Nog eens even opfrissen: “Whilst cycling recovers from continuing doping controversies and the admission that Lance Armstrong cheated during his career, most notably during the Tour de France, we are in a transition period for the sport. However, we feel there remain areas in which the sport can move forward in repairing previous doubts about riders performances and ensuring that those performances are genuine and honest. Bike Pure are calling on contenders of major grand tours such as the Tour de France to be more transparent. In an unblemished sporting arena, there should be no reason whatsoever for any athlete to have to convince the public that their performances are genuine, but unfortunately, due to the tarnished history of Tour de France podium finishers in recent years, there is still room for improvement. We are hoping that current grand tour podium finishers can make more data available within the public domain in order to alleviate any concerns there may be about questionable performances. Of course, it is not a stipulation that riders must produce data but we feel strongly that by doing so would provide serious evidence that the sport is changing. If podium finishers of grand tours were to provide information such as SRM power data, heart rates and VO2 max it would provide affirmation in the belief that we are entering a new era for the sport. Obviously there may be concerns that rivals could use the information to gauge what condition a rider may be in if released during the event, but releasing such information after an event would go a long way in sending a clear and concise message that performances are genuine. We often hear riders and teams making statements they are clean and that performances are genuine, but we see little firm evidence to back this up, especially amongst podium finishers of 3 week Tours. It would speak volumes for the sport and also for the riders themselves if we saw more information. This information could also be stored to become a benchmark in years to come to gauge performances and provide a valid means of tackling doping in sport. We contacted Team Sky’s Chris Froome on this issue some weeks ago, asking if he would be willing to produce his data during or after the Tour. We didn’t receive a direct response however he did pass the email to his team. We received a phone call on 20th June from Fran Millar, Head of Business operations for Team Sky who said Froome wouldn’t be making any of his data public. Bike Pure also asked if Froome would be willing to make data available after the Tour and we have not received a response as yet. Many will know that Froome aligned with our organisation some years ago whilst riding for Team Barloworld. We have asked for clarification from Chris on a number of occasions in the last 18 months via email and direct message on Twitter if he still wished to form part of our organisation. As a result of not receiving such clarification from Chris or Team Sky in recent days we have made the difficult decision to remove his bio page from our website. This in no way insinuates that Froome is a suspicious rider but we feel that if riders do not support our organisation then there is no reason for us to promote them as such. For those who ask ‘Why should riders release their data?’, our reply would simply be ‘Why wouldn’t you?’. World opinion is that pro cycling is tainted and as such, many cycling fans have become non believers. Bike Pure are campaigning for more transparency and emphasis on the publication of data which over time, will help bring the non believers back to the sport. Bike Pure is a not for profit organisation and believes in the principle values of transparency, integrity and fairness in sport.”
Posted on: Mon, 15 Jul 2013 06:12:51 +0000
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