Canoeing :-)

Ed and I took a beginner canoe course this weekend, through the City of Edmonton, at Hermitage Park. Those of you who know me via Guiding might be asking, why would she be taking a beginner canoe course? (ie. hasn't she already taken the basics multiple times through Guiding?) And you would be right - a few years ago, I even completed the CRCA Flatwater A-C certification (and a year or 2 before that I did a course where we probably even completed the D level as well but weren't being CRCA-certified). But, I never have any opportunity to practice, and Ed has never taken any canoeing course, so we thought it would be a good idea for him to get the basics. That way, if we rent a canoe again and they insist (as usual) that the guy has to go in the stern, we won't be going in circles as we usually did whenever Ed would try to steer :-).

So, it was a good review for me, and Ed found it very useful - he now has confidence that he mostly knows what he's doing. And they shifted the time from 1-4 pm to 9-12 pm each day - so as it turned out we didn't get stuck out in the rain today, bonus.

A reasonable request ...

All I want to do before I take any questions is ask that everybody take a step back - I don't know what your position is now, and I wouldn't blame you if you were a bit skeptical because of what cycling has been through in the past and the way other cases have gone - but all I'm asking for, just for me, is that I be given a chance to prove that I'm innocent. Cycling has a traditional way of trying people in the court of public opinion before they get a chance to do anything else. I can't stop that but I would like to be assumed innocent until proven guilty, since that's the way we do things in America.

- Floyd Landis (as quoted in Cycling News).

It's hard to know what to think, Landis certainly comes across as the type of rider who wouldn't resort to doping, but then again what do we really know about any of these riders to be able to say "so-and-so would never do that, they don't seem like the type"? Some random thoughts:
1) Rumour has it that actually his testosterone level was low overall, but it was the ratio to the marker substance in the body (epitestosterone) that was high. I'm not sure exactly what that would imply, but I think it illustrates the difficulty in testing and catching people for using hormones naturally found in the body, they can't go by absolute levels and instead have to resort to other techniques.
2) There have been several athletes who have had their positive test for testosterone overturned because they were able to prove they have normally high levels of testosterone. Some of the things that have been shown to naturally raise testosterone levels include alcohol (Landis had previously admitted to having a beer after his really bad day in the mountains, which was the night before the stage he blew everyone away and the night before this test was done), and exertion (again, the test is from the stage when he powered away from everyone, lots of exertion there).
3) I wonder frequently where the line should be drawn in terms of catching doping athletes. In medical statistics we learned about sensitivity and specificity for testing, where sensitivity "refers to how good a test is at correctly identifying people who have the disease" (or are doping in this case), and specificity is "concerned with how good the test is at correctly identifying people who are well" (or who aren't doping). I'm sure that the tests they're currently using probably have both high sensitivity and specificity, but it's never 100% so there's always the possibility of false positives (meaning that innocent athletes can get banned from competition), as well as false negatives (meaning that some dopers don't get caught). Then, there is rampant speculation that dopers are using techniques so that there isn't actually any of the banned substance in their bodies at the time of a test, or that they're using substances for which there aren't any tests yet, or techniques (like blood transfusions) that really can't be tested for directly and it ends up being the police investigations (like Operation Puerto) that catch them (if at all). Which would mean that the overall sensitivity of drug testing in sports could be fairly low, and yet there's still the possibility of false positives with the tests they do have ... so what's more important, sacrificing a few innocent athletes in order to have a better chance of getting all the dopers, or trying to ensure that it's only the dopers that get caught and punished. I'd say the latter, but I wonder sometimes if that's the case at present. From a conference I attended in May, it seems as though a lot of administrative effort goes into processing the exemption forms for bronchodilators and corticosteroids which have questionable performance enhancing effects - maybe they need to make more effort changing the culture overall.
4) Are we expecting too much from athletes? Is the Tour de France really too hard (ie. through the mountains) as world champion Tom Boonen suggested during this year's Tour before he abandoned (in the mountains)? -sorry, can't find a link at the moment.

Anyway, I'm kind of glad the DP Forum is down for the moment, I'd spend too much time reading about this case if it were up and running :) , and I've got other things to think about - like our getaway next weekend to Panorama ! We *were* going to go camping to Mt. Robson provincial park in BC, but we didn't get around to making a reservation in time, and it's not like there are a lot of other options there if all the first-come first-served sites are full for a long weekend ... so we made other plans instead. For some reason I really love the Radium-Invermere-Panorama area so it's always great to go back there again :)

A month later...

I was going to post on my birthday, about how it was such a day of mixed emotions - nice to spend time with family, but I had to work that day, nice that the Tour de France was going to start the next day, but there was a big doping scandal that took out a number of the top contenders (on my birthday no less). But obviously I never got around to it ...

Busy watching the Tour for the last few weeks, as well as working pretty much full-time again. The Tour was the most exciting one that I've ever seen, as the outcome wasn't essentially predetermined. My favourite rider for the overall (Aussie Cadel Evans) ended up 5th, which is really good considering he was 8th last year (but there were a lot who suddenly had expectations that he'd do even better given the strange circumstances of a number of riders missing from the Tour). And my favourite sprinter (Aussie Robbie McEwen) ended up winning the green jersey, as the top rider in the points competition (points given each stage depending on your placing rather than the time, you could say it measures the consistency of finishing near the top - the overall contenders will often finish in the middle of the pack on flat stages for example).

As for working, well, I've realized yet again that the job I'm going to in September will be a good thing for me ... I'm starting to feel similar fatigue and frustration to when I had my own practice, the thought that I only have just over a month to go is what's getting me through. At least I'll get paid on Friday ... they made a mistake in registering me properly through the computer system when I started for July, so the first set of billings to Alberta Health was entirely rejected, then when they tried to fix the problem the next set of billings missed the payment deadline, but it looks like everything went through ok this time. I think I might have gone on strike otherwise ;-)

And I'm nearing the point of giving up on the pregnancy thing, I just can't deal with the expectations and hopes of being pregnant and then the cruel disappointment each month when it doesn't happen (like today for instance, I was so sure this was going to be the lucky month). I'm not sure I want to spend tons of money for alternative ways to experience the same disappointment ...

I think I'm starting to sound really sorry for myself, and I'm not generally like that, so I'd better stop now :-). Maybe I'll go watch a movie or something (I've got a bunch recorded that I haven't had a chance to watch yet)...