Caffeine

The 2007 WADA list has caffeine in the “2007 Monitoring Program” but it is not a “Prohibited Substance”. The 2007 US AntiDopingAgency (USADA) list seems to directly quote the WADA list on stimulants, so ditto. It used to be one of the threshold substances (under 12 micrograms/ml of urine and you were OK) but was delisted as of Jan 1, 2004.

HA! I just noticed this draft from 11/30/07! Dang if I can remember where I was going with it, just a stub and all. Reminded me about something over at Zuska’s diggity dogs. Caffeine really is a drug. Gee ya think?

no longer quite the n00b scicurious recently had something about adenosine and caffeine so I’ll just point you there for the science.

one of PalMD’s podcasts ( I think it was #2 or #4 but I could be wrong) talked about the wonders of coffee and how medicine can’t really find much to worry about. Sure, save the addiction part.

Anyway, I’ll just snap this up in case it jogs my memory of what I was thinking about. Probably some papers on cycling performance I guess….

Science Blogging San Diego

Are you a scientist in San Diego who blogs or (duh) reads blogs?

Time to tribe up my friends.

Why let all those nutballs in the North Carolina Research Triangle area have all the fun? Are we really lamer than the Minny-soooooootans?

email bikemonk at the google mail or drop a comment. let’s plan some stuff…on blog and IRL.

Live-blogging a Vasectomy: PSA from Abel Pharmboy

Everyone is already all over this but Abel Pharmboy liveblogged his vasectomy yesterday. As the DM noted at the new digs, this was a Public Service Announcement:

But the very serious part of this post is to educate men on how mild a vasectomy is relative to tubal ligation in their female partner. As I said, this is the least I could do in return for my wife’s true suffering in bringing our lovely daughter into this world.

What some people will do for the greater good…

One for the Journal-n-Impact Factor Geeks

DM, I’m looking in your direction. Anyway, Chris Rowan of Highly Allochthonous has a bit on the new Nature Geophysics journal. For the usual bioscience audience around these parts, I think you will see some familiar themes emerge and one comment that goes a bit off the path:

Knightie Knight

Sheep cloner Ian Wilmut, Knighted. Vision neuroscientist and recent MRC head Colin Blakemore, stiffed for being “too controversial”.

I don’t understand these British things…

Huckabee on Medical Marijuana

I posted on John Edwards views on medical marijuana before, here’s Mike Huckabee fielding a similar question:

[h/t: Kendra Campbell of The Differential]

Wiener Blut

You just knew if it was such a profitable business, then the lab in Operación Puerto couldn’t be the only one didn’t you? Cyclingnews has the call:

Do you use a computer?

Then you should know a little something about this group of pioneering programmers of the ENIAC.

(h/t Coturnix)

Sentenced, Sentenced, Sentenced!

When we last visited with Ms. Marion Jones, she was in the dock for lying to investigators about sports doping. Well, she just got 6 months in jail to start March 11.

Rock (of crack) Racing

okay that was a bit uncalled for. But US domestic pro cycling outfit “Rock Racing” has hired Tyler Hamilton and wants Floyd Landis for an “advisor”. And this team is coming to play, people:

With the addition of three-time national champion Freddie Rodriguez, 2002 world time trial champion Santiago Botero and former U.S. Postal Service domestique Victor Hugo Peña, as well as domestic standouts Doug Ollerenshaw, Mike Creed and Cesar Grajales, Ball has quickly built a team that has shaped up to be one of the strongest on the North America scene.

Plus Tyler? Damn.

Wait a minnit, Rock Racing the team is a sponsor of the Amgen “We make EPO” Tour of California? And they are going to come gunning with Tyler Hamilton who should be a top-5 favorite if he hits the start line? So they are sponsoring their own rider’s win? Oh, my head hurts…

__

Update 1/11/08: And now an interview with Floyd Landis.  Conditioned on the journalist obtaining answers to Floyd’s questions of USA Cycling CEO Steve Johnson:

“I want short and direct answers, no spin or political bullshit,” he told me. “I made them yes/no questions and those are the answers that I want to hear. [Get those answers] and I’ll answer any questions you ask.”

Of course the science-y part comes up, as usual:

FL: Should strict liability be applied to the athletes and not the labs?

SJ: I think the labs have every obligation to manage these cases at the highest level. I think it’s fair to challenge the labs’ procedures and handling of samples. They should be able to produce documentation that they have followed their own rules in managing and testing doping samples. Frankly that gets right back to this balancing act between protecting the rights of the athletes and catching cheaters. You have to do it correctly, and the labs should be held to the highest of international standards.

FL: For example, is it reasonable that the panel admitted in the Scott Moninger case that he was not intending to cheat but convicted him, while the panel in the Landis case admitted to substandard lab practices and convicted him?

SJ: I don’t know enough information to make that comparison, frankly. I would assume in Floyd’s case that arbitrators determined that any substandard lab practices had no impact on the outcome of the test for exogenous testosterone, but I don’t know for certain.

FL (2): Here’s another way to ask it: Should the athletes be responsible and punished when they make a mistake and when the lab makes mistakes? Scott Moninger was banned as a cheater when there was no intent to cheat. In my case the lab followed none of its own rules, causing the result, and I am held responsible to explain what happened. What I’m trying to understand is why the athlete is judged as the only party who can be dishonest.

Likes the Politics do you?

In a bit of blatant self-promotion, ahem.

Carry on. Carry on.

Performance Doping in Academia, Take 2

A recent commentary in Nature by Barbara Sahakian and Sharon Morein-Zamir discusses the ethical questions arising from the use of cognitive enhancing drugs to improve intellectual function in “normal” people. This follows a prior piece in Nature arguing that science-enhancing drugs may not be just acceptable but indeed laudable, which I covered previously. A couple of blogs are already on it, including Adventures in Ethics and Science (natch), Retrospectacle and Action Potential. [Update: 12/21/07: More from the Silverback , Corpus Callosum and Munger.] Commentary on the first two Borg blogs is already quite brisk. People seem to love discussing brain doping!

More Journals for NPRC

Additional journals are lined up to join the Neuroscience Peer Review Consortium. This may be of some relevance to prior smart arse comments, particularly the appearance of Biological Psychiatry as a lateral competitor of J Neuroscience.

Boondoggles

The DM recently used the pejorative term “boondoggle” (Wikipedia, fwiw) to refer to the larger NIH funding mechanisms like Centers and Program Projects (the “P Series“, a comprehensive list of NIH mechanisms is here).

What think you all?  If you’ve been funded under or associated with one of these things, what are your takes? Good thing? Bad thing? Do you see consistent trouble spots for their operation?

Are they a big ol’ waste as DM seems to think?

The correct angle for maximum launch

‘course we never called it that. We were just trying to jump our bikes as far as we could. For those of us who’s formative bike riding years were the 70′s, well, Evel Knievel has passed. See Dave Moulton’s post for the reminiscing about the BMX years…