Doping cloud lingers over Tour
CYCLING’S greatest race, the Tour de France, begins today, hoping to cast off the recent cloud of suspicion and scandal of doping with a celebration of its historic 100th edition.
A total of 198 riders from 22 teams will line up for the 212km first stage from Porto-Vecchio to Bastia on the Mediterranean island of Corsica.
Three weeks, 3 403.5km and 20 stages later, only the very best – and most fortunate – will finish.
Last year’s runner-up behind Britain’s Bradley Wiggins, Chris Froome, is favourite to win the race after successes in Oman, the Criterium International, Tour of Romandie and the Criterium du Dauphine.
But the 28-year-old team Sky rider is likely to face stiff competition from 2007 and 2009 Tour winner Alberto Contador of Spain, despite his lack of victories this season.
Challenging both men are Spain’s Joaquim Rodriguez, who was runner-up in the Giro d’Italia in May, and Australian outsider Cadel Evans, the 2011 winner, who could become the oldest victor at 36.
This year’s race is the first to be held after the Lance Armstrong doping scandal, which sent shockwaves through cycling and the world of sport.
The US rider, who was unmasked as a serial drug cheat in a devastating US Anti-Doping Agency report last year, was subsequently stripped of his record seven Tour wins between 1999 and 2005.
Race organisers have refused to nominate a winner in his place, as cycling was plunged into a period of deep introspection about the extent of drug use in the peloton in the 1990s and 2000s.
The spectre still looms large over the Tour, after the 1997 winner and three-time runner-up Jan Ullrich of Germany admitted doping last weekend – and said it was widespread.
There have also been accusations French star Laurent Jalabert used the banned blood booster erythropoetin (EPO) during the scandal-hit 1998 Tour, forcing him to step down as a radio and television pundit.
Tour organisers and today’s riders, however, maintain doping is largely a problem of the past. — Sapa-AFP