not sure what the rules in road racing are. in mountain biking, it's kind of funny. mj is not a banned substance for xc racing, but it is tested for in dh racing. rich houseman got pipped by that rule back in 2002 or thereabouts. talk about a double standard!!
Don't forget the 1998 Tour de France - now known as the "Tour de Shame".
That year kind of made this year seem tame in terms of how many riders are going to finish the race. Only 111 riders made it to the finish line in Paris in 1998 after so many were booted out of the race due to all the doping.
And the history of cheating in the TDF since 1903 - be it pushing other riders over out on the course, dropping tacks on the road to puncture the tires of your competition, hopping on a train or in a truck to short cut parts of the course when nobody was watching, using a myriad of stimulants, drugs and blood transfusions - is filled with decades of cheating or trying to gain an edge against the rules.
Year one in 1903 of the TDF:
Riders were caught catching trains, taking cars and even dropping spikes trying to flatten their opponents’ tyres.
Year two in 1904:
The 1904 Tour was almost the last one with the cheating that went on.
Many tours saw the use of cocaine and or amphetamines in the first 5 or 6 decades of the TDF as a way to "cheat" and keep riding with a tired body.
1967: Tom Simpson's death on the slopes of Mont Ventoux after the Briton had taken a fatal mix of amphetamines and alcohol to help his tiring body.
1978: Belgian rider Michel Pollentier attempted to evade doping controls after winning a stage in 1978 but was caught with an intricate tube-and-container system that contained urine that was not his.
1997: Uzbekistan's Dshamolidin Abdushparov becomes the first rider to be disqualified from the tour for taking banned substances.
1996: Bjarne Riis won (confirmed doper)
1997: Jan Ulrich won (confirmed doper)
1998: Marco Pantani won (confirmed doper and killed himself - maybe a fitting winner of the Tour de Shame) The 1998 Tour was dogged by doping scandals from first to last, primarily centring around the Festina team, and was quickly dubbed 'Tour de Dopage' and 'Tour de Shame'.
1999 - 2005: Lance Armstrong won (????)
2006: Floyd Landis won (confirmed doper)
2007: Patrik Sinkowitz charged with doping before Tour de France and booted; Michael Rasmussen pretty much had it won (????) and his team Rabobank gave him the boot; Alexander Vinokourov booted for a transfusion and team Astana is out; Cristian Moreni fails a drug test and bye-bye team Confidis;
2007 just fits nicely into the history book as the latest addition of cheating and has already been dubbed - the Tour de Farce.
13 comments:
what tour?
cheaters
is it cheating if 97 percent of the riders are doing it? perhaps to the three percent who aren't...
... i'm not saying it's right.
I feel left out. I'm riding a bike. Where's my dope?
But seriously, I'm beginning to think Cheech and Chong should sponsor a team.
now that's a team i'd be stoked to ride for! doping... but not for performance.
(for any kiddies reading, i'm joking in my comment above...)
if 97 percent of the riders are cheating, it's still cheating.
Maybe they should have an "open" class in professional racing. Kind of like World of Outlaws
that'd be interesting. you'd have people killing themselves to win. but then i suppose that's already how it is, to a certain extent.
are you sure, ahem, doping < ////#~~ is not performance enhancing?! do they test for "it"? hmmm.....
not sure what the rules in road racing are. in mountain biking, it's kind of funny. mj is not a banned substance for xc racing, but it is tested for in dh racing. rich houseman got pipped by that rule back in 2002 or thereabouts. talk about a double standard!!
Don't forget the 1998 Tour de France - now known as the "Tour de Shame".
That year kind of made this year seem tame in terms of how many riders are going to finish the race. Only 111 riders made it to the finish line in Paris in 1998 after so many were booted out of the race due to all the doping.
And the history of cheating in the TDF since 1903 - be it pushing other riders over out on the course, dropping tacks on the road to puncture the tires of your competition, hopping on a train or in a truck to short cut parts of the course when nobody was watching, using a myriad of stimulants, drugs and blood transfusions - is filled with decades of cheating or trying to gain an edge against the rules.
Year one in 1903 of the TDF:
Riders were caught catching trains, taking cars and even dropping spikes trying to flatten their opponents’ tyres.
Year two in 1904:
The 1904 Tour was almost the last one with the cheating that went on.
Many tours saw the use of cocaine and or amphetamines in the first 5 or 6 decades of the TDF as a way to "cheat" and keep riding with a tired body.
1967: Tom Simpson's death on the slopes of Mont Ventoux after the Briton had taken a fatal mix of amphetamines and alcohol to help his tiring body.
1978: Belgian rider Michel Pollentier attempted to evade doping controls after winning a stage in 1978 but was caught with an intricate tube-and-container system that contained urine that was not his.
1997: Uzbekistan's Dshamolidin Abdushparov becomes the first rider to be disqualified from the tour for taking banned substances.
1996: Bjarne Riis won (confirmed doper)
1997: Jan Ulrich won (confirmed doper)
1998: Marco Pantani won (confirmed doper and killed himself - maybe a fitting winner of the Tour de Shame) The 1998 Tour was dogged by doping scandals from first to last, primarily centring around the Festina team, and was quickly dubbed 'Tour de Dopage' and 'Tour de Shame'.
1999 - 2005: Lance Armstrong won (????)
2006: Floyd Landis won (confirmed doper)
2007: Patrik Sinkowitz charged with doping before Tour de France and booted; Michael Rasmussen pretty much had it won (????) and his team Rabobank gave him the boot; Alexander Vinokourov booted for a transfusion and team Astana is out; Cristian Moreni fails a drug test and bye-bye team Confidis;
2007 just fits nicely into the history book as the latest addition of cheating and has already been dubbed - the Tour de Farce.
so true bruce... tour de farce. it's got a catchy ring to it.
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