Posted on 7/26/2007, 8:55:51 AM by Aeronaut
Tour de France ping!
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“Versus” TV coverage:
Stage 17: Thursday, July 26, 2007 - Pau to Castelsarrasin
8:30am to 11:30am: LIVE Daily Coverage
12:00pm to 2:00pm: Race Action Replay
2:30pm to 4:30pm: Race Action Replay
5:00pm to 7:00pm: Race Action Replay
8:00pm to 11:00pm: Expanded Primetime Coverage
12:00am to 3:00am: Race Action Replay
The French have a bicycle race and the world watches. These must truly be the end times.
NO, it hasn’t been canceled; nor has MO Baseball and Barry Bonds’ “record” hunt; NBA and playoffs with refs under suspiciion, pro golf and steroid users, or the NFL and accused dog fighters and other felons.
I love following the Tour.
And at least they are trying to right the ship and being honest about performance drugs and doping.
I think, especially the NBA — with game fixing — sport sin America are all creeping into WWE territory.
But that is my opinion.
Go Contador!!
I’m amazed at the lack of respect shown for the world’s leading cycling event (104 years old) by the likes of Vinokourov, Ullrich, Basso, rasmussen and Tyler Hamilton. Perhaps by never mentioning their names in race coverage (have you heard the name “Bjarne Riis” once this year from Phil and Paul? His name used to crop up daily), it will deter others planning to cheat.
This example really shows how sport must proceed. The officials have an uphill struggle trying to stay ahead of the cheats, but sponsors can pay their part. Here they’ve just gone and fired someone who was blantantly cheating, even if it wasn’t proven. In other sports sponsorship contracts could be written so that any athlete caught doping has to repay their sponsors all the money they took from them.
Remove the benefits of cheating, and hopefully remove the cheating.
Another thing this does show is how truly great Lance Armstrong was. Do you think these guys just started cheating after Lance left the sport? They just never got caught because all the doping officials were trying to do was catch Lance (which they never did). He is truly one of the greatest athletes in all of sports history.
Like the Patric Clerc said, "This is war, and in war we will have casualties."
At least they are saying what they mean & meaning what they say, unlike a few other sports which only pay lip service.
The REASON cycling is having scandals is because they're NOT looking the other way & sweeping the garbage under the rug like other sports.
The next generation of riders, which isn't yet so psychologically dependent on the juice that they'd rather deliberately expose themselves to the world as cheats (as Vino did) rather than face the terror of racing their bikes for the first time without artificial help, are out there.
We just gotta get rid of the junkies first so that they can have their day.
Yes, it looks bad, even absurd. But war ain't ever pretty, and I really think we can finally say that the good guys have the upper hand now. They've proven they're serious & they're willing to clean it up by any means necessary, even if it means torpedoing their most prestigious race to do it.
“The REASON cycling is having scandals is because they’re NOT looking the other way & sweeping the garbage under the rug like other sports.”
And that cycling obviously doesn’t involve that you need to be smart. How could Vino NOT see this comming ?
What a disgrace the tour has become in 2007! I was enjoying some fine racing recently, but now the leading rider is pulled by his team just as it appears as though he will win the tour.
What’s next?
Loved your post about Lance. He is arguably the greatest athlete this country and especially Texas has ever produced.
And they have been rolling for about 45 minutes on stage 17.
Looks like everybody is keeping a wary eye on each other.
He is certainly a great athlete - but he was certainly on HGH and EPO - and he was lizenced for larger quantities of testosterone because it’s part of his post cancer treatment.
There’s certainly an interesting question in moral behind that - shall the tour punish a guy because he’e taking a medicament that increases his performance that he takes as a presribed treatment ? Or shall the tour punish those who are healthy ?
Anyhow in lances times and before the great athlets were not riding by the book. Neither LAnce nor indu nor pantani nor virenque nor jan nor mario nor erik and nor biarne and even nor floyd.
Asume anything else and you can be called naive for a good reason if not ignorant.
I wish American Sports would follow suit and get as aggressive as cycling is starting to get.
Still, the suspensions need to be attention getters -- to hell with this 25 game/50game/1 year crap in baseball, or the 4 game/1 year crap in football, or even the 2 year crap in cycling --- all sports should sign an agreement RIGHT NOW : IF YOU ARE CAUGHT USING PERFORMANCE ENHANCING DRUGS YOU WILL BANNED FROM ALL PROFESSIONAL AND AMATUER SPORTING COMPETITIONS FOR LIFE.
That is the only thing that will get thier attention. Give them thier just due, just like Landis is getting, but if after all is said and done they are found guilty - the ban stands. LIFETIME - no chance for reinstatement! Do not pass go, do not collect $200 Million in endorsements.
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