Its good to see a leader in the Anti-Doping field taking Floyd’s admission seriously. ‘”Floyd Landis has shown immense moral courage to take the stand he has, and one of the benefits from his disclosures is that we now have the missing piece of the puzzle,”" His knowledge could certainly go a long way to helping improve the Biopassport.

However, it is a bit surprising that the EPO microdosing was not suspected as masking method.”Of course we knew that autologous transfusions are undetectable, and we also knew that microdosing was probably being used. What I had never encountered before was the scenario that riders were using the two in tandem, during the major Tours. That was the missing piece of the puzzle.”

Masking blood doping was one of the logical possibilities considered in A Tale of Two Cyclists

“Masking:

Transfusion plus volume expansion: Very low Retic despite what looks like a low to normal Hgb without other cause for suppression.

EPO plus volume expansion: High retic normal HgB, and an effect that can overcome significant physical stress.

Transfussion plus EPO micro dose: High Hgb, low normal Retic, and an effect that can overcome significant physical stress.

Transfusion plus volume expansion with EPO micro dose: Low to normal Hgb, low normal retic, and an effect that can overcome significant physical stress.”

Remember also, that Altitude training may be a way to mask the Retic suppression that might come after discontinuation of EPO or a blood transfusion.

“Abrupt stop of EPO plus altitude: Very high Hgb, with low normal retic.”

Given the legality of Altitude training, this may be a preferred method when logistically possible. It would also explain the otherwise counterproductive use of altitude tents previously reported in the middle of grand tours. Hopefully officials pick up on this possibility as well.

Ashenden goes on to state,  ”[Microdosing] keeps the percentage of reticulocytes close to normal – not exactly normal, but close enough that we would have difficulty excluding the possibility that some other reasonable explanation could account for the subtle change we had seen.” This statement makes for an uncomfortably good description of a Retic pattern we previously analyzed at length.

In an interesting aside, Ferrari offers comments that imply a bit too much knowledge, ”
Not everyone accepts the researchers’ conclusions. Among them is Michele Ferrari, the controversial Italian sports medicine doctor whose clients have included Armstrong. “It’s a bit like playing Russian roulette,” Ferrari said in an e-mail exchange. “There is absolutely no microdose that can be taken without the risk of getting detected by out of competition controls within a 12-hour window.”” His statement does to some degree corroborate Floyd’s statement that Ferrari may have advised against EPO use once the test was developed.

The posting of a series of selected emails today by Team Radioshack raises the question; Why? The problem with attacking Floyd is that his character has already bottomed out.  Any additional damage to his image is of marginal value at best. Instead, the emails are one more thing to write about where Armstrong and doping are in some way linked.  The email release comes in contrast to the more recent approach of simply letting things go away. This technique proved incredibly effective in addressing questions about Armstrong’s Biopassport data. Rather than offering a substantive explanation of his data his team simply took it down and let the story go away. For a refresher refer to articles 1, 2, 3, and 4. Unfortunately for Armstrong, apathy toward the Biopassport story effectively destroyed any chance of using Biopassport data in the future as a form of defense. So why release the emails? They will of course reinforce the base. But why bother circling the wagons if there is nothing to fight?  The relevant information in this case will be corroborating witnesses or facts. Given that scientific data is unlikely to clear Armstrong, he is essentially in the same boat as Floyd in needing someone to corroborate his allegations of a blackmail conspiracy. Two of the people Landis named said on Friday that they had been contacted by antidoping officials who had asked them to cooperate with the investigation in exchange for leniency. An excerpt from the New York Times suggests at least two people are considering coming forward Those people, who said they were still deciding if they would cooperate, did not want their names published because they are still deciding if they want to come forward with information that may help the officials’ case.