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2008 Tour de France

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I find it interesting that the police are involved in hauling away the dopers. For all our steroid controversies the biggest risk of jail time comes from perjury.

IMO the next big step the tour could take is to say that if a member of a team is caught the entire team is DQd.
Extreme - but it would enlist another level of policing.
 
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Oh8ch;1207784; said:
[censored].

Ricco was doping.
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Unbelievably dissapointing. What an asshole.

For those of us that have watched this event before, it is amazing how different the level of competition is now vs when the drugs were more prevelant. You just do not see the long sustained attacks on the steeps, the long brakeaways (Tyler Hamilton, Veronique and Ja ja come to mind).

Everyone is close to the same level. Not sure I like it.

Fuck it, let em big ring it up L'alpe D'huez at 30 kmh.
 
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I really bought into the tour this year and have loved the competition.

The first two dopers didn't bother me because they seemed to be guys trying to hang on at the end of their careers who just hadn't learned. But Ricco was even described in this thread as "the future of the tour". I agreed. I was rooting for him.

When he took off to win his stage his surge was so strong that my first thought was he had help. I set that aside because it didn't seem fair to comment based solely on a strong performance. Well, that was our clue with Landis as well.

There is still one rider on the tour whose performance is almost too remarkable. As a sprinter it is a shorter distance and more easily explained without help. But if that shoe should drop the tour will be in a shambles and I will go back to watching it only on the third Sunday as they cruise through Paris.
 
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Oh8ch;1208644; said:
I really bought into the tour this year and have loved the competition.

The first two dopers didn't bother me because they seemed to be guys trying to hang on at the end of their careers who just hadn't learned. But Ricco was even described in this thread as "the future of the tour". I agreed. I was rooting for him.

When he took off to win his stage his surge was so strong that my first thought was he had help. I set that aside because it didn't seem fair to comment based solely on a strong performance. Well, that was our clue with Landis as well.

There is still one rider on the tour whose performance is almost too remarkable. As a sprinter it is a shorter distance and more easily explained without help. But if that shoe should drop the tour will be in a shambles and I will go back to watching it only on the third Sunday as they cruise through Paris.
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I think he is clean, or I hope so. That kid is soooo fast, no one even close. Notice Robbie McKuen's (sp) lack of any speed this year. Hmmmmmm

Here is a good article by the Science of sport

The Science of Sport

le Tour de France 2008: Third doping shock
[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]Posted: 17 Jul 2008 07:35 PM CDT[/FONT]
[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]Another dark day for cycling as it fights to clean up[/FONT]

[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]In one of our pre-tour posts this year we mentioned that we would focus on the racing, and how last year the doping took center stage. We hoped this year would prove different, but that hope vanished somewhere on the road to Narbonne yesterday, and here we are in the middle of July discussing yet another tour doping scandal.[/FONT]

[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]Tour hits strike three with Ricc?[/FONT]

[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]
moz-screenshot.jpg
First it started with Team Liquigas's Manuel Beltr?n, and then Mois?s Due?as of Team Barloworld. Both tested positive for EPO, and Due?as was caught with, shall we say, a plethora of doping products in his room including blood bags and other items. Yet in some ways, people did not seem to mind these infractions. Beltr?n (37) was of the "old guard" and raced in the EPO-rife 1990's when that drug was (ab)used with wreckless abandon. Duenas, although only 27 this year, was not a contender by any stretch---he finished barely in the top third in the last two tours. So although disappointed by these two positives, they were dismissed as the inevitable consequence of having 188 riders in the Tour - some would cheat, surely?[/FONT]

[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]Ricardo Ricc?, however, is a big name. At only 24, Ricc? was hailed as a member of a new generation of riders who were fed up with the dopers. Even more, he was quickly becoming a contender and real threat as he attacked the field on the Col d'Aspin and destroyed the bunch, putting 1:15 into them by the summit. He won that stage, and the earlier finish at Super-Besse, but now he has left the tour in shame for alleged use of what he surely thought was an undetectable drug---else why would he be taking it?[/FONT]

[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif]The Science behind "Micera" and EPO: EPO makes a comeback[/FONT]

[FONT=Georgia,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif][/FONT]
Cont'd ...
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Oh8ch;1208644; said:
There is still one rider on the tour whose performance is almost too remarkable. As a sprinter it is a shorter distance and more easily explained without help. But if that shoe should drop the tour will be in a shambles and I will go back to watching it only on the third Sunday as they cruise through Paris.
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Folanator;1208707; said:
I think he is clean, or I hope so. That kid is soooo fast, no one even close. Notice Robbie McKuen's (sp) lack of any speed this year. Hmmmmmm

Here is a good article by the Science of sport
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You guys are talking about Tour rookie Mark Cavendish from England... I was thinking the same thing this morning after I heard he won his second stage in a row and 4 for Le Tour. I hope for his and the sport of cycling's sake that he is clean. Mark is definitely one of those pure sprinters though... a great burst of speed for a bunch finish but sucks in the mountains... he's almost 2 hours behind Cadel Evans in the GC.

As for Robbie McKewen... I think his lack of speed comes more from getting older than anything else. I would imagine this will be his last tour.
 
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A series of attacks on the final climb split up the top 10 riders today.

Frank Schleck takes over the lead, but it's extremely close - 6 guys still have a very good chance to win it. There's a rest day on Monday, two more days in the Alps (Alpe D'Huez on Wed.) and a long individual time trial on Saturday. Sunday should be just a ceremonial ride for the yellow jersey.

Once again, here are the riders relevant for the vbet:

00:01 Frank Schleck (leader)
00:07 Bernhard Kohl ("field")
00:08 Cadel Evans (former leader)
00:38 Denis Menchov
00:39 Christian Vande Velde ("field")
00:49 Carlos Sastre
02:48 Kim Kirchen
04:11 Alejandro Valverde
07:43 Damiano Cunego
09:01 Andy Schleck
21:13 Yaroslav Popovych
22:30 Stefan Schumacher ("field")

OUT- Riccardo Ricco (kicked out for doping)
OUT- Juan Jose Cobo (team pulled out after Ricco tested positive)
OUT- Oscar Pereiro - fell on the descent today, broken shoulder blade
OUT- Stjin Devolder (quit during a climb today)
OUT- Haimar Zubeldia

Here were the standings after stage 10:

00:00 Cadel Evans (leader)
00:01 Frank Schleck
00:38 Christian Vande Velde ("field")
00:46 Bernard Kohl ("field')
00:57 Denis Menchov
01:28 Carlos Sastre
01:56 Kim Kirchen
02:10 Juan Jose Cobo ("field")
02:29 Riccardo Ricco ("field")
04:41 Alejandro Valverde
05:37 Damiano Cunego
06:01 Oscar Pereiro
06:11 Stefan Schumacher ("field", former leader)
08:34 Andy Schleck
13:36 Stjin Devolder
18:09 Yaroslav Popovych
36:15 Haimar Zubeldia
 
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Great stage today. Don't bother with the first 4 hours, just ff to the last 45 min. Unbelievable action.

Cadel is showing a few cracks in the armor. He has a very weak team and the CSC boys beat the shit out of him today.

Vandeveldt is fantastic. I really like this guys game. He cannot jump like the little guys can but he has game big time. Looks like with his TT ability he is a shu in for the podium in Paris.

Good comebacks by the other top guys. The overall is really up for grabs.

It all comes down to Wed. I cannot wait. Going to take a half day vacation, get wired on expresso and shout at the TV for 4 hours.

Vinka vinka vinka!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
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Great stage today. Don't bother with the first 4 hours, just ff to the last 45 min.
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Agree, except for a couple of great crashes that might have come before the 45 minute mark. Hate to see a serious injury like the one with Pereiro, but the road rash festival on both sides of a roundabout was great fun (having gone face first over a set of RR tracks and once being hit by a truck myself I think I can get away with saying that).

But that battle up the last climb was classic.

I have to wonder how many are on drugs today, and which will get caught.
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Unfortunately it will take a couple of clean years before folks quit asking that question. The the drug makers will come up with something new that escapes detection and the cycle (no pun intended) will start over again.
 
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I cannot tell you how many times I have gone down. Crashed in a Crit when a couple of guys got tangled up in front of me. I flipped and must have slid 30 yards going about 40mph. Ground off the skin right down almost to bone on both hips. Cleaning that was big fun for about a freeken week.

Good call on the crashes. Seeing that double crash going around the trafic circle was wierd. The couple of slide outs (menchov) was bizzare. You dont see guys just wipe out when they are all anoe that often.
 
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Oh8ch;1209688; said:
Only time I ever saw 40 mph on a bicycle I was on a serious downgrade and squeezing the brakes with both hands.
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I hit almost 55 at Ironman Lake Placid. Talk about something that will make your ass pucker up like Mili in a Hawaian jail with a cell full of 300 lb gay Samoans.
 
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