Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Thursday Roundup

Quote of the day

If Dick Pound says anything, he will say how this shows the fairness and due process of the Anti-Doping Crusade, neglecting to mention his previous excommunication of the heretic Jones.

Later, his consigliere will have the head of the lab taken out and shot. link
Marion Jones cleared, B sample negative, reported by AP via Yahoo. Jacobs takes the opportunity to bash the culture of leaks. Because the EPO test is tricky, Jacobs was not surprised by the negative B. This is presumably in relation to the B confirmation for Landis that was expected. He believes this should put some pressure on the Federations to clean up their acts -- this is undoubtedly prelude to the fight for Floyd.

Smarmy Dick sends the consigliere, according to an email quoting an AP report:
World Anti-Doping Agency chairman Dick Pound said "EPO is open to interpretation."

"Maybe the first one was made too hastily," the Montreal lawyer said in a phone interview Thursday with The Associated Press. "You wouldn't think there would be variations between the amount in sample A and sample B. I'm sure there will be some explanation forthcoming from the lab or from USADA.

"I think the test is good, you just have to know how to read it."
Gary Wadler tries to explain on NPR, but gives a whitewash to the labs. Says there are 183,000 tests a year, and only a handful of EPO tests that don't confirm with the B sample. His numbers make no sense, because there aren't anywhere near that many B samples tested -- I'd be surprised if there more than 100 EPO B samples tested in a year. If it's a handful of five of those that don't confirm an A sample, that's a 5% error, which seems atrocious to me.

Jones and Floyd, Bikebiz.uk chimes in, gives TBV huge plug. Gosh.
Leaves more questions than answers, says ScienceBlogger.
Floyd, get the number of Jones' lab, suggests catty blog.
Deserved Media bashing, by our friend Rant.

ANSWER PROVIDED: more wristbands. Why didn't I think of that?

Marketing skittishness about athletes, leading with particular comment on Floyd's endorsement values, from Knowledge @ Wharton. With Paris Hilton (Lance's rumoured squeeze) and Kobe Bryant references, we get sex and shark jumping in an academic article. Trifecta!

Portugese Blogger comments on doping, in charming machine translation: "The process is already too much stranger and lost all the legitimacy."
Tribute to a Brave cyclist, in Spanish blog (machine translated)

Grr, grumble, is it the corporate money in cycling? wonders blog.
Who heard of Landis before the bust? quizzes marketing blog.
Chemical Eye column touting IRMS re-run in Valley Sun

[updated 20:45]

3 comments:

Unknown said...

If Dick Pound says anything, he will say how this shows the fairness and due process of the Anti-Doping Crusade, neglecting to mention his previous excommunication of the heretic Jones.

Pound's being sued for libel in Austria; maybe he's got another one coming from Jones.

DBrower said...

Probably not in the US. Jones would almost certainly qualify for the "public figure" interpretation. It might be hard to prove that Dick spoke with "Actual malice and a reckless disregard for the truth", which is the applicable legal standard. He could always just plead arrogance and stupidity, and that he had reason to believe everything he said was true. There was no actual malice involved because he was, um, speaking for the Good of Sport.

TBV

Unknown said...

Probably not in the US.

Hmmm. Pound's a Canadian. I wonder what the laws on such matters are like there?