Sir Bradley Wiggins the drug cheat?

Yet more cycling theatre!

Some papers are today leading with Wiggins being a drug cheat based on the report of the Government Select Committee that has been looking into the matter for quite some time now.

As most things in cycling not much is clear cut.

Basically it looks as though Wiggins and the Sky Team have been playing the system to maximise cyclist performances by using normally banned performance enhancing drugs by use of exempt doctors notes - and one or two times 'off the record'!

Nothing can be proved but it probably is what happened - and no doubt all the other teams were doing the same.

Another massive black mark against the sport but to be honest no rules were really actually broken.

One interesting throwaway line I read was that Sir Mo Farah seemed to have done something similar - well imagine that!

"The DCMS committee was also "shocked" that four-time Olympic champion athlete Sir Mo Farah received an injection of the legal supplement L-carnitine before the 2014 London Marathon that was not recorded on Farah's medical records".

One of the irony's in all of this is that Chris Froome - who I don't believe is a drug cheat - is the only one of the three who has been caught out on in a drugs test and the only one of the three who hasn't been the nations hero or been knighted!

Article here -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cycling/43280081

Wiggins and Sky deny they've done anything wrong.

Do you need to have  asthma to be a top cyclist?

Cajunboy wrote:Do you need to have  asthma to be a top cyclist?

No, I've heard that a jet engine up your arse is quite helpful 

I've got a great deal of time for Walsh, in fact I've got his most recent book 'Seven Deadly Sins' about his pursuit of Armstrong.

I'm also pretty sure why there is bad blood between Froome and Wiggins as Froome (ironically considering the position he currently finds himself in) is not a drugs cheater, yet he had to throw away a Tour win in 2012 (the one that Wiggins won) and the Spanish Tour the year before - both of where he finished runner up and certainly should have won - but had to work for Wiggins knowing he had been taking advantage of the rules and 'unethically' boosting his performance by using these 'super' drugs.

I don't doubt that Walsh is correct in what he said but the bottom line is that nobody can prove that Wiggins/Team Sky broke any rules.

I said at the time - and was largely pilloried - that Froome was the much better rider than Wiggins and didn't deserve to ride second to him.

I doubt Wiggins/Sky were the only people bending the rules but I guess if you push the rules without ever breaking them - then why not do it?

All pure theatre and it will continue as the cycling season has already started and the first of the three main Tours - the Italian - is now only two months away.

It will be fascinating to see what the fall out of this (and Froome's failed test) results in.