Equal Standards

When the Internet started buzzing a few days back with reports that various anti-doping agencies, primarily the French Anti-Doping Agency (AFLD), was making claims against Lance Armstrong, my curiosity was tickled, to say the least. I stood by, waiting to see what the next bit of news would reveal. Upon reading that the Tour winner’s “behavior” was bad, I had a strong desire to fly to France and yell at some folks. With my interest still peaked, or at least awake, I stayed tuned in until reading Lance’s official statement. Unless the man is sanctioned for this somehow, I will officially tune out – as soon as I finish this rant, that is.


To set the record straight, I am not suggesting that Lance or any other professional cyclist – any athlete, for that matter, should be exempt from drug testing. When I hear stories of athletes complaining about doping controls, I feel only a little worse for them than I do for people who move in to house next to the airport and then complain about the noise. Were you not paying attention when you signed up for this stuff? However, if you are going to ask a cyclist or any other athlete for samples of their urine, blood, hair, skin, nails, food off their plate, beer out of their ‘fridge and whatever else they are asking for these days, it’s high time for the people testing to get their collective acts together.


Despite my lackluster palmares, I have been to the doping control more times than I care to remember. It seems that my knack for being the “random” selected rider far outweighs my ability to win the lottery. The more of these things you do, the more you grow to resent them. For me, the more resentful I got, the more I would scrutinize the doping control protocol. While it was often the joke on my teams, that the control would consist of the first three finishers, a random, and me, I don’t think I ever did more than about 20 controls in a year. Lance’s control in question is number 24, according to him, and there are plenty more to come.


In 1994, while riding for the Coors Light Cycling Team, I was selected as one of the 2 “randoms” after the Core States US PRO Cycling Championship in Philadelphia. The nice people at the Adolph Coors Company saw fit to make us a bunch of 10th anniversary US PRO Championship Silver Bullets. Since my job was done for the day, I saw absolutely no problem knocking back a couple of the special edition 16 ouncers. Okay, I had 6 before my chaperone found me and informed me of how I’d be spending the next half hour or so. In most cases I would have wanted a representative from my team on hand, but I was just lubricated enough to feel comfortable representing myself.


I rolled into the hotel where the control was being held and climbed off my bike, leaning it against a giant planter, housing some obnoxious plant. I made my way to the control room and walked through the open door. This is where things started going wrong. First, the control was being administered to International Olympic Committee standards, not those of the UCI. Second, the doctor’s assistant was his roughly 15 year-old daughter, who’d brought her friend along to hang out. Third, the door to the small hotel room was never closed, meaning there was no private room in which to do all of the paperwork, pouring of urine, etc. The last thing I can remember was the lack of any beverages – not that I needed any more fluid in my system at that point, but providing it for us was part of the protocol that should have been followed.


To make matters worse, one of the podium members tested positive for a banned stimulant, but because the UCI protocols weren’t followed, his only punishment was to receive no prize money. This story occurred a long time ago, and times have changed fairly dramatically, but some things seem to have remained the same, based upon what I read into Lance’s explanation. If riders are expected to be held to a higher standard than the rest of the population, the governing bodies that control racing and the anti-doping agencies should be held to an equally high standard.