Le Cyclisme - Quick, hide behind the Sofa !

So Vino and his team have left Le Tour; now Bradley Wiggins can't continue thanks to his drugged team mate, Cristian Moreni; Rasmussen's gone back to Lake Garda in disgrace; Sit down protests; bombs in the Basque area. What next ?? Well at least we now have a yellow jersey wearer (Alberto Contador) !

But with all this Tour de Farce, I'm not sure I really want to watch the race.
Great, so the Tour de France is getting more air time and column inches on mainstream media than the perfunctory one-liners it usually gets. It's a shame it's all for the wrong reasons though.

Hats off to the organisers who are determined to stamp out the doping problem. But doing this all in mid-competition almost makes me want to hide behind the sofa like I did when watching Dr Who as a child. Then, I was scared to see my hero get exterminated. Now, I fear which rider will get caught in the net and disgraced next - maybe one of my favourites (Tom Boonen, George Hincapie, Fabian Cancellara et al) . Alot of people liked Alexandre Vinokourov. It was a real shock to discover he had been cheating. Maybe Messrs Prudhomme and Clerc should just tap me on the shoulder and let me know when it's ok to come out from behind the sofa. Somehow I don't think that'll happen very soon !

Well, at least L'Equipe sports newspaper is today reporting on a doping scandal in athletics - maybe things aren't so bad in the world of cycling !

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...