Weak Focus

By now everyone knows that Floyd has failed a drug test; in this case his testosterone ratio is out of whack. I’m not sure by how much, and it’s possible he’ll pass with the b sample. It’s also possible that it’s an unaugmented result. Floyd has made reference to taking thyroid supplements for a problem he’s had the last year. Do thyroid supplements cause elevated testosterone levels? I have no clue. I do know that the positive test hasn’t cast cycling in a very good light, and again that’s deeply unfortunate. It does seem a bit odd to me that they’d find the result so far into the race. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’d assumed there had been previous testing and from what I understand testosterone isn’t useful for immediate performance boost like an amphetamine, or EPO. I’d expect it would have been seen earlier but perhaps I’m wrong and they haven’t been testing the whole way.

I’d sure like to believe that it’s all a mistake and Floyd is clean; he certainly seems too clean cut to cheat. I felt the same way about Tyler though, and it’s deeply unlikely that he wasn’t taking something. It just goes to show that no one is immune to the call. Outdoor magazine has an excellent article written by an amateur cyclist who goes in for doping. It says more about the appeal of doping than I could. Even still; say it ain’t so Floyd… say it ain’t so. And Phonak, know that sacking Landis isn’t going to rid you of the problem. I think the president of WADA had it right in an interview I heard today. I can’t reproduce the statement, but the gist was that the businesses that sponsor cycling need to withdraw their support and encourage others to withdraw their support until this gets fixed. It’s the sort of approach that hits big sports business where it counts: in the pocketbook.

What a spectacular recovery. I don’t have anything glib to say, but wow what a come back. It’ll be a good boost for Visionquest as well, which is great because Robbie is a really generous guy. He’s been a big supporter of the local race scene, especially the Northbrook track, so it’s great to see him get some large scale publicity.

I’m going to stop making predictions for the tour because everytime I try I’m miserably wrong. Landis had an impossibly good ride today to get himself back into third, just 31 seconds off the leader and well within striking distance for the time trial. What an unpredictable race. Landis’ ride today was unbelievable, but in relating it to the people I work with there was one unanimous comment, “So… he found some good dope last night then, eh?” So rather than make poor predictions about the outcome of the tour I’d like to revisit the issue of doping in sports.

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First off, my apologies to Mr. Rasmussen, who I too quickly discounted. Somehow I managed to overlook his performance yesterday in service of his GC man and instead labeled him as having a bad day when it’s obvious it was quite the contrary. That’s what I get for not working harder to get to the TV coverage. He put in a stellar ride today, and I was happy Sastre wasn’t able to catch him in the final kilos after all the work he’d put in. I always feel bad when these big early attacks get swept up at the end.

The big news of course is Landis cracked, and cracked bad. Floyd lost well over 10 minutes today; he’s done. It makes you wonder whether the conservative approach up until now was strategy, or a mask for Landis being weaker than he let on. Tomorrow is another brutal day of climbing and he needs to get quite a bit of time back if he wants to look at even keeping a podium spot. Looks like Floyd’s tour just went belly up.

This leaves Levi the only American still in the top 10 on GC, and he’s just sneaking in under the wire. He was riding well today but wasn’t able to capitalize on the break he got once the leaders started to really attack. This has really turned into a dissapointing year for the Americans, from one that should have been another chance to really shine. Hincapie was patently dissapointing, Leipheimer had that early bad day and has been reluctant to lay himself out it in a big way, Floyd looked good but obviously didn’t have it.

So how does this leave us? Well, it’s a much more open race. Kloden has a slight advantage in the time trial on both Pereiro and Sastre, but not enough to recover the time he’s down now. Sastre sounded like he was going really good today, and tomorrow should be a fun battle to see if he can put Pereiro in trouble. CSC looks to have the stronger team at the moment, depending on how Schleck is going tomorrow, and whether big Jens Voigt is back in play for Sastre may well determine whether they can put enough pressure on Pereiro to get back the time they need. While I’m sad to see Floyd’s hopes go up in smoke it’s certainly turned this into an exciting race.

So Landis is back in yellow after the first day in the Alps despite all predictions to the contrary. Not only that but Rasmussen didn’t seem to have much of a day at all, and De La Fuente looks poised to wrap up the KOM jersey. I didn’t get to watch the coverage and could only follow along on cyclingnews, but the live reports there are pretty good for getting a feel for things. It more or less sounds like the race may be over at this point:

• Landis has 2 minutes on any of his nearest rivals and shows no signs of going away in the next few mountain stages.
• Boonen abandoned so Robbie is pretty much a cinch for the sprint jersey with nearly fifty points lead.
• De La Fuente has 30 odd points on the next closest KOM contender. He may pay the price for his work today but unless Rasmussen comes around, or Sastre somehow decides to free Schleck to race for the jersey, De La Fuente is the safe bet.

For such an unpredictable beginning to the race it sure seems to be ending early. Obviously stranger things have happened in the mountains, but it certainly seems that the jerseys will stay on the shoulders of their current owners. Of course I’ve been wrong before…