Football
Associated Press 17y

Tour de France to start in London under doping cloud, with no defending champion

LONDON -- With 2006 winner Floyd Landis fighting doping
charges and cycling under intense pressure to clean up, the 189
riders scheduled to start the Tour de France on Saturday will be
scrutinized more than ever.

Doping scandals have damaged the sport's credibility to such an
extent that the July 7-29 race is starting without a defending
champion and several other big-name riders are absent.

"We are still in a difficult and heavy climate," AG2R cyclist
Christophe Moreau said Thursday. "What we need in cycling today is
to talk about sport, talk about the winner."

That's unlikely to happen.

Pre-race chatter is not about who will win, but whether the
champion's yellow jersey can be won cleanly.

"There have been a lot of problems," T-Mobile rider Michael
Rogers said. "We need transparency by all teams and all riders,
and I think it is hard for us to go ahead if we don't put the past
behind us."

While many riders have been suspended or fired, others are
preparing for Saturday's 4.9-mile prologue in England's capital
armed with medical certificates allowing certain products to be
used. But such use of medical authorizations has led to concerns
that prescriptions are being used as masking agents to hide other
doping products.

"Last year, 60 percent of riders tested on the Tour had medical
authorizations," France's Anti-Doping chief Pierre Bordry said
Wednesday. "The AUT (a medical authorization) can become a
passport for doping."

According to the International Cycling Union, up to 40 percent
of riders at this year's race have an AUT.

Cycling officials said they sense a groundswell of opposition to
cheating.

"More and more riders are calling us to say: 'Don't give up.
Carry on, we're behind you," Tour director Christian Prudhomme
said. "There are more and more managers who are also saying, 'It
has to change, and we really want it to change."

Rather than being a "Who's who?" of stars such as Landis, 1997
winner Jan Ullrich and 2005 runner-up Ivan Basso, this month's Tour
is shaping up as a case of "Who's left?" -- only Astana rider
Alexandre Vinokourov is a recognized favorite.

Ullrich and Basso were kicked out on the eve of last year's race
and since have been implicated in doping. Ullrich denies doping.
Basso, who received a two-year doping penalty from the Italian
cycling federation in mid-June, admits attempting to dope but said
he never went through with it.

Landis tested positive for synthetic testosterone at last year's
Tour and his case is now before an arbitration panel.

Ullrich and Basso were tied to a Spanish doping investigation
known as Operation Puerto. More than 50 cyclists were implicated
because of alleged ties to Eufemiano Fuentes, a doctor accused of
running a blood-doping clinic in Madrid.

"It's clear that last year's atmosphere didn't help," Moreau
said. "The time that has passed since then has passed too slowly
... (things have) stagnated too much."

Moreau and the other 188 riders all had blood tests early
Thursday morning. UCI doctor Marc Vandevyvere signed a document
saying none of the tests had come back positive.

Measures to stop cheating appear to be getting more intense.

The ICU requested that all 600 ProTour cyclists sign a charter
saying they are not involved in doping and promising to submit DNA
samples to Spanish authorities for the Operation Puerto probe.
Cyclists who sign the charter also must agree to pay a year's
salary on top of a two-year ban if caught doping.

Prudhomme said anyone who refuses to sign the charter will not
take part in the Tour.

Multiple sprint-stage winner Alessandro Petacchi and Matthias
Kessler are among other riders who won't be taking part in this
summer's Tour. Petacchi, a 33-year-old Italian rider who won four
sprint stages early in the 2004 Tour, returned a "non negative"
test for the asthma drug salbutamol during this year's Giro
d'Italia, and Kessler tested positive for elevated testosterone in
April.

Bjarne Riis -- the 1996 Tour winner and director of Team CSC --
won't be in London, either. He recently admitted to using EPO from
1993-98, and decided Thursday not to join his team for the start in
London -- a day after a CSC official said Riis would be there.

^ Back to Top ^