# Beating the bio passport with EPO



## ElvisMerckx (Oct 11, 2002)

From today's NY Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/26/sports/cycling/26micro.html?ref=sports


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## 3rensho (Aug 26, 2003)

Just read this at lunch! Does not bode well for any vision of a clean sport. I sure hope WADA has some BA tests hidden up their sleeves but I'm not going to bet the house on it. 

I know, the cheaters will always be ones step ahead of the testers. It sucks but I'm beginning to thing this is going to be true for some time to come. 

I personally have viewed any stunning or unexpected result through the same self-imposed, cheater filter that always forces me to include the (internal) caveat, "If he/she's clean...". I feel this way about Peter Stetina, Peter Sagan, Taylor Phinney and any new, successful rider. It's sad but I think that's where we're at with racing today. 
Seeing Liquigas ride so strongly this Spring made me wonder the same thing.


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## Rex Hunter (Apr 7, 2010)

ElvisMerckx said:


> From today's NY Times:
> 
> http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/26/sports/cycling/26micro.html?ref=sports


I wouldn't advise people to get carried away with this. The amount of EPO we are talking about here is very small and will just aid the athlete a little bit during the off season. It's probably more of a psychological boost than anything else.


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## ultimobici (Jul 16, 2005)

Rex Hunter said:


> I wouldn't advise people to get carried away with this. The amount of EPO we are talking about here is very small and will just aid the athlete a little bit during the off season. It's probably more of a psychological boost than anything else.


Evidently you missed this bit.


> Working with sports medicine doctors, cyclists discovered that carefully controlled, small doses of EPO eluded the urine test while still raising their red cell count. Rather than using the hormone to create high-octane blood effectively, microdoses of EPO let athletes put in superhuman hours of training without suffering the natural consequence of fatigue.


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## AJL (Jul 9, 2009)

And microdoses of EPO during a race would have the same effect (reducing fatigue) - though it's more risky. It allows a rider to put in a strong kick or two on, for example, a mountain top finish - while other riders are only able to respond by upping their tempo a bit.


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## Rex Hunter (Apr 7, 2010)

ultimobici said:


> Evidently you missed this bit.


To the lay man all training hours are super human for pro cycling. Like I said, if true this is just helping them a little in the off season with training. I wouldn't over state its impact.


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## Dwaynebarry (Mar 16, 2004)

Rex Hunter said:


> To the lay man all training hours are super human for pro cycling. Like I said, if true this is just helping them a little in the off season with training. I wouldn't over state its impact.


Hard to say. It clearly doesn't look like riders are having the wild swings in form they use to have but is it enough to make an also ran a podium contender?

We know that as the sport is transitioning to being cleaner guys who were still full-bore have been winning a lot (and getting caught). Hard to say if the mind set is still "as long as you don't get caught, it isn't cheating" or if there really has been a cultural shift where riders are unwilling to dope. Look at the Giro, lots of known dopers at the sharp end.


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## Coolhand (Jul 28, 2002)

Rex Hunter said:


> To the lay man all training hours are super human for pro cycling. Like I said, if true this is just helping them a little in the off season with training. I wouldn't over state its impact.


I wouldn't understate it either. A very small improvements lead to big results at that level.


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## sokudo (Dec 22, 2007)

Why is a micro-dose of EPO doping but vitamins or electrolytes are not?


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## MarshallH1987 (Jun 17, 2009)

sokudo said:


> Why is a micro-dose of EPO doping but vitamins or electrolytes are not?


Mostly because vitamins and electrolytes can be found in food as part of a normal diet. But that is a very good question. Caffeine is a stimulant and very powerful performance boosting substance, is drinking coffee doping?


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## den bakker (Nov 13, 2004)

MarshallH1987 said:


> Mostly because vitamins and electrolytes can be found in food as part of a normal diet. But that is a very good question. Caffeine is a stimulant and very powerful performance boosting substance, is drinking coffee doping?


mostly because EPO is an a doping list and salts are not :thumbsup: :idea:


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## Dwaynebarry (Mar 16, 2004)

sokudo said:


> Why is a micro-dose of EPO doping but vitamins or electrolytes are not?


For the most part taking more vitamins doesn't do anything for you, only if you have a deficiency do you have a problem.

A similar arguement that by taking the various hormones (EPO, testosterone, growth hormone, etc.) all riders are doing is maintaining normal levels or their "health" has been made. Afterall, the stress of a 3 week grand tour should cause most riders to "deteriorate" (e.g. look at Lance's blood parameters from the Giro vs. from the Tour last year). 

On the other hand many dopers take supraphysiologic levels or hormone-derivatives that don't even exist naturally (e.g. most anabolic steriods) and drive their physiology to a place it could never exist at a natural level (e.g. high hematocrits, the muscle mass/strength of some weightlifters).


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## ZoSoSwiM (Mar 7, 2008)

Next they'll figure out a way to make altitude tents illegal. 

WADA is on a witch hunt and it's giving cycling a worse image daily... 

It's logical that microdoses would work and be less detectable than large doses. I'm not surprised by this at all.


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## Coolhand (Jul 28, 2002)

MarshallH1987 said:


> Mostly because vitamins and electrolytes can be found in food as part of a normal diet. But that is a very good question. Caffeine is a stimulant and very powerful performance boosting substance, is drinking coffee doping?


Not any more- I think for a while they limited the amount of caffeine you could have in you, but that got dropped.


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## den bakker (Nov 13, 2004)

Coolhand said:


> Not any more- I think for a while they limited the amount of caffeine you could have in you, but that got dropped.


IIRC at the dose where it became illegal, the sideeffects more than cancelled the benefits (elevated heart rate etc).


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## Coolhand (Jul 28, 2002)

ZoSoSwiM said:


> Next they'll figure out a way to make altitude tents illegal.
> 
> WADA is on a witch hunt and it's giving cycling a worse image daily...
> 
> It's logical that microdoses would work and be less detectable than large doses. I'm not surprised by this at all.


Didn't France do this? Or was it another country? Or just a proposal- I remember reading about this somewhere and laughing at the stupidity of it.


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## MarshallH1987 (Jun 17, 2009)

den bakker said:


> mostly because EPO is an a doping list and salts are not :thumbsup: :idea:


lol, good point.


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## rubbersoul (Mar 1, 2010)

Rex Hunter said:


> To the lay man all training hours are super human for pro cycling. Like I said, if true this is just helping them a little in the off season with training. I wouldn't over state its impact.



The point is that is a newer, more sophisticated approach to doping / cheating, which is banned / not permitted to any extent.


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## rubbersoul (Mar 1, 2010)

Coolhand said:


> Didn't France do this? Or was it another country? Or just a proposal- I remember reading about this somewhere and laughing at the stupidity of it.



I've often wondered of the logic / ethics of this too. given that the physiological effect of the hypoxic tents is for the body to increase its own production of EPO (which is of course a naturally produced hormone), in contract to more simply injecting the recombinantly produced version made by Amgen or Janssen Ortho Biotech. Bizarre eh?
________
The View Condo Prathumnak


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## terzo rene (Mar 23, 2002)

(Altitude tents are against the rules in Italy)

Based on the estimated watts per kg numbers coming from the Giro they are definitely not getting that much benefit from whatever they are doing at this point. Garzelli had a wide margin of victory on Corones and was still 1:00 slower than last year's passport failing winner.


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## RHRoop (Nov 1, 2006)

The book Lance's War did a good job of explaining why EPO was so much more than high-octane fuel. That a pro-tour cyclist should see a decrease in hematocrit compared to an average person means that the biological passport should still be functional although perhaps less senstive. When a cyclist ends their season and recuperates for a month or two before going back to base miles their hematocrit should change (go up slightly). As they increase their training load it should drop. If it goes up that would be an indicator of doping even if EPO is not found in their test. I believe this one way that riders are selected for additional screening.


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## sokudo (Dec 22, 2007)

Dwaynebarry said:


> For the most part taking more vitamins doesn't do anything for you, only if you have a deficiency do you have a problem.
> 
> A similar arguement that by taking the various hormones (EPO, testosterone, growth hormone, etc.) all riders are doing is maintaining normal levels or their "health" has been made. Afterall, the stress of a 3 week grand tour should cause most riders to "deteriorate" (e.g. look at Lance's blood parameters from the Giro vs. from the Tour last year).
> 
> On the other hand many dopers take supraphysiologic levels or hormone-derivatives that don't even exist naturally (e.g. most anabolic steriods) and drive their physiology to a place it could never exist at a natural level (e.g. high hematocrits, the muscle mass/strength of some weightlifters).


Hormones, steroids, things that damage your health - sure, declare them doping.

But micro(!)-dose of EPO? 
Or autologous transfusions (done in moderation)?

As far as vitamins, - taking vitamin C and vitamin E is essential. Without them a rider gets tired fast.


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## AJL (Jul 9, 2009)

RHRoop said:


> The book Lance's War did a good job of explaining why EPO was so much more than high-octane fuel. That a pro-tour cyclist should see a decrease in hematocrit compared to an average person means that the biological passport should still be functional although perhaps less senstive. When a cyclist ends their season and recuperates for a month or two before going back to base miles their hematocrit should change (go up slightly). As they increase their training load it should drop. If it goes up that would be an indicator of doping even if EPO is not found in their test. I believe this one way that riders are selected for additional screening.


And during a grand tour, a cyclist's hematocrit should go down (rbc damage and rbc production decline due to the extreme biological stress). Tyler was bagged (after being warned many times) because his hematocrit kept going up as the tours progressed. Duh!


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## RHRoop (Nov 1, 2006)

AJL said:


> And during a grand tour, a cyclist's hematocrit should go down (rbc damage and rbc production decline due to the extreme biological stress). Tyler was bagged (after being warned many times) because his hematocrit kept going up as the tours progressed. Duh!


Good article today in CyclingNews.com about how the biological passport should work to target riders who don't see a decrease in reticulytes and their rbc.


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## AJL (Jul 9, 2009)

RHRoop said:


> Good article today in CyclingNews.com about how the biological passport should work to target riders who don't see a decrease in reticulytes and their rbc.


Thanks!


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## danl1 (Jul 23, 2005)

I'm still reading all of this in light of the basketball traveling analogy: The sportsmen's view is that it's 'cheating' only if you get caught - pushing hard up against the edges of the rules is part of the game.

Not that I agree with that on an ethical basis, but as one draws the line between medically assisting the horrible wear and tear that training / racing bring , vs actively 'enhancing' performance... there's some fuzz there.

While the sport, athletes, and governing bodies will never admit to it, all they'll ever be able to do is set a baseline for how far is 'too far'. The biological passport is a more sophisticated version of a 50% hematocrit, but it's essentially the same thing:

"Here, but no farther."


I long suspected that any Postal/Disco doping was likely out-of-competition, more about enabling superhuman training effort than a raceday biological NOX tank. Landis' 2006 error was that he got desperate and triggered the nitrous in race. 

(Allegedly, room for doubt, just talking, not being a hater, etc.)


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## danl1 (Jul 23, 2005)

Add:

One could argue that doping to a line set by the biological passport methodology is inherently more fair than a truely 'clean' sport. 

Kinda like assigned weight in horseracing, only in reverse.


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## prs77 (Dec 13, 2004)

danl1 said:


> Add:
> 
> One could argue that doping to a line set by the biological passport methodology is inherently more fair than a truely 'clean' sport.
> 
> Kinda like assigned weight in horseracing, only in reverse.


That's an interesting idea. It's similar to what Nascar does. Everyone has the same restrictions on their car, so it supposedly comes down to talent. If everyone had the same hematocrit, then teamwork, tactics, training, etc would determine the race and not whether someone had a gene that gave them a 2% increase in hematocrit over the next rider.


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## den bakker (Nov 13, 2004)

prs77 said:


> That's an interesting idea. It's similar to what Nascar does. Everyone has the same restrictions on their car, so it supposedly comes down to talent. If everyone had the same hematocrit, then teamwork, tactics, training, etc would determine the race and not whether someone had a gene that gave them a 2% increase in hematocrit over the next rider.


kicking the can? So now it would be the one that genetically works well at a low hem. value and can now boots it legally that would have the "unfair" advantage. How did that improve things?


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## euro-trash (May 1, 2004)

Coolhand said:


> Didn't France do this? Or was it another country? Or just a proposal- I remember reading about this somewhere and laughing at the stupidity of it.


Italy did this. I always found it funny guys said they were using tents at the Tour. In the middle of a 3 week Tour you need maximum recovery, making an altitude tent counter-productive. I always assumed they made that statement so if they came back with a 'crit over 50%, they could claim it was an accident that resulted from over-use of the tent...


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## danl1 (Jul 23, 2005)

den bakker said:


> kicking the can? So now it would be the one that genetically works well at a low hem. value and can now boots it legally that would have the "unfair" advantage. How did that improve things?


The argument isn't to try to equalize for genetics. That's always an acknowledged part of the superiority of a given athlete, so no change here.

The argument is that a sufficiently rigorous testing equalizes "enhanced preparation" to a mostly level setting. 

If the argument against doping is about what the athletes are doing to their bodies long-term, a low setpoint mitigates the problem, and there's likely some truth that certain drugs at appropriate levels could decrease long-term harm. 

If the argument is about fairness in sport, it tackles the problem far better than any misplaced belief that cheaters can be directly caught by pass/fail chemical presence tests. We've been past that for a long, long time.


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