CheshireTom

growler, It is 2-4-2 (normally AC-DEFG-HK) in Elite and 3-3-3 (normally ABC-DEG-HJK) in Economy. Tom

It seems Manchester will eventually get its Thai flights after all. From the Bangkok Post ....................... "Thai Airways International is spreading its wings to five new destinations: Moscow, Johannesburg, Berlin, Sendai in Japan, and Manchester. The scheduled flights to Moscow and Johannesburg are set to start in November and December respectively, while flights to the three other cities are expected to begin between 2006 and 2007...................... ..............Three or four flights a week are planned for the service to Manchester, the airline's second serving city in the UK, in 2007, while it plans to start flying to Sendai three times a week sometime next year. Mr Vasing said the the introduction of new destinations, timing and frequencies would be in line with the airline's fleet expansion and delivery schedules." The timing of the MAN service seems to indicate that it is tied-in to the delivery of Thai's 777ERs which will commence in the latter part of 2006. It's still a bit of a way off but it may be worth taking into account if you are in the habit of accumulating airmiles. Tom

misterhandy, Thai AirAsia is now booking through until the end of March 2006. Prices from/to Singapore are from 230 Baht each-way plus the add-on taxes etc. Tom

Hub, Without referring specifically to LA, I agree with you entirely re the testing procedures, however, a test for chemical 'A' will not necessarily detect chemical 'B'. I think that's what folk refer to as keeping one step ahead of the testers as the Balco cases highlighted. I don't think Marion Jones has ever tested positive for anything but you've got to wonder about the coincidence of her slump in form coming around at exactly the same time as the testers found out what exactly it was that other athletes alleged she was on. At the end of the day, it is not sports fans who are naturally cynics. It is those athletes on drugs who have not only cheated the other competitors but also Joe Bloggs who has paid good money to see them who generate the cynicism. As a case in point, I don't think we ever seriously questioned the ridiculous times being run by sprinters in the late 80s until Ben Johnson came along. Any bets that the Chinese team will win a whole host of medals in Beijing in 2008? Tom

BigD, Are you the full shilling, or what? All I said is that I can't get my head around how he has continually beaten all those cycling guys that are on drugs and have admitted that fact ............. somebody mentioned David Millar as a prime example. Another poster said that Florence Griffith Joyner was one of his favourite athletes. Her legacy is a couple of ridiculous world records and an untimely death. But, just for the record, she never once tested positive. As I have already said, LA will now have his day in court to put over his side of the story. As for trying to tear him down a peg or two, I'll remind you that it was Greg Lemond who labelled him "a fraud". Tom

BigD, Sometimes I wonder if you are really that thick or whether you have to work at it. The allegations were made in a book, LA Confidential, excerpts of which were reprinted in The Sunday Times. LA is currently sueing Times Newspapers and the case will be heard in London sometime at the beginning of Nov. LA will have his day in court to establish whether or not he did, or did not do, what has been alleged in the book. If he thought that The Times would back off under the threat of legal action he has made a serious miscalculation. The contents of the book and the newspaper excerpts, which you obviously have never read, will make for a very interesting court case ........... if LA now continues with the action. Tom p.s. I ain't seen you around for a few days. I heard that McGuiness was in Philly and assumed you had gone to pay homage.

spike, "Thank God Tom was not a testing judge or Lance would not have won 7 Tours." And LA's lucky that the London High Court Judges aren't either. From Reuters today ....... Armstrong loses London court joust Seven-times Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong suffered defeat in London's Court of Appeal on Friday. Three judges ruled that a London newspaper was entitled to argue that it could print a story containing allegations that Armstrong had taken performance-enhancing drugs. The cyclist has denied taking banned drugs. The judges agreed with The Sunday Times newspaper that it was entitled to argue such a story was privileged on the basis it was in the public interest and the newspaper had a duty to publish it. The Court also ruled that when the case comes to court the paper can argue a number of points which it says justified publication of the story. The High Court had earlier struck these out, along with the public interest defence. The Sunday Times had challenged a High Court ruling in December in which a judge rejected its claims that the allegations, which had originally been made in a book, were a matter of public interest and the paper was therefore protected from being sued for libel. Tom p.s. Why would I ever bet against LA? Biased, maybe. Stupid, no!

livermore, I think the rules say that you declare prescription drugs or banned substances before the event, not after it; even if it is only for a sore bum. I think LA employs folk so that these little nuances called rules are adhered to. The fact that triamcinolone can also be ingested orally to help improve lung function is purely coincidental, of course. I suppose since the UCI is an international organisation LA can claim that he didn't understand the rules since they were written in French. It reminds me a bit about the difference between Linford Christie and Ben Johnson ............. Ben Johnson didn't think of a cup of ginseng tea! Tom

themook, I think we've all set out our stall re Lance and I think it would be accurate to say that he is a controversial champion. Of the other US sportsmen in my lifetime that I would consider great (or at least who have given me the most enjoyment), not necessarily athletes, I would rate: Tiger Woods (I am lucky enough to live about 40 minutes from Southport and Royal Birkdale so I may even take a trip up there this weekend to see Michelle Wie - frightening ability for her age!). McEnroe and Connors - some great memories of two great competitors. Ali and Leonard - made boxing an art form at times. Marino and Montana - the top dogs during my TV induction to American Football Mark Spitz - whatever became of him? Greg Lemond I know bugger all about baseball and basketball as neither have really taken off over here so my apologies for omitting any folks from those sports. Tom

livermore, Your second paragraph says everything about your mentality. No-one has got a downer on LA because he is American so your little jibe about British cyclists is irrelevant and really does show what you know about cycling or are you one of these armchair coaches that cheers everyone on ...... as long as they're waving the stars and stripes. The "he has never tested positive" argument was, as I have already stated on this thread, identical to that used by Kostas Kenteris, Flo Jo and Marion Jones to name but a few. It was good that you brought up the case of David Millar since he also claimed never to have failed a drugs test up until he actually did. One of his more memorable quotes was: "It upsets me to think that people assume every pro is on drugs. Just because people can't comprehend the level of fitness and ability that some riders have, they now assume they all do it on drugs." Never a truer word was spoken. Tom

farman, To travel out on Xmas day Airfaresbasement has Qatar @ GBP 568, Gulf at 601 and EVA @ 658. http://airfaresbasement.com/ Airroutes has Sri Lankan @ GBP 577 Airroutes.com Thomas Cook has Gulf @ GBP 592 and Lufthansa @ 632 thomascook.com Expedia has Gulf @ GBP 570 and EVA @ 621 Travelbag/e-bookers has Jordanian @ GBP 525 All of the above are available and include all taxes. There are loads of flights around, even more so if you travel on Boxing Day. As for buying now or waiting ...... simply speaking, there is a 50% chance the fares will go up and the same that they will come down ............. up to you! Tom

themook, I would disagree that he didn't just come from nowhere. Prior to winning the tour he had competed four times previously and managed to finish only once, when he came in somewhere around 20th/25th or thereabouts. I think you would agree that is not a particularly strong pedigree by any stretch of the imagination. You are right to say that he has lifted the sport to new heights but there again so did the East German swimmers and Chinese runners in their particular events. Tom

BigD, Thank Christ for that. I thought for a moment you were going to claim to be related to Stephen Roche. BTW, no need to spit your dummy out. Tom

Gary, No, I never mentioned anything about his nationality and it seems that it is only you that finds it somewhat relevant. (Kostas Kenteris is Greek BTW and sorry about my earlier spelling). I was actually a big fan of Greg Lemond when Channel 4 in the UK first started programming the tour. But if you think I'm critical, just bear in mind that it was fellow-American Greg that labelled LA as "the greatest fraud in the history of the race". If you read my first post in this thread I had already anticipated the same old Yank bashing arguments from the likes of you when I wrote: "Before the usual suspects mention Yank bashing, I had exctly the same cynicism when grandad Linford Christie was still competing at some ridiculous age." Hopefully that will answer your question. As for outstanding US athletes, certainly in my llifetime, I would probably nominate Michael Johnson and Ed Moses as being up there. Who are your top Brits? BTW, where do you get your persecution complex from? Tom

themook, "He trains harder than most guys on the tour; he also concentrates on winning this race almost exclusively." Unfortunately, this is identical to the defence offered by Kosta Kederis when questioned about his form and choosing to compete in one major competition each year. Oh, and the standard "I've never tested positive" reaction which, in LA's case, isn't quite true. Tom

Bill, Chuffed means pleased........... Tom

echster, I will avoid any A v B comments as well as I am a little bit biased since we build the Airbus wings up the road from me just outside Chester. I do think the arguments tended to get a bit polarised on the question of hub-to-hub or point-to-point and 10 years ago none of us were probably looking at Dubai, Doha and, to a lesser extent, Abu Dhabi emerging as major hubs. I would agree that the best economy trip I've made was in the SQ 777ER from Manchester to Singapore but I don't know if that was down to Krisworld and the amazing SQ girls. Whatever the case, it was a very pleasant trip. In biz class the front section of Qatars two-class A330 suits me down to the ground but I could be tempted by Thai biz class if they put a 777ER on a non-stop MAN-BKK routing. I did read an interesting article in the Times at the weekend that questioned the finances of air-to-air refuelling on long haul flights given the cost of fuel which came up with some good numbers. I think if it's good enough for Air Force One it would be good enough for me. Thanks for your continued good info. Regards, Tom

Samsonite, I'm well aware of the arguments put over by various pundits on discussion boards and I could pick and choose pro-Airbus comments from the multitude of A v B threads available, however, I've noticed that all that does is bring out folks deep-rooted prejudices. Personally, I've flown on a multitude of Boeing and Airbus aircraft and for a traveller it boils down to how the airline operates the aircraft in terms of furbishment, service etc that counts, not whether the aircraft was assembled in Washington or Toulouse. I realise that you may be a trifle miffed that some European upstart came along to disrupt the US monopoly in the civilian aerospace market but that is no reason to start crying foul at every turn. At the end of the day, a little bit of healthy competition is good for the traveller. Hopefully, we will get Thai doing a non-stop service to Manchester at the end of 2006/start of 2007 with one of their 777ERs. I'd be equally chuffed if they were doing it with an A340-600. Tom

Somebody needs to tell that to the guys at UPS and Fedex .............. Didn't Boeing mock the A380 saying there was no market for larger aircraft? Tom

echster, Thanks for that. Tom

Matty, Much as I would like to admire LA as an athlete I can't get my head round how was always beating the guys who were on some of the most advanced performance-enhancing drugs on the market. I guess I'm a bit too cynical. Before the usual suspects mention Yank bashing, I had exctly the same cynicism when grandad Linford Christie was still competing at some ridiculous age. Whatever happened to the Scottish guy who built his own bikes from washine machine parts? Tom

Neither Tiger Airways nor AirAsia flies BKK-MNL other than via SIN/KUL respectively. Thai Air Asia has been touted to start the route but nothing has appeared in its schedules yet. Tom

I think you'll find that only Thai, Philippine and Kuwait Airlines fly MNL-BKK direct. It may be worth comparing the price against AirAsia via KL or Jetstar/Tiger Airways via SIN. Tom

echster, The Swiss site shows Thai operating A346 7 days a week on their codeshare but the Thai site shows EQV (star alliance site shows a MD11) as the aircraft type so it all gets a bit confusing. A couple of months ago on their investors presentation TG were unambiguous in saying the 346 was for European secondary routes (everywhere except FRA and LHR), Auckland and Tokyo now they seem to be all over the place. It really makes you wonder if they do have a strategy. Personally, I think they've got way too much capacity at the front end of the aircraft for some of the routes they are allocating the aircraft to and that they would have been better taking the EVA (and their own 345) route and went for a C, Y+ and Y configuration. The obvious problem on the LAX route is that the 345 and 346/747 configurations are incompatable, i.e. no Y+ on the 346/747 and no F on the 345. No problem if, like SQ, you are providing a daily choice between the two but not if it is a pick 'n mix spread over the whole week. Any idea about their 772ER deliveries? Are they still next year? To me that would seem a better choice of aircraft for the Euro secondary routes and KIX/LAX, paricularly if they go for a C/Y+/Y configuration. Tom

echster, Thanks for the update. These 5 x A340-600 are going to be busy aircraft ............ Milan, Tokyo, Zurich, Auckland, Johannesburg, Osaka and Los Angeles at the last count. Any I've missed? Paris? Madrid? Given the cock-ups with the A340-600 schedules on the Auckland, Zurich and Milan routes, I'm surprised Thai knows what it will be doing next month, no matter next year. When is the next investors' presentation? Next month? It will be nice to get some clarification what they are getting up to. That said, the LAX flight would make sense to be upgraded to a A346 since I would think some pax would be pissed off if they got the A345 in one direction and one of the older clapped-out 747s in the other direction. I think I will continue to avoid them until they put a non-stop 777ER into Manchester. Tom