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Possible new rules for the 2008 Tour de France

The Tour has a drug problem. First it was Patrik Sinkewitz. Then Alexandre Vinokourov. And now, Christian Moreni. Not to mention all those who "retired" or were otherwise dealt with prior to the start of this year's Tour. At the start of this year's event, hopes were high that the doping scandals were behind us. Alas, that's turned out not to be the case. Given that it seems the doping is impossible to control, I have some proposed changes for next year's Tour--changes that will handle the doping issue, as well as make the race more exciting for fans everywhere.

Update: Holy cow, Rasmussen's gone too!

  1. No more drug tests: Clearly they're not working to dissuade anyone from cheating, so let's just open things up. Anything goes--whatever drug you think will help your performance, you're free to give it a shot. The Tour will save millions in expenses, and spare themselves any further embarrassment when yet another big name rider fails a drug test. The other upside is that the tour will go much quicker, as I expect the average pace of the drug-enhanced athletes will be notably quicker than that of previous tours. Lose the rest days, too, as there won't be any need.
  2. Allow physical contact during the race: Think of the best of wrestling, roller derby, NASCAR, and demolition derby combined into one action-packed multi-week event. "And there goes Smithson, over the edge of the Col d'Aubisque, courtesy of a great body check from Peltiere!" 'Yes, Todd, that really was a great check, and the 1,500' vertical drop will really slow Smithson's return to today's route!' Think of all the new fans this will bring to the sport.
  3. Umbrella girls: Hey, if it works for Moto GP, it can work for the Tour, too. After all, it can get toasty sitting there on the saddle, waiting for the race to start. Each day, anyone in the top 10 in the general classification will be protected from the sun (or the rain) by an umbrella girl.

OK, so the above is in jest. I do enjoy watching the Tour; it's simply an amazing display of endurance, strategy, and outright speed. However, if something isn't done about the doping and drug issues, the sport is in danger of losing what little reputation it has left. It's bad when you begin to doubt any result, not knowing whether you just saw a heroic performance or merely the results of chemistry at work (i.e. Landis and Vinokourov's "great" mountain stages in 2006 and 2007).

I don't have any good suggestions on just how to further clean up cycling, though--perhaps changing the current two-year ban into a lifetime ban? Bigger financial penalties? Disqualification of an entire team if anyone fails a drug test during a race? Whatever it is, it's clear that more changes are needed if the sport is to cleanse itself.

8 thoughts on “Possible new rules for the 2008 Tour de France”

  1. Today on French TV, the commentators, one of whom was a former Tour winner, suggested the lifetime ban idea. I'd thought myself that it would be the best way to deal with it - you simply tell them that if they cheat, they'll be working at McDonalds!

    As for a team being disqualified, that's what's happened in the past two days - both teams whose riders tested postive have left the Tour, though it's clear that the race organizers have "asked" them to leave.

    My thought is that the organizers should sue the teams and their sponsors for degrading the image of the race. Individual sanctions don't work, so they need to hit the teams much harder.

  2. It needs to be a lifetime ban from the sport. That's the only way.

    The problem can't just be cleaned up by getting rid of riders. Look at Bjarne Riis, who has admitted to doping to win the tour, he's now the boss of CSC. How can CSC be taken seriously?

  3. I don't like the lifetime ban, mainly because of two reasons:

    1. Do we really want to take the possibility to better themselves away from those riders?

    2. Banning riders for life means punishing the wrong ones. Having read the full SPIEGEL interview with Joerg Jaksche, for instance, one thing became entirely clear to me: The ones perpetuating doping in sports are those who introduce teenage athletes into a tradition of drug use. How is a 12-year-old supposed to realize he should resist doping when he's surrounded by people telling him it's the right and -- more importantly -- only way to become successful? So if you're going to ban someone for life, ban Manolo Saiz and Gianluigi Stanga.

    Besides, I think we should refrain from being too holier-than-you. The greatest riders of the last decade -- Lance Armstrong and Jan Ullrich -- both are convicted of doping. But I'm convinced that in a world without doping, they would still have been the greatest. They just aren't perfect humans. Are we?

  4. Peter --

    To be technically accurate, neither Lance or Jan has never been convicted of doping. Both have been accused of doping, but neither ever had a positive test. Lance actually had a positive test in 1999, for having cortisone in his bloodstream, but it was both approved and too low to be called a positive test. Wikipedia:

    "Armstrong has continually denied having used performance-enhancing drugs and has described himself as "the most tested athlete in the world".[6] Throughout his career only one test showed indications of the presence of doping products: in 1999, a urine sample showed traces of corticosteroids, but the amount was not in the positive test range. He later produced a medical certificate showing he used an approved cream for saddle sores which contained the substance.[7]"

    So at this point, neither is guilty of doping, though both are suspected.

    -rob.

  5. That being said, Peter, we the public should take the responsibility by no longer watching any tv programme dealing with the Tour. As soon as no more sponsorship money runs down the rive, the doping problem will cease to exist. Unfortunately, the young talents will have to prove the quality of their efforts much harder than the generation before did.

  6. While it's not correct to say convicted for Armstrong, (No criminal court involved) the evidence is pretty overwhelming. See for example: http://www.smithersmpls.com/2005/08/armstrong-lie/ and the news stories linked there.

    The short version is--to validate the new test for EPO (illegal for a long time but only tested for since 2001) the lab went back to the 1999 B-samples and tested a bunch of them which unsurprisingly showed a lot of positives. This was supposed to be done anonymously with only a number ID on the test tube. But L'Equipe got ahold of one of Armstrong's control forms from 1999 and got his ID number, which was one of the ones which were positive for EPO. Conincidentally, 1999 was also the year he tested positive for steroids (He admits he used the steroid cream). Done and done. As I recall, Armstrong's defense (about the time of the "freedom fries" nonsense) was that the lab was French. It went to US Cycling which had, by 2005 when the articcle came out, completely been taken over by Armstrong, and they unsurprisingly did nothing.

    IMO, the Tour is waaay to hard do be done without the use of chemical enhancement. 19 out 21 days riding a century and a half, sometimes up mountains, is physically impossible.

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