Lance Armstrong and the Science of Drug Testing 482
Hugh Pickens writes "As the media reports that seven-time Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong says he will no longer fight doping charges from the US Anti-Doping Agency, which will strip him of his titles and ban him from competitive cycling for life, Tracee Hamilton writes that the Lance Armstrong vs. USADA fight is a tough one in which to take a side, because to believe USADA means suspending belief in the science of drug testing. 'If you take personalities out of the equation, you're left with pee in a cup and blood in a syringe,' writes Hamilton. 'Armstrong never failed a drug test. He was tested in competition, out of competition. He was tested at the Olympics, at the Tour de France, at dozens if not hundreds of other events. And he never failed a test.' Instead Travis Tygart, chief executive officer of the USADA, gathered a group of people who swear they saw Armstrong doping. 'If the results can be discarded in favor of testimony, then let's go right to the testimony phase and quit horsing around with blood and urine.' There has been no trial, no due process, but in the minds of many, that testimony outweighs the results of hundreds of drug tests. 'I don't know if Armstrong did the things he's accused of doing, and neither do you,' concludes Hamilton adding that it can't work both ways. 'Either a drug test is the standard, or it isn't.'"
Overlooking something important... (Score:5, Informative)
The USADA doesn't actually have the authority to strip Lance Armstrong of anything. The UCI is the only organization which can strip his titles from him and according to them the USADA hasn't even come close to meeting the burden of proof they require. So this is all just a giant smoke and mirrors act by the USADA. Armstrong has stopped fighting them because their accusations are irrelevant to him.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
No, that's not what's being said at all.
What the USADA is saying is that the kind of doping that Lance Armstrong was allegedly going through with (example, blood doping) is very hard to detect, and as such tests at the time and even now have problems picking it up. What they do have is more than a dozen people willing to testify that they saw him do it.
He already tried to block the decision via the US courts and failed. He still had plenty of options left to fight the charge, including actually turning up to discussions they invited him to and also involving independent bodies like the Court of Arbitration for Sport, but instead of that he's given up and said he can't be bothered. Whether that shows that he's just weary of being persecuted or he realised he can't win, or whether it's a tacit admission of guilt, will probably be debated for years to come.
As it is, he won't dispute the charge so he's guilty, and it's a sad ending regardless.
Re:If we're not for science, what are we for. (Score:5, Informative)
How about asking the doctor he paid over $400,000 to what he did to earn that payment? The doctor is synonymous with doping and blood transfusions to hide cheats, mainly from the old eastern bloc.
When 9 (or more) of Armstrong's team and support staff turn against him giving evidence, there's clearly something to what's going on.
All the evidence is against him. 9 people have given testimony against him. He has a very costly arrangement with the world's most renowned doping doctor cheat. Armstrong isn't fighting this, he's given up knowing he's finally be trapped in a web of evidence.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
This page is very informative and, if it is to be believed, implies that there was some scientific basis for calling him out as a cheat
http://nyvelocity.com/content/interviews/2009/michael-ashenden [nyvelocity.com]
Re:If we're not for science, what are we for. (Score:5, Informative)
That doesn't appear to be true. While the first test result for any given sample has come back clean, that potentially just means that he's been ahead of the curve on using doping methods that avoid detection. The USADA reports indicate that some of the re-tests on samples have come back as indicating doping. We'll probably find out more as they take their case to the ICU.
Of course this whole thing from cycling to baseball to the Olympics is ridiculous. With shades of Futurama, it'll be a relief when we can put all these stories behind us after performance enhancing drugs in all sports are mandatory.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
No, that's not what's being said at all.
What the USADA is saying is that the kind of doping that Lance Armstrong was allegedly going through with (example, blood doping) is very hard to detect, and as such tests at the time and even now have problems picking it up. What they do have is more than a dozen people willing to testify that they saw him do it.
He already tried to block the decision via the US courts and failed. He still had plenty of options left to fight the charge, including actually turning up to discussions they invited him to and also involving independent bodies like the Court of Arbitration for Sport, but instead of that he's given up and said he can't be bothered. Whether that shows that he's just weary of being persecuted or he realised he can't win, or whether it's a tacit admission of guilt, will probably be debated for years to come.
As it is, he won't dispute the charge so he's guilty, and it's a sad ending regardless.
The way I understand it, USADA can't strip Armstrong of anything.
UCI would have to do that, and UCI doesn't seem too inclined to do USADA's bidding here [cnn.com]:
The sport's governing body said Friday it expects USADA to submit documents "to the parties concerned," as the case threatens to wipe a cycling icon almost out of the record books.
"The UCI recognizes that USADA is reported as saying that it will strip Mr. Armstrong of all results from 1998 onwards in addition to imposing a lifetime ban from participating in any sport which recognizes the World Anti-Doping Code," the Switzerland-based organization said in a statement.
"As USADA has claimed jurisdiction in the case the UCI expects that it will issue a reasoned decision" explaining the action taken, the UCI said, adding that legal procedures obliged USADA to fulfill this demand in cases "where no hearing occurs."
In other words, USADA has to put all the evidence it has out, and it has to be a "reasoned decision".
The question is, what is a "reasoned decision"? A group of cyclists who WERE caught doping testifying they saw Armstrong doping - but only making that testimony when threatened with a lifetime ban if they didn't?
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think anyone has ever believed that passing a drug test mean the person was clean for sure. Why do they store samples for X number of years in order to re-test them in the future, with better technology? It's because if it's found out later that somebody was doping, then his results are invalid.
If we find out some other way besides a drug test that somebody was doping, then his results are invalid.
The great irony here is Lance Armstrong donated funds for the most sophisticated drug testing machines which are used in labs for testing bicycle athletes as well as others. I've spent years reading the science of testing and the amatuer science dopers used to beat the system, many of the biggest cheats were caught with the doping substances and/or equipment. But some have been caught thanks to advances in scients which now establish baselines and profile racers, where certain blood blood hormones decrease over a 3 week race and a spike or leveling off at a higher than expected level will get a rider pulled. Microdosing may provide a tiny (some studies suggest negligible boost) assist, which are hard to measure, particularly if a the substance is consumed during the event and no marker remains at the end.
Taking the personalities out of it .. Lance was either astoundingly good at managing it or he didn't dope. Putting the personalities into it, you have to ask, what Lance does - what's in it for these people to testify against him, other than being rewarded with reduced or suspended bans? USADA clearly muddied the water and it probably wouldn't hold up in a court of law with out solid evidence.
I'm of the opinion he's innocent until actually proven guilty, not just on the word of a lot of people who have various reasons to disparage him (word from inside his own teams is he's demanding and a tough gut to get along with.)
I wouldn't take anything Landis says as fact, after his attempt to blackmail Greg Lemond (by telling what he knew of what Greg suffered as a child.) He's a pretty low creature. The rest I can't really say one way or the other, though Hincapie I might find most believable.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Why does this matter? (Score:4, Informative)
I don't think you quite understand the A/B testing system. You produce two samples at the same time, an A sample and a B sample. The A sample is put through a quick and crude test that should have a high false positive rate and a low false negative rate. If the A sample comes up positive then the B sample is put through a much more thorough (expensive) test that should have both a low false positive and false negative rate. Only if the B sample fails is it considered a "failed" test because the B sample is the only one that "proves" (within an accuracy threshold) you were doping. The A sample only narrows the field.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
Very good call.
Pertinent quote.
I have never doped, and, unlike many of my accusers, I have competed as an endurance athlete for 25 years with no spike in performance, passed more than 500 drug tests and never failed one. That USADA ignores this fundamental distinction and charges me instead of the admitted dopers says far more about USADA, its lack of fairness and this vendetta than it does about my guilt or innocence.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
- Lance Armstrong [lancearmstrong.com], June 13, 2012
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:1, Informative)
First sentence is a lie. He did take doping products as part of his cancer treatment.
Second sentence is a lie. His performance changed by leaps and bounds, especially the developped power during climbs. Two lies in fact, they were several positive drug tests but they were rejected by UCI.
Re:Drug test the final standard? (Score:5, Informative)
What are the 3 common points between Jan Ullrich, David Millar, Bjarne Riis and Richard Virenque?
- All of them wore the Tour de France yellow jersey at some point (Riis and Ullrich won the tour outright, Virenque won the mountains classification several times).
- All of them eventually admitted to doping.
- None of them were ever caught by the so-called "drug tests". They were found out through other evidence (drug transport interception, raid on clinic, etc.)
The simple fact is that the drug tests in the 90s were a joke. They got a bit better in the 2000s, and that's how many of the later crop of dopers were caught (Floyd Landis, Tyler Hamilton, etc.) They're still nowhere near 100%. Extraneous evidence is still a major factor in catching dopers.
Is Lance Armstrong one of the greatest cyclists of all times ? Yes he is - he won 7 Tours while all his competitors were loaded with drugs too!
Did he do it without doping? If you believe that, either you don't follow cycling much or you're 12.