A ex-pro just died, perhaps from it, at age 36.  (Had gone through treatment and chemo for it last year.)  Jonathon Cantwell.  (https://www.velonews.com/2018/11/news/former-pro-jonathan-cantwell-dies-at-36_481056)

That's two riders in a pool of what, 10,000? that have had it in a 25 year span.  I've heard of maybe one case outside cycling ever.  Is this a consequence of drug use?  Saddle irritation? (though it seems to only show up in pros, not amateurs who do crazy mileage.  Granted, that pool is pretty small).

Now he was riding at a high level in the early 2000s, the big time EPO era (and who knows what else).  Is there a link between EPO (as used by athletes) and testicular cancer?  Are there hormones or steroids in use in cycling that could be linked?  (As I write this, I'm thinking this is probably it.  We know he-who-shall-not-be-named recited an impressive list of banned substances to Betsy Andreu and others including as I recall steroids.)

Perhaps testicular cancer is simple a risk of so many hours in the saddle and riding that hard.  Perhaps more attention needs to be made to good saddle fit.  (To draw an analogy - pro football.  Even before drugs, the diet of a lineman set that person up for a life that was not going to take him far into his senior years.  The head bashing didn't help either.)

I have paid heavily for my life choices, some of which I was fully aware of going in.  Given the same choices again, I'd do much the same.  I felt a strong empathy for the great hockey player and one of the world's best ever skaters - Bobby Orr - who destroyed his knees living the life he loved.  Empathy also for the fact that the surgery to repair his knees and allow him to use the gift of that incredible skating ability did not exist when he was playing and is now commonplace.  I lived 30 years with the chemicals in my liver from boatbuilding that meant I had a bunch of weird "allergies"- to wool, tobacco, diesel fumes, people's pheromes (the ultimate marriage curse), etc.  Last year, my GP, a nurse with a million letters after her name, suggest a natropathic "liver cleanser".  90 days.  I felt like s*** the middle month.  And many of those symptoms of 30 years that I thought I was taking to the grave are gone.

Ben