Clean Cycling Rebuild the Sport Image
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Clean
Cycling
Rebuild
the
Sport
Image
CPA
–
Cyclistes
Professionnels
Associes
JAMK
–
University
of
Applied
Sciences
March
2014
Report
by
the
students
of
the
Finish
university
JAMK
–
University
of
Applied
Sciences
1
CONTENTS
1
Clean Cycling Project ............................................................................................ 2
1.1
Project group ................................................................................................... 2
1.2
Client ............................................................................................................... 2
1.3
Task ................................................................................................................. 2
2
Theory of altering corporate image........................................................................ 2
3
Survey .................................................................................................................... 4
3.1
Survey demographics ...................................................................................... 5
3.2
Respondents and professional cycling............................................................. 6
3.3
Image of professional cycling ......................................................................... 8
3.4
Comparisons between different age groups and genders .............................. 15
3.5
Top of mind words ........................................................................................ 17
3.6
Open question ................................................................................................ 18
4
Promotion ............................................................................................................. 19
4.1
Ideas............................................................................................................... 19
5
Continuation ......................................................................................................... 23
Sources ......................................................................................................................... 24
Appendix 1 ................................................................................................................... 25
2 1 Clean Cycling Project 1.1 Project group The project group consists of 7 members. Jussi Laurila has been assigned as a project leader and the other members are Jaakko Koskinen, Samuli Salonen, Arttu Nevanperä, Tibor Kis, Thao Nguyen and Dang Tuan Hoang. The group was selected by teacher Juha Saukkonen. 1.2 Client The client for this project is CPA (Cyclistes Professionnels Associés) an association based in Switzerland and established to protect and improve the working conditions and rights of professional cyclists. Simon Kostner is the person responsible of the project in that end. 1.3 Task The task given to the group was to establish a basis for an ad campaign or such to improve the image of cycling in relation to doping. Hence the name of the project: Clean Cycling. The doping problem has troubled the professional cycling for a long time. (Historical base: 90s, Lance, present situation in here). The first task in hand was to establish a basis of knowledge what are we dealing with this project. Also important was to find cases of image improvement projects that have been successful or unsuccessful to guide the way for a successful campaign. To give us a proper view on opinions regarding cycling and doping, a survey was put online for people to answer to. 2 Theory of altering corporate image The image of corporation is important to attract and sustain customer base. The corporate image can be defined as the sum of mental pictures that the range of stakeholders (customers, investors, employees etc.) relates to the corporation (Morley 2009).
3 When a company decides to try and change its image, it should start by analyzing the current situation and what is the current image like. The image change campaign then should have a clear theme that consistently supports the message that the company wants to give and the vision it has for the future. A careful planning and solid execution is not enough, regular feedback and monitoring are needed to make sure the desired objective is achieved (Howard 1998). Figure 1. Operational model of corporate image (Gray and Balmer 1998) With improvement of image the corporation can alter the perceived image of quality on its product or services, achieve customer loyalty, change the buying behavior and gain competitive advantage (Dowling 2001). However, a loss of reputation and brand image can put the business in disadvantage in all the sectors mentioned and in worst scenario lead to bankruptcy. An example of image management in sports is the way cross country skiing has lately evolved. In order to keep fans attending the actual live events the distances of the races have shortened and are commonly broken into several laps. This allows the spectators to see the athletes close-up several times during the race. Other examples how skiing was made more of a spectacle are firstly the race where the athletes change the style (and equipment) from traditional to skating in the middle. Secondly the final of Tour de Ski, where the last race ends up with skiing up a downhill-skiing slope. The latter is prime example of making cross-country skiing a show to keep the sport interesting and developing.
4 3 Survey The basic idea of bringing out this questionnaire and completing the survey was to get to know more about the ideas and opinions of people in the big picture. There are plenty of surveys and studies about what how the professionals are towards the topic of clean cycling and use of drugs and steroids, but we thought that getting to know the mindset of usual outsiders, hobby cyclists and ordinary people about this, could be the easiest way of serving the purpose of the project. First of all we were interested in the people that were answering the survey. We collected information about their gender, age and nationality. Then we stepped to the topic of cycling. Obviously we were interested in their relation to cycling, if they were even involved, followers or participants either as a hobby or in a professional way. This gave us a picture of what kind of people answered the survey. Then we continued by looking at their interest in professional cycling and other questions about the sport such as how long they have been following professional cycling. After all these we started to concentrate more on the actual topic of doping and the question of the use of steroids and the image of the sport. Is doping a problem in professional sports or then more specifically in professional cycling? It was an important thing to ask from the people and get what the image in their head is. As one of the last topics we started asking about the image of doping in the sports, asking how many percentage of cyclists they think use, how reliable the tests are to avoid doping, what do they think are the sports mostly involved with doping or wether the problem could be solved at all. Then last but not least, we were interested in the point of view of people in the topic of who are responsible for cleaning the sports from doping, if the resources were enough to actually make a difference. In the end they could freely write their suggestions of changing the sport and the image towards a clean and fair future.
5 3.1 Survey demographics The survey was answered by a total of 98 people from multiple countries and age-groups. The respondents were mainly men, with 84 of the total people who answered being male as seen on the Figure 2. Figure 2. Gender of the respondents Age-wise, two of the largest groups were 15-25 years old (28 people, roughly 29% of respondents) and 26-35 (36 people, 37%). One respondent was under 15 years old, there were 16 people of the age between 36 and 45, 46- to 55- year-olds consisted of 15 people and there were also 2 people answering who were over 55. Figure 3 shows the distribution to different age groups. Figure 3. Age of the respondents People from 14 different countries answered the survey, a big portion of them being from European countries as can be seen from the Figure 4. Finland had
6 by far the biggest representation with a total of 63 respondents. Second- biggest amount of answers came from Portugal with 9 people. 6 respondents were from the United States and 5 from the United Kingdom. Italy and Spain had 4 and 3 people answering respectively. The remaining 8 respondents were each from a different country (Austria, Canada, Denmark, France, Greece, Macedonia, Sweden & Vietnam). Figure 4. Nationality of the respondents 3.2 Respondents and professional cycling Out of all the respondents, the majority was familiar with the sport of professional cycling as 70 respondents marked themselves as recreational participants in the sport as shown in Figure 5. The survey was also filled by 5 professional cyclists. 46 people identified as followers and only 5 people said that they had no relation to professional cycling. In the survey there was an option to select multiple for this question, so that explains why there were more than 98 results.
7 Figure 5. Relation to cycling Many of the responders expressed to be ”very interested” in professional cycling when asked about their level of interest. More than 64% (63 people) of the surveys came back with that answer. Overall the majority of the respondents were interested in the sport, with ”somewhat interested” coming up as the second-most popular choice with 22 replies. Then came ”not very interested” with 7 responses, ”neutral” with 5 and 1 expressing no interest at all. Figure 6. Level of interest to professional cycling A lot of the people had also a history of following professional cycling, 42 of the respondents answering with the option of ”more than 10 years”. 22 people answered with ”5-10 years” and 17 with ”3-5 years”. 9 people had been following professional cycling for 1-3 years, two less than a year but only roughly 6% (6 people) had not followed the sport at all.
8 Figure 7. Years as a follower of professional cycling 3.3 Image of professional cycling As one can see in the Figure , 40 participants responded that to them the image of professional cycling is positive while only 26 people see it as neutral. 32 people consider the image of professional cycling as negative. Figure 8. The image of professional cycling Based on the figures, the image of professional cycling is still quite good as there are more people thinking it is positive rather than neutral or negative. The amount of people seeing the image as negative is still quite high. In the survey respondents were asked whether they see doping to be a problem in professional sports and alternatives were scaled from 1 to 5; 1
9 meaning not at all and 5 meaning very much. Figure 9 shows the distribution of answers. Figure 9. Doping as a problem in professional sports in general Only 2 participants responded that they don’t think doping is a problem at all. But there’s a considerable rise from 3 to 5. 18 people chose 3 representing neutral stance, 32 people answered 4, seeing doping as quite a big problem and 44 people chose 5, seeing doping as a very big problem in professional sports. Respondents were asked similarly their opinion to doping as a problem in professional cycling. Figure 10 shows the distribution between answers. Figure 10. Doping as a problem in professional cycling
10 Also with professional cycling the number of respondents rises significantly from 1 to 4, but in 5 there’s only 26 people seeing doping as a very big problem in professional cycling. This could be due to high amount of respondents that have followed the sport for quite long and have seen the change since the early 2000s. The respondents were asked, what in their opinion is the percentage of professional cyclists that are doping. According to the graph shown in Figure 11, the popular choice was 11-30% as 22 respondents chose that. Only one respondent thought none of the professional cyclists use doping. Sadly answers 51-80% and >80% gathered many responses with 16 people choosing 51-80% and 6 >80%. Figure 11. Respondents’ opinion on what percentage of professional cyclists are using doping When asked about the reliability of doping testing, results showed a spread of responses, as can be seen in Figure 12. Scale was from 1 to 5, 1 representing
11 “Not reliable at all” and 5 representing “Extremely reliable” also giving the choice of “I don’t know”. Many respondents thought doping testing is quite reliable with 27 people answering 4 and 25 answering 3. Only 5 people thought doping testing as not reliable as all. Figure 12. Respondents’ view on reliability of doping testing To compare the image of cycling, respondents were given a list of 23 different sports and asked to choose what sports in their own opinion have a doping problem. They could choose at maximum 5 different sports from the list. Figure 13 shows the distribution of these answers.
12 Figure 13. Respondents’ view on which sports have a doping problem American football was chosen most frequently (64 answers). Athletics followed on second place with 63 answers and weight lifting on third place (55 answers). Cycling was on the fourth place (48 answers) and cross country skiing on fifth with 4 answers less than cycling. Cycling was third individual sport on the list and out of team sports only American football was on the top
13 5. Obviously cycling has still a lot of work to do as almost half of the respondents chose it on their list of 5 sports that have a doping problem. In the survey we asked whether the respondents think that doping problem in general can be solved. Figure 14 shows the distribution of answers between “Yes”, “No”, “I don’t know”. Figure 14. Can the doping problem in general be solved? Most of the respondents thought that doping problem can’t be solved (37 answers), but also 34 respondents answered that it can be solved where as 26 people didn’t know for certain. The results point out that doping problem is considered as a severe problem that can be near impossible to solve. In the survey we also asked who the respondents believe are the ones responsible for cleaning the sport. Choices were from athletes to organizations in the sport and respondents could choose more than one alternative. Figure 15 shows the division of answers.
14 Figure 15. Responsible for cleaning the sport of cycling In respondents’ opinion the athletes have the most responsibility for getting rid of doping problem and staying clean with 65 people answering so. Second most popular choice was teams with 63 answers. Many respondents also considered UCI as responsible for keeping cycling clean. Considering these results it seems that a common effort from all the stakeholders in cycling is wanted to clean the sport of cycling. Lastly in the survey the respondents were asked about the resources put into the anti-doping work. Figure 16 shows the distribution between the alternatives. Most of the respondents would like to see even more resources put into the work against doping, with 58 respondents considering the present resources less than enough. Only 3 respondents thought that too many resources are put to antidoping work.
15
Figure
16.
The
amount
of
resources
put
to
antidoping
work.
3.4 Comparisons between different age groups and
genders
After analyzing the dataset as a whole, we wanted to take a deeper look into
the differences in the views of the demographics. That is why we went ahead
and opened up the dataset so that the differences and similarities would show
up more clearly. Thus, we hoped to see which were the common factors
reflecting in the responses between the different demographics and in
contrast, which were the ones solely noted to appear in certain groups of
people. The first two cross tabulations to be analyzed are age and gender,
and their correlation on the data.
The first question was to do with the views respondents had on professional
cycling. The respondents were given multiple choice options of three to
choose from; positive, neutral and negative. The results show an equal
dispersion between the different age groups on the three choices. Though, the
only little exception being 26-35 year olds which have answered a relatively
small 16,67% on neutral whilst negative and positive having rates of
approximately 40%. Reasons might be due to the fact that they have a deeper
understanding of the sport, or that they are just purely more willing to express
their feelings but whatever the reason, there is a hefty change in the
responses of the neutral responses compared with the other age groups.16 When we asked about the reliability the respondents thought the doping testing to have, none of the age groups had high percentages in the extremities. More often than not they stayed within the neutral choices (options 3) or leaned a bit to the reliable (option 4) or unreliable (option 2) responses. The biggest difference may be noted when pulling together options 1 and 2; 25% of the 15-25 year olds thought the reliability is either somewhat or completely unreliable. The same number for the rest of the groups (over 26 year olds) was a bit over 35%. The more skeptic views of the older age groups might be because that age group has basically seen more of the ups and downs of the way antidoping has been evolving through years. Allowing multiple ticks in the question about who are responsible of cleaning the sport, 66% answered athletes and 64% answered teams. Also, UCI got over 50% of the respondents to tick them, scoring 58%. This can be read as a mutual agreement on cleaning the sport from inside rather than putting the blame on parties coming from outside, e.g. WADA, IOC. According to the survey, the age group 15-25 was the only one topping the 50% margin for WADA (57%). Although all the age groups answered the resources put in antidoping work not to be enough more often, it can be seen that the younger the age group, the more lenient they are towards antidoping work; 29% of 15-25 year olds answered the antidoping resources put in use are enough as they are. The same number for age group 26-35 was 28%, for age group 36-45 it was 19% and for 46-55 14%. The research done proves that there are more skeptic views among the elder age groups than the younger ones. And actually, this can be seen as a positive thing to the sport as doping has not tarnished the minds of the younger viewers, giving the possibility to better mold those images of the sport into a more positive way of seeing it. Due to the fact that only 14 out of the 96 respondents were women, and 86 were men this section may not have enough data to really separate these two groups. Most of the responses had no effect whether the respondent was a
17 woman or a man, response percentages do not differ from each other. These are the results that showed some sort of a difference that could be noted between the two genders, or that can be highlighted as having an effect on the overall results. The results showed that among both of the genders a massive over 50% of the respondents believe that out of all the professional cyclists over 11% use prohibited performance enhancing substances. This is a truly sad number in the light of clean cycling. And when combining it with another fact seen from the survey it can be noted that the respondents image of the sport is doping oriented; 50% of the women respondents see the doping problem in general cannot be solved. The same number for men was 36% and the rest were divided equally among the ones saying that it can be solved and with those having no opinion. 3.5 Top of mind words The respondents were asked three top-of-mind words they associate to professional cycling to better establish its image. All together we got 275 words associated to professional cycling. These can be divided into main groups of People, Emotions, Races and Attributes of racing. In the People group there are two sub-groups of Cyclists and Teams. 5.1 % of the respondents associated professional cycling to Lance Armstrong and 3.3 % to other riders like Contador, Pantani and Froome. 5.8 % associated Teams to the sport and Team Sky was even named couple of times. 9.8 % of the respondents linked Emotions to professional cycling. These emotions were mainly positive and strong e.g. passion and excitement. 15.6 % associated some race to professional cycling. For most respondents (10.5 %) this race was Tour de France, but 5.1 % also mentioned other races like Giro d’Italia, Vuelta a España and classics (Paris-Roubaix, Milan-San Remo etc.) Big group of associations was the Attributes of racing. 16.4 % associated words like hard, tough and suffering to professional cycling. 12.4 % of the
18
respondents linked doping and drugs to the sport which seems reasonable.
Endurance and performance were linked to professional cycling in 10.9 % of
the answers. Last noticeable group in 3.6 % were the words for mountains
and hills.
Word cloud from t-o-m-words
agony amazing amount amrstrong amstrong armstrong beautiful bianchi bicycle bikes challenges
cheating classics climb climbs competition competitive contador cycling dedication demanding
determination doping drugs effort endurance exciting finish france grand heroes
inspring intense intrigue italia lance level marco milano money mountain mountains never oprah
pantani paris-roubaix passion peloton performance pirata potential power professional protour races
racing roubaix sacrifice scandals science shimano spectacle spectators speed sport suffer suffering
tactics teams teamwork technologies tough toughness track tradition training transition uphills victory
women
The bigger the word is the more frequent it was represented in the answers.
3.6 Open question
Last question of the survey was open-ended, where the respondents could
voice their opinion how the image of cycling could be improved and the sport
to be promoted as clean and fair. We got 44 answers which was good for
further ideating the project. The complete list of ideas is in Appendix 1.
The clear main topics were openness in the sport and organizations around it.
Especially corruption in organizational level and “omerta” of the sport were
frowned upon. In a way on UCI level there’s progress with Brian Cookson
becoming UCI president instead of Pat McQuaid continuing in that position.
The athletes should be encouraged to take a clear stance against doping. The
new generation of riders seems to be taking a stronger stance in this
consideration, for example Taylor Phinney and Marcel Kittel have spoken
strictly against doping and are at the same time showing that it’s possible to
be successful in professional cycling without doping.
The stories behind the cyclists and not only their prestige were seen valuable.
Women’s and junior cycling (U23 etc.) have interesting and different stories for
the public. Also the other big values of the sport should be brought up
frequently. These could be the for example the camaraderie of the sport and19
unwritten gentlemen’s agreements. Also the backstage stories of professional
teams (Youtube-channels, Twitter- & Facebook-accounts) seem to be
interesting for the general public.
The frontline fight against doping was considered important and not only by
common doping tests. The stricter punishments were considered a good
approach in the antidoping war. Professional cycling is one of the sports
where doping testing is considered quite reliable especially compared to other
professional sports. There is still some juxtaposition how the former dopers
should be treated. Some people don’t want to see them in the sport at all, but
the problem is that then the wanted openness in sport is risked. Not many
former athletes still active in the sport are willing to open up if that only results
in them losing their job. In this case it seems UCI has chosen its approach
with the CIRC (Cycling Independent Reform Commission, formerly known as
Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Brian Cookson: “Their work will also be
focused on understanding what went so wrong in our sport and they will make
recommendations for change so that, as far as possible, those mistakes are
not repeated.” and “It will also be seeking testimony from people involved in
the sport or who have been involved in the past and we are in the final stages
of discussions with WADA to agree how best to incentivise people to co-
operate with the Independent Commission.”(O’Shea, 2014.)
4 Promotion
4.1 Ideas
Following is a list of ideas that were based on the survey results, previous
knowledge and views.
4.1.1 A fictional follow-up of a young amateur dreaming of riding TDF or
other Grand Tour. A story of the trials he is facing, the passion and the
enthusiasm of the sport on all levels taken from a clean perspective. It’s20
not the winning but participating and competing in such a demanding
sport. Three different approaches to the fictional story:
a. The dream doesn’t become reality because of another cyclist is
doping and takes the place in the team instead of the clean
athlete. The best effort is not enough when all are not playing
with the same rules.
b. The dream comes true but the cyclist has to give up his values,
because of external pressure to cheat from the team or other
people close to him.
c. The dream comes true with the ideals of clean sport. A lot of hard
work is needed and given opportunities to cheat are discarded to
continue with the values of fairness and integrity.
4.1.2 The stories of many young riders brought to knowledge in many
aspects in different approaches. The touching background story is the
interesting part, not the goal and result. Racing and training diaries of
cyclists that are proceeding on their path to become professional
cyclists even if they don’t always win. Good example of such a story is
the Charly Wegelius book: “Domestique – The true life ups and downs
of a Tour pro”. A long way of hard work to become a professional
cyclist and only wanting to help the team win after realizing the
strengths as a rider. Quote from the book: “Mapei knew that the doping
culture existed, but fixing it wouldn’t come through drug raids at the
Giro d’Italia, or throwing the rule-book at stupid individuals who got
caught. They wanted to make doping an unacceptable part of their
team, and they made a team that was so good that being part of that
was enough for riders. We were overpaid, we were looked after better
than any other cycling team on the planet, and we were reassured that
as long as we toed the line we would be looked after.” (Wegelius, 2013)
4.1.3 “The Cyclingleaks” - a portal of open approach to the past, the people
who cheated are telling their side of the story: why and how they did it,
what happened and how to avoid that happening again, what regrets21
they have for doing so. The UCI has its Independent Commission CIRC
to act as such but their actions are not open to public. This approach
would be more open with a will to understand the reasoning for the past
errors and giving amnesty to those who come forward to tell their story
willingly without outside pressure.
4.1.4 The opposite to the previous. “The Cleanleaks” – a portal where riders
are taking a stand against doping by telling their story of their ideals,
goals and how they’ve gotten there. Prominent international riders
presented like Taylor Phinney or Marcel Kittel – Quote from his
interview: “We need to show that we are here to fight for our voice and
that we do not want to be compared to those riders who have cheated
or are cheating.” (Kittel, 2014). Possibility to also provide open data like
bio-passport, tests, power numbers etc. in one portal.
4.1.5 Rational campaign that brings up in cycling related imagery the amount
of effort and work the war against doping needs: amount of tests, the
workload of an athlete because of bio-passport and whereabouts info.
How cyclists compare to normal citizens with their lack of privacy
because of fight against doping. Slogan could be for example: “Our
best effort on the road and off the road”. E.g. the “normal” day of a
cyclist: waking up to a doping control, filling the where-abouts info, hard
training/racing, recovery and then doing it over and over again,
emphasizing the lack of privacy and the timeframe. How the energy has
to be enough for activities on and off the road. Bringing up the other
demanding aspects of cycling outside the training and racing.
4.1.6 Campaign opening the reasoning why cycling as a community wants to
catch the doping athletes at the same time risking the image instead of
just hiding the problem. Why does cycling want to keep the integrity in
the sport.
4.1.7 Reporters closer to teams for openness. Assigned “All access” reports
from inside the team.22
4.1.8 Promotion the other values of professional cycling: camaraderie, the
shared passion, the terrain (mountains, forests, fields etc.), the
gentlemen rules of the sport (waiting for fallen riders etc.). Why would
one want to become a professional? Not much money for the
domestiques and not everybody can become a Grand Tour winner.
What are the other explanations that are pushing the riders forward.
4.1.9 Pushing a change in UCI about sanctioning. For example the team
would lose World Tour points or even WT status if their rider is caught
doping. Taking a stricter policy towards teams brings more incentive to
a team to stop riders doping.
4.1.10 Pushing an organizational change in UCI resulting less control in
sanctioning for national federations and more to independent
antidoping associations under WADA and CAS.
4.1.11 Promotion of the stricter punishments put into action year 2015. The
punishments are becoming harsher to prevent cheating.
4.1.12 Success in international competitions builds national interest towards
the sport. The success of British cycling team in 2012 Olympics has
contributed to increase the amount of employees cycling to their work
in Britain. It is always more interesting to read or see the stories of
people that are easier to relate to, like countrymen.
4.1.13 Promotion of cycling in a historically unsuccessful country could be
easier as the past doping scandals have probably less effect in the
public opinion. Starting to form an image from a clean table. There are
also national differences to stance against doping, in other countries it
isn’t seen as bad, more of a part of the professional sports.
4.1.14 Promotion of cycling through travelling. Cycle-tourism is promoted in
many countries and has also the aspect of more ecological travelling.
Also the scenery and the peaceful take on tourism, “slow-tourism” as a
trend. Although this is clean cycling in ecologically clean sense, it’s still23
promoting cycling in a positive light and that’s is also a good approach
to improve the image.
4.1.15 As our questionnaire shows, Lance Armstrong pop out quite often. And
as he is seen as the “devil” now, it is interesting to see how public
reacts to his participation in triathlon, is he still welcomed in other
sports. If things go well he can potentially clean his face in a way and
perhaps improve the image of cycling also. What if he is found guilty of
doping again in triathlon? Will it change the image of cycling for worse
as he is considered a cyclist.
From the survey we see that doping is on top of everything. But looking at the
bright side (most of the respondents are above 20 which are mature people
and have been following cycling for quite a long time), the image of cycling by
now is still 50/50 and more specifically there’s no huge difference between the
positive and the negative. Still cycling cannot deny what was done.
Confession can be the way out. Idea is to campaign that cycling wasn’t on the
right track, not only considering doping. Cycling as sport is saying sorry for the
mistakes and the disappointments. After confession to pros of cycling are
presented, how there are still good things. Stimulation from the Internet
Explorer commercial, seen here:
Http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B05AqF3kEHY.
Some of the ideas may not be suitable to proceed with CPA but could be
promoted to other associations or can become suitable in other time.
5 Continuation
Project is continued as a course work in the lead of Jussi Laurila together with
Simon Kostner to establish a complete marketing campaign based on the
research and the ideas collected in this project.24 Sources Dowling, G., 2001. Creating corporate reputation, image and promise. Oxford University press, Oxford. Gray, E.,R. and Balmer, J.,M.,T., 1998. Managing Corporate Image and Corporate Reputation. Long Range Planning vol 31 issue 5 12.10.1998. p.695-702. provided by Elsevier Howard, S., 1998. Corporate image management: a marketing discipline for the 21st century. Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford. Morley, M., 2009. The global corporate brand book. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. O’Shea, S., 2014. UCI announces Cycling Independent Reform Commission. Cyclingnews 8.1.2014. Http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/uci-announces- cycling-independent-reform-commission. Kittel: The clean generation has to speak out against doping. Velonation Press 4.2.2014. Http://www.velonation.com/News/ID/16259/Kittel-The-clean- generation-has-to-speak-out-against-doping.aspx Wegelius, C., 2013. Domestique – True life ups and downs or a Tour pro. Ebury Press, Croydon.
25
Appendix 1
The suggestions collected in survey (translated summary after non-English
comment)
- Pitäisi tuoda enemmän esille sitä, että vaikka urheilijat käyttäisivät
dopingia, niin he ovat silti kovia jätkiä ja treenaavat ihan hulluna. Doping
itsessään ei tuo tuloksia vaan siihen vaaditaan myös kovaa työtä. Tätä
mielikuvaa pyöräilyn vaativuudesta pitäisi tuoda esille. Dopingin
kitkemiseksi tarvitaan monitahoista yhteistyötä kaikkien toimijoiden
kesken. (promotion of hard cycling training needed even with doping; to
get rid of doping, a co-operation of all stakeholders in cycling is needed)
- Teams and riders sohuld publish all data, including biological passport
and power meter.
- Testing in other sports at the same level
- Pro cycling has a problem with its image because of the past few
decades rampant doping use. Current state of cycling is a lot better
because of the biological passport controls. To improve the image
cycling must continue strict doping controls, preferrably by an
independent system (from UCI, Pro Tour, race organizers) like WADA.
There's also a need to get rid of the "omerta" of speaking about doping
in cycling. Riders should be encouraged to speak to WADA about
current and past doping cases.
The other image problem cycling has is not so visible to the general
public, but fans are aware of the amount of dirty politics that has been
going on inside UCI. It needs also to be sorted.
- To promote the clean athletes and not to be suspicious right away if
someone performs on really good level. Also the amount of testing that
they are doing in contrast to other sports should be brought up.
- Focus on the present without ignoring the past.
- Remove corruption. Don't hide positive results from doping tests.
- Putting a neutral journalists into cycling teams to monitor who they are
doing for example David Walsh and Sky. More extensive use of the
blood passport also taking into account weight and watts
- Make cyclists do fewer events - they should do odd races, not as many
as they currently do. Make cycling amateur again and don't make
performance linked to money/fame! The sue of doping in sports is simply
explained by modifying the principles of game theory to account for the
fact that lots of money and success depends on performance and that
performance is increased by doping and that the chances of testing
positive in a test is very small!
- Less money in prizes
- Honest and transparent governance by ruling bodies
Separation of commercial responsibilities and anti doping responsibility
Consistent enforcement of rules by central and national agencies
Better intelligence, less lab tests
Remove some of the doping incentives....reevaluate WT points system,26
Emphasize benefits of team sponsorship outside of winning, etc
Establish a WT code of ethical conduct and roll out to all in UCI and
teams
- limited budgets, limiting number of races, F1 types of rules regarding
equipment introducing, decreasing of doping substances on WADA list,
improving field testing
- A ban for life when positive for epo or similar. Change uci rules.
- A credible, transparent, believable testing scheme. Fans should know
how many blood tests each athlete has in his bio passport file and when
the samples were taken.
And MUCH MORE money put toward anti doping research to develop
new tests.
- We need more sponsors and directors who value honesty and
transparency over having a perfect image. I respect leaders and
companies who invest in bringing light to dark places and who are
committed to the long, slow work of making the future more fair for
athletes.
- Getter professional business people involved to introduce proper
management and ethics.
- Antidoping resources in cycling I believe are enough since riders get
caught. Also the amount of tests is enormous in cycling compared to
many other sports like soccer, american football and basketball.
I think all cycling teams should make a strong statement against doping.
Sky has at least tried to do this, maybe with not so good success yet.
But others should also work against doping. The mentality of pro cyclists
needs to be changed so that they won't take the decision to try forbidden
substances if they are offered that opportunity. This mentality needs to
be taught to cyclists from a young age. How, I don't know.
I think money is a big reason to use doping. Without money there would
only be the feeling of winning/losing and by using doping substances
most athletes hopefully feel that they are cheating.
- Strict implementation of the current antidoping policies; continuous
research in antidoping detection methods
- Certify athletes as clean such as that proposed by The Clean Protocol.
- Contract between rider and team to include penalty for positive test.
Loss off points for team/ relegation to continental status for 1+ test in
calendar year. 2 +ve tests = lifetime ban for rider. Previous dopers
cannot hold any position in the sport.
- I can't give any suggesion..it's not important the image you give of the
sport but the reality. I think that Doping is no more only a sport problem
but a social one too. When people see a great performance now, after
so many episodes of doping among top bikers, they think something like:
"Is this really a great performane or is it doping behind it?"
- Publishing power files and biological passports
- Find other points to focus on while communicating the image of the
sport. Focus on the positive things and not on doping. People must think
of these points, and not on the bad ones.
- The three imperatives are: 1) increase the penalties, 2) take away to the
national federations the ability to decide in the first instance on doping27
cases 3) invest more resources on antidoping. 1) It's very important to
increase the lenght of the bans and the penalties both for riders, doctors
and all the person involved in doping cases; 2) Many federatons act for
their own interests so it's impossible to discourage the riders on tacking
drugs; 3) the doping is always a step ahead antidoping so if no one
increases the investments this distance will never reduce.
- Life time bans. Ban former dopers from working in the sport after their
careers. Make doping a crime.
- Make everybody clear what is on the list of banned substances. Avoid
countries like china where it is likely to get a "false-positive". Make sure
that all pro-athletes of all countries are tested equally frequently (e.g. so
incidents like the last two winners of tour of turkey tested positive cannot
occur).
Empower the WADA to test all! sports equally. Make people aware that
not only cyclists are the "bad guys".
Find a way to ensure better and longer sponsorship. The current
situation with many teams forced to quit due to lack of sponsorship is a
breeding ground for cheating (athletes desperately trying to secure a
spot in a team)
Encourage young people to do this beautiful sport and show them that
"you can make it" in a clean way!
- First of all, full cleaning of the system. Found out who have been using
doping in the past, how widely it has been used, who has been aware of
it (boards of management etc.). Give full amnesty to those who have
used it (Lance Armstrong for example), maintain their achievements and
not to blame the athletes themselves but the whole corrupt system that
has made it possible.
- I agree with the idea that not doping needs to be a more attractive option
than doping. There need to be further safeguards to ensure that clean
athletes don't pay penalties, but also more systematic ways of
eliminating dopers. It needs to be a collective effort from everyone in the
sport.
- Testing, testing and testing.
- More news about positive things in sport, not always about doping
- Not all cycling is procycling. Only a tiny portion of it.
- Removing old dopers from the sport. All of them. Even the ones that are
running teams.
- Lifetime ban for dopers.
- Decreasing prize money, maximun salaries for riders, better view of
womens cycling, more antidoping testing,
- i need make more good markting and next talk to multinacionalit
sponsors... ( coca-cola, vodafone, microsoft, etc etc)
- Longer bans or, if possible, life time bans from the sport to blood and
EPO dopers. That way maybe they'd start to give some thought to the
consequences before doing something that stupid because clearly they
don't take rules seriously. I also believe that creating a sort of
psychometric test only focused on the sports' ethics would be a good
idea (if this makes any sense at all). The athlets would be submitted to
do the test, the odds of that athlete resorting to doping in the future28
would the calculated and, depending on the results, that same athlete
would be introduced to a program where he/she'd be (re-)educated and
hopefully learn what's really bad about doping, in the ethics department,
as well as the real consequences, which includes the damage it may
cause on the athlets' health.
- Stop using doping
- LIfetime ban for users of doping
- In my opinion cycling is a one of very few of sports that have some
"gentlemes rules" left. For an example to wait crashed or rider who have
had technical problems. Fair game and exiting sports should be
highlighted!
- Honest communication and consistent policies and processes
- A comprehensive truth and reconciliation process must be put into use in
order to get rid of the tainted past haunting the current pro cycling world.
Then, it could be possible to set the scene for a fair and clean sport.
- Wada should organize agressive surprise testing campaings and test
athleres of other commercially remarkable sports. For example NHL
players could be tested as actively as pro cyclists are tested, cycling
could look fair and clean compared to them.
- Punishments should be heavier and more/mostly towards team directeur
sportifs and team owners
5 year bans. No place for dopers as a coach or sport directors.You can also read
