I confess. We here in the ivory towers of Launch Day headquarters are cycling fans. We like to ride our bikes, we like to follow local racing, we like to watch the pros race their bikes on tv. With the Tour de France lurking just around the corner, I thought I’d take a moment to talk blood doping.
Mennonite bad boy Floyd Landis got a lot of headlines recently. Floyd’s a polarizing bike racer (well, former bike racer) known mostly for getting stripped of his 2006 Tour de France title. Currently he’s pretty well known in cycling circles for ‘fessing up to doping his entire career (and naming more names on top of that, including Master of Universe His Lanceness, apparently triggering a federal investigation) after spending the last four years proclaiming his innocence, raising money to proclaim his innocence, writing a book about his innocence, trashing the labs and people that worked to bust him, etc etc- basically making a big mess after growing tired of lying about his innocence.
But I like Floyd.
In interviews (at least in interviews not related to doping) he’s always had this sort of surprising, refreshing candor and frankness; a guy-next-door charisma, if you will. He seems a likeable guy. In this article he roughly details How To Get Away With Doping.
It’s a fascinating read.
These days, the term “doping” usually refers to riders transfusing their own blood. Ok? Not shooting up crazy chemical concoctions into their bloodstream, though that happens too but usually not w/o failing a test or two. You can test for chemicals. It’s harder to test for your own blood.
It can be confusing to understand at first. Allow me to elucidate. Endurance athletes will bag their own blood as they train and stick it in the fridge. This is good, yummy blood, full of healthy red blood cells. Then over the course of a nasty three-week stage race, as they deplete their red blood cells from continuous massive effort, they transfuse this good blood back into their system, and the healthy red blood cells make them feel all spunky and healthy again. This is “doping.” Ok? Got it? Are we all on the same page? Red blood cells deliver oxygen. The more you have, the faster you go.
So in the old days, riders would use EPO, which makes your body make more red blood cells. But you can test for EPO usage. So that ain’t gonna work any more.
So instead they bag their good blood, and transfuse it in later. Same net effect – more red blood cells.
So the tests have changed. No more EPO. You’ve got to somehow test for red blood cells.
So they created the “biological passport system,” where they track your levels of young red blood cells, which should remain more or less constant.
This is where it gets awesome.
When you transfuse your blood, your body slows down production of young red blood cells (called “reticulocytes.”) So that’s what the test looks for – a lower-than-normal count of young red blood cells.
But if you microdose EPO, because it’s just a teeny tiny bit, you don’t fail the EPO test. And guess what that EPO does — it makes your body generate just enough new red blood cells to get you back up to baseline, so you don’t fail the passport test.
Awesome.
In the article I linked to, Floyd says he bought a piece of medical machinery to measure his young red blood cell count.
Harnessing the power of the Google interweb thingie, I found a Coulter LH7000 for a measly $18k. I wonder if that’s what Floyd has. I bet it’s beeping and whirring away in his apartment right now.
I can just see Floyd up ’til 11 on a Friday night, huddling over his LH7000, sprinting into the next room “Honey I finally found a way to boost my reticulocyte count w/o flunking the EPO test!! Break out the Jack Danny, let’s have us some celebrate!!”
Chops, dudes. Blood hacking.
So that’s the science of it.
Note to kids: Take a lesson from Floyd – don’t lie. It’s simpler.
In this interview with Bonnie at Espn, he talks not about the science of it, but about the human side of it.
He lied, because he felt that’s what he was supposed to do to get back into bike racing. (Another note to kids: Sometimes we grownups trade our integrity in order to get rich/laid/ahead. We forget that it’s a bad idea … but we do get reminded later …)
Anyways, he thought cycling would welcome him back in if he toe’d the party line. (By “toe party line,” he means, “lie.” Another note to kids – if the party line of your organization is “lie,” look for some new friends.) But that didn’t happen. Lying made him feel pretty crappy. He was willing to deal w/ it if he could get back into bike racing. But he didn’t get back. He hasn’t had the same kind of results in races he was getting back in ’06. But he still felt crappy about lying, duh. He also probably felt crappy watching the peeps go on racing w/o him. So might as well ‘fess up, stop lying to his mom, feel less crappy, and reconcile w/ life as a non-bikeracer.
That’s the gist.
I like Floyd. Cycling’s full of lessons.
