ASO still refusing to admit Astana in TDF

Fred Fredburger wrote:
Being stridently wrong about this
is what finally embarrassed Lafferty onto leaving.

I thought it was because his antimatter hero retired.

On Jun 4, 8:14*pm, "Mike Jacoubowsky" wrote:
"Tom Kunich" cyclintom@yahoo. com wrote in messagenews:nvGdnZ6ty9pZhNrVnZ2dnUVZ_tninZ2d@earth link.com...

"hizark21" wrote in message
...
ASO still refusing to admit Astana in TDF (http://www.cyclingnews.com/
news.php?id=news/2008/jun08/jun04news ).

It's simply ridiculous that the ASO is refusing to let Astana enter
the TDF. *The ASO should have put forth a set of condtions for Astana
to meet if they wished to enter the TDF. Astana is the dominant spring
team now and they deserve to ride in the TDF.

The Tour de France this year is one of the "Asterisk" races where the
winner will only be the winner because his real competition isn't there.

For that to happen it would take a guy like Cadel Evans to that he won't be
racing the TdF this year because, given the reduced stature of the event
without last year's winner, he would be better off sitting it out and
targeting the Olympic road race instead. I don't think that's likely to
happen.

--Mike Jacoubowsky
Chain Reaction Bicycleswww.ChainReaction.com
Redwood City & Los Altos, CA USA

Hey Mike what's so hard about the concept that Astana got put on
probation for a year, and banned from the big event? The collegiate
folks do this all the time, and it's usually for several years, and
don't try calling that "amateur" sports. This crap usually gets
applied in basketball and football who's budgets, and cash take exceed
pro-cycling I'd bet.
Just showing up and saying "I've changed" doesn't work in court for
repeat offenders most of the time. They still have to do the time.
Astana should shut up, stay clean, and make it impossible to easily
exclude them next year.
Bill C

On Jun 4, 4:17*pm, "Mike Jacoubowsky" wrote:
I would assume that ASO would argue that the good showing of Astana
proves that they're doping. That's the type of reasoning you're seeing
from the ASO management.
Well, they were on vacation a week before the start and came there and
kicked ass..'if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck'. Bruyneel and
Contador is the problem, Astana has nothing to do with it. Vino was
never a contender.

So the only way to prove you're clean is to lose convincingly? We know 2nd
place isn't enough (Zabel in his past life).

This is only indirectly about being clean or not. ASO has a real
problem with Bruyneel and Contador still has a cloud over him. I think
it's ASO's distaste for Bruyneel primarily. If Bruyneel wasn't the
director, I'll bet Astana would have been invited.

--Mike Jacoubowsky
Chain Reaction Bicycleswww.ChainReaction.com
Redwood City & Los Altos, CA USA

"Qui si parla Campagnolo-www.vecchios.com" wrote in
...
On Jun 4, 10:28 am, wrote:

On Jun 4, 7:56 am, hizark21 wrote:

ASO still refusing to admit Astana in TDF (http://www.cyclingnews.com/
news.php?id=news/2008/jun08/jun04news ).

It's simply ridiculous that the ASO is refusing to let Astana enter
the TDF. The ASO should have put forth a set of condtions for Astana
to meet if they wished to enter the TDF. Astana is the dominant spring
team now and they deserve to ride in the TDF.

I would assume that ASO would argue that the good showing of Astana
proves that they're doping. That's the type of reasoning you're seeing
from the ASO management.

Well, they were on vacation a week before the start and came there and
kicked ass..'if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck'. Bruyneel and
Contador is the problem, Astana has nothing to do with it. Vino was
never a contender.



Any argument about Astana ticking ASO off is specious, as Astana has
the right to participate, as a pro tour team. Even before the Pro
Tour, the top 15 rated teams were guaranteed a spot in the Tour de
France. Just another reason why the UCI is a necessary evil.

-ilan

On Jun 4, 4:46*pm, Victor Kan wrote:
On Jun 4, 2:14 pm, "Qui si parla wrote:

...

Bruyneel and Contador is the problem, Astana has nothing to do with it. '

Do you mean Bruyneel and Contador together are the problem, or each
individually are problems?

ASO says Contador by himself is not a problem:

http://velonews.com/article/77008/co...our-sweep-with...

“We have nothing against Contador, but rather against the team’s
repeated errors,” Tour director Christian Prudhomme told the Spanish
wire service, EFE. “If Astana doesn’t have any problems in 2008, we
would take a different decision for the next edition of the Tour de
France.”

Yep, I think the 'problem' is not Astana but Bruyneel.

Donald Munro wrote:
Fred Fredburger wrote:
Being stridently wrong about this
is what finally embarrassed Lafferty onto leaving.

I thought it was because his antimatter hero retired.

Kind of related. My memory is that the combination of LANCE's retirement
and Operation Puerto convinced Lafferty that cycling was clean. During
July of 2006, when Flandis won the tour, Lafferty was full of
observations about the tour that PROVED it was finally clean. Sample
posting:

http://tinyurl.com/4bxxc9

In article ,
Mike Jacoubowsky wrote:

The ASO just isn't making sense. Not so much in the exclusion of Astana, but
rather their atttitude about positive doping tests. They still consider it a
failure when they find someone testing positive, instead of evidence that
they can find and punish those doping. What was that latest thing they were
saying? That they're going to specifically target certain athletes because
of what happened last year, instead of randomized controls? I don't get it.
The randomized controls found Rasmussen didn't they? And Vino? And
Keschekin? But the fact that those guys were doping and caught is an
indication that doping controls aren't working?

Why do you believe ASO cares about doping? Astana is just this
season's UCI whipping boy, ( just like iBet was last season.) Once
the battle for control is over and the Pro Tour is dead, cycling
will be magically clean, just like soccer.

ASO wants control of the money and no doping scandals to dry up
the money. Finding dopers doesn't really help with either goal.

_ Booker C. Bense

Yes, but Astana has gotten rid of all the old management and most of
07's riders. Like I said before the ASO should have told Astana that
they have to resolve certain issues if they want to enter to the
TDF.

Bill C wrote:
On Jun 4, 8:14�pm, "Mike Jacoubowsky" wrote:
"Tom Kunich" cyclintom@yahoo. com wrote in messagenews:nvGdnZ6ty9pZhNrVnZ2dnUVZ_tninZ2d@earth link.com...

"hizark21" wrote in message
....
ASO still refusing to admit Astana in TDF (http://www.cyclingnews.com/
news.php?id=news/2008/jun08/jun04news ).

It's simply ridiculous that the ASO is refusing to let Astana enter
the TDF. �The ASO should have put forth a set of condtions for Astana
to meet if they wished to enter the TDF. Astana is the dominant spring
team now and they deserve to ride in the TDF.

The Tour de France this year is one of the "Asterisk" races where the
winner will only be the winner because his real competition isn't there.

For that to happen it would take a guy like Cadel Evans to that he won't be
racing the TdF this year because, given the reduced stature of the event
without last year's winner, he would be better off sitting it out and
targeting the Olympic road race instead. I don't think that's likely to
happen.

--Mike Jacoubowsky
Chain Reaction Bicycleswww.ChainReaction.com
Redwood City & Los Altos, CA USA

Hey Mike what's so hard about the concept that Astana got put on
probation for a year, and banned from the big event? The collegiate
folks do this all the time, and it's usually for several years, and
don't try calling that "amateur" sports. This crap usually gets
applied in basketball and football who's budgets, and cash take exceed
pro-cycling I'd bet.
Just showing up and saying "I've changed" doesn't work in court for
repeat offenders most of the time. They still have to do the time.
Astana should shut up, stay clean, and make it impossible to easily
exclude them next year.
Bill C

On Jun 5, 11:57*am, hizark21 wrote:
Yes, but Astana has gotten rid of all the old management and most of
07's riders. Like I said before the ASO should have told Astana that
they have to resolve certain issues if they want to enter to the
TDF.



They have. They told them "Prove it by staying clean for a year."
Everyone who went there knew what had happened, and if they expected a
free pass then they were idiots, or lied to. The grief caused to ASO
by Astana is huge, and I see no reason for them to make AQstana earn
their way back in by being clean for a year. Too bad they can't get a
study done on what the doping by teams cost them in revenue and force
the teams to pay the bill before getting back in too. This free pass
**** is messed up.
Bill C

hizark21 wrote:
Yes, but Astana has gotten rid of all the old management and most of
07's riders. Like I said before the ASO should have told Astana that
they have to resolve certain issues if they want to enter to the
TDF.

Of the 30 riders on their roster, 17 were there last year.
Most of last year's riders are still there. Which is to be
expected I suppose, since most if not all of the holdovers
would have multi-year contracts.

Bob Schwartz

On Jun 5, 7:12 am, Kyle Legate wrote:
dave a wrote:

On the other hand, I suspect that one of the top stories during the TdF
will be the exclusion of Astana. That's still exposure.

Astana doesn't sell anything. Exposure is meaningless.

What about for making benefit glorious nation of Kazakhstan?

Jeff