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Alexandre Vinokourov and his supporters should accept the ‘bleeding’ obvious after Tour de France shame

Despite being caught with his hands in the cookie jar, the disgraced Tour de France rider is now claiming lab tests which nailed him are unsound. Presumably previous tests which didn't nail him are also unsound.

by Robin Parisotto on 03 August 2007

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Alexandre Vinokourov: Heading downhill now (Gettyimages.com)

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The claim by Kazakh sporting officials that Alexandre Vinokourov is innocent of blood doping has similarities with Lithuanian officials chanting the same tune about Raimondas Rumsas back in 2003.

We all remember that Rumsas' wife was intercepted after the final day of the 2003 tour in which he finished third and was found to be carrying a boot load of drugs, supposedly for her mother. Rumsas tested positive for EPO the following year. Egg on faces all round.

Kazakh deputy minister for tourism and sport, Kairat Aitekenov has suggested that Vinokourov tested positive for blood doping due to an injury days before, with Vinokourov saying that the laboratory performing the test was incompetent.

'It is astonishing that according to some athletes the competency of drug testing labs is somehow related to the number of positive tests'

As far as Vinokourov’s injury is concerned, even a life-threatening and traumatic bleed does not affect your blood group. Treating a massive bleed with a transfusion can certainly add ‘foreign’ blood groups into the circulation. One would assume that if Vinokourov needed a transfusion this would/should have been declared.

As far as is known his injury wasn’t such that a medical transfusion was required. The only possible way for his blood group to be affected was for someones else's blood to be put there, or are we going to go down the vanishing twin theory track again as Tyler Hamilton suggested? You can bleed till the cows come home (or till you are dead) but your blood group will never change.

In relation to Vinokourov's claim that the lab was incompetent, then they must have been incompetent twice because both A and B samples were positive. This parallels with Lance Armstrong's comments that the same lab was incompetent when EPO was detected in his urine samples from 1999. On this occasion though the lab was incompetent six times over because six of Armstrong's urine samples tested positive (plus six others no less).

It is astonishing, but hardly surprising, that according to some athletes the competency of drug testing labs is somehow related to the number of positive tests, in other words, the more positives then the more incompetent the lab!

In my view the drug testing labs, or more correctly the technology (and drug testing protocols), are incompetent (or incapable) of detecting drugs given anecdotal widespread abuse by producing, arguably so many false negative results. Why don’t the cheats who get up and claim that the labs are incompetent on the basis of positive results say the same thing about false negative results because isn’t it in their interest to expose fellow competitors whom they may have suspicions about but who continually test negative (falsely)!

We are all dead tired of the predictable rhetoric from athletes and their mouthpieces when caught with their hands in the cookie jar.

Next case!

Comments (2)

by Asylzhan on August 04, 2007

The author sounds a bit skeptic and he is very incompetent. Here are some corrections: There was not the case of blood group change of Vino's blood. Erythrocytes - so called red (blood) cells were concerned. My suggestion is to get some (elementary) knowledge on Medicine before writing such childish article, claiming sensation. Also as far as I know it was the first participation of the laboratory on the Tour. Hence - possible lack of experience. Don't be in hurry, gather some wit.

by Robin on August 05, 2007

The premise of the homologous blood test which Vino tested positive for is that 'foreign' antigens have been introduced that would not normally be there unless blood has been transfused ie, there are changes in the blood groups not consistent with normal physiology. It is most unlikely there has been a change detected in the major blood groups (ABO) but more likely in the lessor 300 or so known blood groups such as Kell, Duffy and etc. An explanantion of how this occurs would warrant a separate article. What I tried to discuss here was that an injury cannot lead to the presence of 'foreign' blood groups into the body unless it was put there in the first place. The claim by Kazakh officials that the test was positive due to injury demonstrates a lack of understanding of the blood transfusion test.