Yes - clearly the USADA are far too conservative in their approach and should bring more charges - Edit 1
Before modification by snoopcester at 29/08/2012 05:55:56 PM
of course, i can't find any info on the two losses so i'm sorry i can't offer more than just conjecture as to why arbitration is so successful for USADA.
It would be the wins not the losses which are telling, without knowing the details of at least a sample of the wins then it is a completely empty stat that can be used to mislead.
but, by its nature, arbitration is the last word in a dispute, so there will be no appeal once the decision comes down, otherwise it's mediation and not arbitration.
You are still wrong, repeating an incorrect claim doesn't change that.
the process seems to be stacked against the athletes in general, not just specific to lance armstrong himself. but then, i am a less than casual fan of cycling and a non-interested party in this particular drama so i'm not going to pretend i have a stake in this story.
Sorry but this seems to me to be nothing but ideal conjecture based on a meaningless statistic.
i will end with this though: if armstrong cheated, then yes he deserves to have whatever punishment is fitting to someone who took drugs to gain an advantage over his competitors. but if the world of cycling is as corrupt as you insinuated in your previous post, then perhaps the entire sport should be done away with and everyone who participates should find another sport to occupy their need to compete. i am thinking about previous replies to this thread showing that the vast majority of the top riders in the tours armstrong won were all convicted of doping, and your previous post saying the UCI can't be trusted and i am wondering what exactly is holding it all together? if all the top riders cheat, and the agency involved with enforcement is mishandling samples, and the agency involved in creating the rules and awards is on the take, what the hell is everyone still competing for?
Why throw away a sport a lot of people enjoy? The fact so many of the top riders from the Armstrong period have been caught shows the systems in place work - frankly it is in a better place than I suspect most sports are, because for all the problem it has it offers lower rewards and more chance of being caught than pretty much any other major sport.
It is also worth noting that cycling is clearly much cleaner now - riders are performing at a noticeably lower level than they did during the Armstrong/ EPO era. The Armstrong case is one of the final steps in it though - it shows everyone in cycling who thinks about doping that no matter how big they become and how long they get away with it for, one day they will be caught. Just need to get rid of McQuaid out of the UCI... but cycling is hardly unique in having a president who shouldn't be trusted to run a newspaper stand honestly.
Edit: Also, forgot to add this - this case shows a key part of the system in operation, which is that there is a system of overlapping jurisdiction. The UCI is reckoned to be implicated in what went on... but the USADA is able to step in and investigate.