The Cycling Independent Reform Commission (CIRC) made a number of recommendations to the UCI to combat doping, noting that although the situation has improved since 2008, cheating has not been eradicated. They suggest the UCI's Cycling Anti-Doping Foundation (CADF) integrate a variety of sources of information on doping to better target testing, and open the overnight window on testing.
The CIRC found that riders are still doping, but the performance gains that result from practices such as micro-dosing the blood booster EPO or steroids are smaller than what was seen prior to the implementation of the biological passport. Rather than have performance enhancement of 10-15 per cent, they write that micro-dosing EPO might only boost a rider 3-5 per cent.
"This has had a significant impact on the doping landscape today because by reducing the performance gains, riders will start to believe that they can have a career riding clean. This is a key development in the fight against doping."
ADVERTISEMENT
The CIRC acknowledged that an "anti-doping framework protects the very essence of sport". Even if 'only' 20 per cent of the peloton is doping to a performance gain of 3-5 per cent, which still creates a great inequality in the races. The sport might not be the farce it was in the decades past, where sprinters started dropping climbers in the mountains, but it's clear from the CIRC report that the situation is still serious. The biological passport, while helpful, is working in a similar fashion to the 50% hematocrit limit: riders saw the limit as permission to dope up to that level, and they now may use the information available to them in the biological passport to dope just enough to not trip red flags on their blood profile.
Because the ADAMS system makes a rider's blood profile available, and this information could be used to adjust a doping scheme, the CIRC recommends "there should be a time lag between testing and the publishing of information on ADAMS".
Although the CIRC interviewed a large number of people involved in cycling, they could not nail down a good estimate of what percentage of the peloton is still doping. Some say 20 per cent, some think as many as 90 per cent are still cheating.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest News http://ift.tt/1MnHqcr
No comments:
Post a Comment