greatdane77

It's quite simple: you have to enter an address and one hour time slot where you will be available for testing. You do this quarterly. You can change the slot and address up until a couple of hours before the one you set. So you can change your whereabouts as much as you like. Purely speculative but changing it often last minute could raise suspicion with the testing agencies. If you can't go online to change it you can phone in your changes (or at least you could a few years ago). Testers can show up outside your time slot but if you aren't home/present it will not be a violation. If you are available when they come outside your slot, you do have to hand in a sample. If collecting blood you will have to be in a seated poition with feet fully on the ground and knees in a 90 degree angle for 10 minutes. This is to "normalize" or rather standardize for plasma volume shifts. Few athletes are aware of this. Testers will ask if you have been to altitude recently, sick or just got home from training. A 2 hour window after training is usually nescessary. So if you're a smart athlete you set your time slot to early in the morning before training. Always setting the same time of day (early morning) will make it less complicated for yourself. An athlete can be in prioritized testing pool from their international federation and national antidoping agency (e.g. UCI and USADA). Not all national antidoping agencies work with e.g. UCI. So in some cases athletes can experience testers coming at the same day or close to each other from two organizations. In other cases they collaborate in an effort to have more strategic testing. Some athletes are tested a lot others less. It depends onmany factors, including the budget of your national anti-doping agency and their priorities. I know all this because my fiancee was a professional MTB'er in bothe the UCI and Danish testing pool for 10 years. And I've published scientific litterature on the Athlete Biological Passport. It's not a bullit proof system but it has changed (not limited to but especially) cycling big time. Riders of our time can have a carreer without having to think of doping because of this. But it's rarely recognized and as many posts in this thread shows, many still sees the system as the culprit

@Supermoo: You absolutely do!! If testers come outside your slot and you're not available it will not be a violation. If they show up and find you - yes, you have to do the test. But you 100% choose your own slot. If you are smart you set your time slot early in the morning. That way you you avoid complicating it for yourself. If you're an atlete in prioritized test pool you need to read up on the rules. It's actually your responsibility. The whereabouts system normalized the blood values of pro cyclists massively since its introduction. The reason for it's existence lies with earlier generations. They are at fault, not the current system. And one could argue that it's a small effort for a sport which is cleaner than it was in the 00's and 90's. And any pro rider (or their wifes) arguing that it's disturbing their life simply comes across as ignorant and entitled

@RonniePivot: I completely agree! It's horrible! Three guys competing for the mic. The result is very little useful info.

@50percentsure: I think just a Jolanda-race. It seemed like after many years she had finally figure out how to pace herself in Brazil and the last WC's of last year. But this was a Jolanda classic, it seems.

@Linc: "If I cared about fitness I’d watch road cycling." You should stick to Nitro Circus, then

Would love a dedicated piece on the different nations selection criteria for Olympics. I bet the US selection farce for Tokyo hasn't induced any willingness at USAC to make a reasonable judgement call. The current situation all but underlines the absurdity that Blevins is potentially left out in favor of a U23 rider - too avoid another legal case. What a crazy system.