Tuesday 24 July 2007

Would the real Maillot Jaune please stand up !!

Vino's been thrown out of Le Tour - along with all the rest of the Astana team ! I just can't understand how anyone could be so moronic as to continue to cheat in sport - especially at a time when so much effort is being made to clean up cycling.

With last year's Maillot Jaune still not officially declared, this year's pre-race favourite thrown out, the current Maillot Jaune (Michael Rasmussen) cycling under a very large suspicious cloud, and certain other racers being of dubious extraction, one wonders if we will have a winner declared at all this year !!

But as Patrice Clerc, Director of ASO (the organising company) says : "the Tour will go on. We are waging a war on doping, and in a war there will be casualties. The Tour de France is going through a bleak period. But we must not back down to the cheats." Vive Le Tour !

At least you can say that whatever strategies the organisers (and UCI) are using they must be working. Alexandre Vinokourov was caught out after using blood homologues at the time trial - just 3 days ago.

My concern now is that with the likes of Raimondo Rumsas (another erstwhile disgraced doper) raking in the palmares on the cyclosportive circuit, could we end up seeing Vinokourov (and many others) at La Marmotte or La Maratona dles Dolomiti ? I really hope the problem is being stamped out and not being displaced...

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