in 1999 (when power was, briefly, going down) ?