Lance Armstrong

[dolphins4life]

So how did he pass these tests?

[EKnight]

You can be nearly certain that by the time a drug is "testable" for, it's no longer used by professionals and has made its way down to your local gym. Performance pharmaceuticals are years ahead of the tests for them. -EK

[dolphins4life]

Doesn't really answer my question

[bsmooth]

It does not really matter how he passed these tests. He is no different than all the other top riders at the same time who also tested positive for PED's.
Cycling has got to be the dirtiest sport that regularly tests for PED's.

[dolphins4life]

^^^^

So what do you think they should do to prevent cheating?

How can we ever be sure that any athlete is clean?

[EKnight]

What do you mean it doesn't answer your question? Of course it does- he passed the tests because they weren't testing for what he was on. How can we be sure our athletes are clean? Easy: I've presumed for years that none of them are. -EK

[dolphins4life]

I thought when you analyze a urine sample, everything shows up.

[Phishfan]

I thought when you analyze a urine sample, everything shows up.

No, tests don't just come back and tell you everything in someone's system. Tests look for specific markers within your body. If a drug is new the test would not know what marker to be looking for. That is a very layman way of describing it.

[dolphins4life]

^^^^

I'll have to talk to the techs who work in the lab I work at

[EKnight]

No, tests don't just come back and tell you everything in someone's system. Tests look for specific markers within your body. If a drug is new the test would not know what marker to be looking for. That is a very layman way of describing it.

Not only are they very specific, but testing for PEDs is not the same as a normal 5 or 10 panel test used for recreational drugs. PED testing is much more expensive and time consuming. -EK

[Pappy13]

So how did he pass these tests?

He didn't. 3 things contributed.

1) He was using EPO. There was no testing done for EPO back when Lance was winning all those tours. The samples however were frozen and retested once a reliable EPO test came out and found that they were heavily laced with EPO.

2) He did actually test positive for EPO in a race later, but because of his stature in the sport it was swept under the rug. The cycling association didn't want Lance to be found to be a PED user. Not only would it have been bad for Lance but it would have been bad for cycling as well.

3) Blood transfusions were used to used to clean the blood, but apparently this didn't really work all that well because once a test for EPO came out, Lance tested positive for it, so it was really 1 and 2 above that kept it from coming out.

[bsmooth]

^^^^

So what do you think they should do to prevent cheating?

How can we ever be sure that any athlete is clean?

Cycling is a joke with the level of cheating taking place. EPO has been rampant since the 80's. All the top riders during Lance's run has tested positive. Show a sport where all the top players tested positive for PED's for years.
As long as there is money and fame tied to winning, you will never get rid of PED's. All you can do is make it very hard to get away with it long term and ban anyone caught using them.