Tour de Drama

[bjammin]

Rass. is grass...
Rasmussen Pulled From Race

By Phil Liggett
July 25, 2007

So, the Tour de France is punishing into chaos tonight after both, the French Team and the Dutch Rabobank has packed their bags headed home. The seal of 189 riders in London are now down to 135 to final days into Paris. Just what the millions of spectators will make of this, remains to be. They certainly will not see the race leader for the past 9 nine days and today’s stage winner, Michael Rasmussen. He was sacked by hi Rabobank Team for lying about his whereabouts when he failed to make himself available for the now well documented out of competition drug test.

His team manager, Theo de Rooy said that Rasmussen had told him he had been in Mexico with his wife. We all know now Rasmussen has been seen training in the Dolomite Mountains in Italy. The team then withdrew because of the Code of Ethics, which is now agreed within professional teams.

Earlier in the evening I had also dreaded to go home for the same principles after former Italian Champion, Christian Moreni, had tested positive during a spot check on Stage 11 for synthetic testosterone. Moreni finished this afternoon and was then taken away by handcuffs by French police.

The new leader of the race will be young Spaniard, Alberto Contador by 1:53 ahead of Cadel Evans and Levi Leipheimer who is +56 seconds in third.

Thank heavens none of these three riders have ever been remotely suspected in dealing with drugs and could now turn out to be the race’s saviors.

Tomorrow is going to be a strange day.

[shudder]

It just seems that the damned sport is imploding, and doing so on international TV.

I had such a great time watching the first two weeks of competition while I was on vacation -- taped the early morning VS. show every day and tapped through it all during the day (great way to watch!).

And then it all seemed to come apart (and may still come apart more... what might tomorrow bring, hm?)

The thing is, Vino didn't have to do ANYTHING else to be top dog. He didn't have to win the damn race at all -- it was fine for Ras to win, considering Alexandre was 30 minutes behind. To many folks, Vino was a hero just for staying in the competition after his fall and the dozens of stitches it took to close up his weeping knees and his elbow. His stick-to-it-iveness was more than enough to convince fans he was the real deal -- a true role model -- no matter if he won or not. A true sportsman. Right?

And then it all seemed to come apart.

Just now I was watching the recording of Ras winning 16 earlier today, and Phil Liggett was going on about Michael being the true king of the TDF. Of course, that was a few hours before Ras withdrew from the race...

It's just unbelievable. This freakin' sport can't get a break.

[Wrecker]

Swiss newspaper to cover only doping in Tour de France:

Swiss newspaper to cover only doping in Tour de France
Posted on Wednesday, July 25, 2007 (EST)
One of Switzerland's largest daily newspapers, Tages-Anzeiger, is stopping race coverage from the Tour de France immediately and will only report doping-related stories, an editor said on Wednesday.