Anyway—the Tour of Luxembourg Skøda Tour. Lance Armstrong finished third overall, and to be fair, that’s pretty impressive, given that his last serious European work was Tour of Flanders—hardly great tune-up for a hilly stage race. Not that the Skøda Tour was particularly hilly, or even particularly stage-y, since bad weather neutralized the GC race on the final stage, but I am trying to avoid eating the hater-tots (above left).

At any rate, the Texan hasn’t been in need of any hassling. Alberto Contador, who you may remember from such soap operas as last year’s Tour, won the prologue of the significantly higher profile (reference the Periodic Table) Dauphine Libere Criterium du Dauphine. Again, in fairness to Armstrong, not much can be inferred from a prologue; however, I feel confident in saying that the Dauphine featured a better field—including a second place Tejay Van Garderen, stepping up two levels (again, see chart) from his strong multi-day performance in Turkey earlier this season.

In more news that Armstrong probably didn’t want to hear, the first road stage of the Dauphine (somewhat unusual in its own right, as a fairly select group won what is usually the token sprinters’ day of a murderous mountain week), resulted in perennially useful climber and Armstrong teammate Haimar Zubeldia breaking his wrist and suddenly looking iffy for the Tour de France.

Conventional wisdom is that this puts pressure on Armstrong for some big finish or other at the Tour de Suisse—which thankfully hasn’t changed it’s name, though could rightly be called the Tour de Convalescents for all the injured riders and adjusted schedules packing its roster. However, while Armstrong’s Tour prep is legendary, he’s also no stranger to the soft-launch/playing possum approach. Speculation is fun, but I’m not putting out any predictions for Lance’s performances until he rolls out of the start gate come July.

It’s also interesting to note that Ivan Basso will be gunning at the Tour this summer with essentially no racing between the two events. Liquigas was convincingly the best team at this year’s Giro, and I think, should Contador come to grief, Basso might just be the TdF favorite. Carlos Sastre, while out of contention for the bis on account of not winning the Giro, also looks like he’ll be making a shot at the Tour—he’s either racing or has been asked to race, depending on who you listen to.

One guy you won’t be seeing in Rotterdam? Skøda Tour winner Matteo Carrara, whose Vacansoleil squad continues to blow smoke in the eyes of the TdF selection committee—and the UCI clowns who put such also-rans as Footon-Servetto and Francais de Jeux in their ProTour “rump”—for not getting a starting slot at this year’s Tour.

Yes, while all reasonable cyclists are just digging out the trainer/building base Jens Factor-style, a few select sprinters—actually, just Andre Gripel so far—are profiting immensely from the UCI ProTour’s attempt to outflank the owners of the biggest bike races on Earth.

I’ve seen 1:45 of Versus’ highlights (they don’t have Stage 2 posted yet), and all I can really say is that final run into the line seemed to have a bit of a hill on it. Andre Griepel, for being a giant sack of hamburger, seemed to shoot up it pretty quickly. Willunga Hill might be too much for him, but if he figures out how to ride cobblestones (he can’t yet, can he?) this could be an exciting spring.

Observations beyond that: Footon-Servetto kits don’t look so awful when the riders are actually moving on the bike; it’s going to be a very red peloton this year and (thanks, Chris!) Lance Armstrong seems to have misplaced his rainbow stripes.

To be honest, I think the story is something of a dog. As plenty of people have pointed out, dumping your doping gear in the trash would be all kinds of idiotic, since anyone with determination and the ability ignore strong odors has access to it; indeed, French journalists have made great sport of dumpster diving in the past.

Then there’s the fact that WADA only kinda bans [pdf] IV equipment—language on the “management of…medical emergencies” could easily be applied to dehydration, exhaustion, electrolyte imbalance, muscle cramping or any number of other side effects from racing a Grand Tour.

And let’s not forget the ongoing political battle between the UCI and the ASO. More than one observer has noted that we could really speed this nonsense along by comparing DNA in the bags to DNA from the riders, but guess who won’t release that information? To me, nothing says “investigational integrity” like a jurisdictional turf war.

But dog or no dog, the case is back in the headlines—and why shouldn’t it be? The holidays are known as a time of recycled news, and this year, the cycling world seems particularly focused on doping. Ricardo Ricco has apparently graced the cover of the latest Pro Cycling, while another Future Publishing property, Cyclingnews.com, has run a story on Christian Moreni’s return to the sport.

I, however, in an attempt to anticipate Astana/RadioShack’s response, prefer direct your attention to the dangers of tap dancing around technicalities in the doping rules with this Sam Abt article from 1991.

So I’m not going to talk about Bernard Kohl, or his recent whining in the press. If he wanted not to manage his weight, he should have taken up soccer. And frankly, a quarter litre of vodka just isn’t that much—I’m not volunteering to consume it, but I wouldn’t say it’s anything out of place for an initiation ritual—especially if a Kazakh named “Vino” is doing the initiating.

I’m also not going to talk about AFLD Chair Pierre Bordry, who was apparently unsatisfied with the media hits he got from retesting some 2008 Tour samples, or claiming—without presenting any evidence, other than “alarming” thinness—that two new substances were being used in the peloton.

And I’m definitely not going to talk about how AFLD then dredged up an old story of an inappropriate coffee stop, and spun it into accusing the UCI of testing Astana last throughout the Tour. I wish the UCI would just rise above this sort of thing—Anne’s got the idea, but the rest of the Aigle crew seems more than happy to dive right in there with the pig.

Best to stick to the positive stories—like Farrar continuing his tear through the second half of the season. I will confess to being kinda excited to see what happens during the one-days next spring, though I might steer clear of San-Remo and wait for the Northern Classics instead.

And to add more significance to the otherwise-forgettable Circuit Franco-Belge, Whit Yost has recently been recounting his time behind the wheel there in the sunset days of Team Mercury in Embrocation. Just wish I had a better idea when Part 2 will be coming out.

Tour of Denmark (29 July – 2 Aug)
Clasica San Sebastian (1 Aug)
Tour of Poland (2 Aug – 8 Aug)

That’s 13 days of racing within 14 days of the end of the Tour—and frankly, that’s too many races. I realize that cycling’s season is long and grueling; even with recently defunct races like Züri-Metzgete and Deutchland Tour, there are a finite number of racing days in which to hold events.

Still, with Grand Tours dominating the schedule, cycling has on-months and off—probably one of the reasons why they moved the Vuelta to September. Now check out this UCI ProTour schedule: in June, there are a mere two events. In August, there are five.

Not only that, but none are run concurrently with the TdF. It almost feels like someone is trying bump the Tour from the public eye without trying to challenge it directly. But who would want to do such a thing? Oh, I don’t know…

I’m not insisting that the UCI is attempting to “retake” the sport with their barrage of August events—like I said, scheduling can be a tricky beast. But if there is some intent behind the UCI’s efforts, I think it’s highly misguided. First off, many who follow cycling, and the entire country of France, are on vacation during August.

Second, it’s not the worst thing in the world for races to run concurrently with a Grand Tour. Certainly, the Tour of California organizers aren’t worried about it, and Catalunya seems to be getting by ok. While the Tour may cast the longest shadow in the sport, it’s not like other events don’t exist—Tour of Austria, for example.

Cramming all these races into the first week in August just makes the UCI look desperate. Wedging events from the second half of the season directly against the tail of the Tour (Poland used to be in September, Clasica in mid-August, and Tour of Denmark didn’t begin in July) makes them a multicolored spandex blur in the racing-numbed eyes of fans.

The classics didn’t become classics by hopping around the calendar to best suit the perceived interest of fans or availability of airtime/newsprint. Objectively speaking, plenty of races have no business being where they are.

Roubaix and RVV have a nasty habit of landing on Easter Sunday (hardly conducive to a day out drinking and yelling) and any bike race slated for February in Belgium is doomed to occasional failure.

Classics became classics by staying put and attracting an audience, developing bigger crowds, better prize money, and the ageless mystique that comes from great riders putting on legendary performances.

The fact is, a lot of bike races aren’t going to develop these things and fail—and that’s not necessarily bad. Missteps allow organizers to learn from their mistakes, increase demand for new races from fans, and free up sponsorship money for new endeavors.

So next season, I’d like to see these races back where they started, preferably with a little blank space around them on the calendar. The UCI may just find that letting its events have some elbow room, and giving fans and journos a chance to get back up to speed pays solid dividends, even if a few races fall by the wayside in the process.

Dear Sir or Madam,

I was very disappointed to read this morning that you filed a copyright infringement complaint against my video “2009 Tour de France – Stage 2 – How The Race Was Won (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nq7oEE7PdUk)”

My use of short, discontinuous segments of footage for purely informational purposes, at no harm to you and no monetary benefit to myself, easily meets the standards for Fair Use under United States law (cf. Time Inc. v. Bernard Geis Associates, Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc.).

However, my disappointment stems not from legal concerns, but from the fact that you’ve chosen to take down a video that actively promoted an ASO event, making it more interesting and accessible for English-speaking audiences. The video I posted, as with my other cycling videos, was extremely highly rated—something which few of your uploads can boast.

While the English-dubbed interviews posted on your YouTube channel are informative, they do little to draw Anglophones into the Tour, or to develop appreciation of the split-second actions that draw the line between victory and defeat. In short, my videos add viewers to your events and value to your company.

Instead of removing my video, your organization should be enlisting my services for English-language video analysis of future ASO cycling events. Destroying the work of others who increase appreciation of your events is utterly illogical, and moreover, unfair to the English-speaking fans who have brought billions of dollars to your company over the past decade.

Sincerely,

Cosmo Catalano
e: cosmo@cyclocosm.com
w: www.cyclocosm.com

The video is still available here, and at some other places, and some of those other places will be extremely difficult for the ASO to muzzle. Personally, I take copyright fairly seriously—if only to pursue reasonable changes to copyright law through institutionally authorized means—and will comply with most removal requests.

Ideally, I’d like to file a Fair Use counterclaim, but it’s outside my budget right now; at any rate, decades of draconian enforcement have predictably created an agile and irrepressible distribution network online that has already begun carrying the work in question through no effort of my own.

I’m furious that the first day of the Giro was ruined by another positive cocaine test from Tom Boonen. But my ire is not directed at the Belgian classics rider. Instead, it’s aimed at the authorities who senselessly soiled his name by announcing a positive test which violates no established protocol, and thus constitutes a clear violation of Article 11 of the UCI’s own internal ethical code [PDF].

Using cocaine in competition, is illegal; its potent stimulant and confidence-boosting powers would be ideal for bunch sprinters. But its use outside of competition is unregulated by anti-doping bodies. People immediately unfamiliar with the full range of its effects on users might say it could be used for weight management, but I assure you, Tom Boonen’s victories should be considered in spite of these positive tests, not because of them.

Beyond the anti-doping auspices of WADA, the UCI has been endowed with near-total authority over cycling. However, there’s nothing—other than a comically-stretched interpretation of the “investigation of facts” clause from Article IX—in the ProTour anti-doping or ethical protocols [PDF] that would be grounds for punishing Boonen, either.

Certain sporting organizations, most notably the NFL and NBA, have extensive player behavior guidelines. As unfair—and arguably racist—as these policies might be, they are established in writing, and all athletes are aware of them from the moment they ink their contracts. But the ASO, organizer of the Tour de France, has no such guidelines in place, and paradoxically, this lack of regulation allows them to exclude any rider for any reason. If Boonen is once again blocked from riding this July, the ethical indiscretion will lie with the ASO’s if-we-feel-like-it enforcement, not Boonen’s recreational activities.

Even as a criminal case, this positive test is a non-starter. While I’m unfamiliar with penal codes in Europe, I’m also fairly certain that distribution and possession—not testing positive—are the offenses which carry penalties. Prosecutors would have to establish where Boonen was at the time he used the drug to press charges, and even then, it would be tough to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he ingested them willingly without an eyewitness. If Boonen’s lawyers are feeling lackadaisical, this might result in a plea bargain for community service.

Dope testing is widely regarded as one of the most invasive and inconvenient processes a human being can endure—anyone who follows a cyclist on twitter or has read either of Lance Armstrong’s books can tell you that. But athletes comply with it nonetheless, to prove that their performances, and the races they compete in, are the result of skill, talent and hard work.

By releasing news of positive tests that are not prohibited under anti-doping codes, drug testers violate the tremendous trust athletes place in them every day. It is as unacceptable for testing bodies to announce an out-of-competition cocaine positive as it is for them snap a photo of an athlete’s genitals and broadcast it across the Internet.

No one argues that riders aren’t role models, and no one argues that they shouldn’t strive to be model citizens while in the public eye. But blocking Boonen from participation in the Tour de France to “protect the image of cycling” on evidence that he ingested a recreational drug—evidence that never should have been public in the first place—opens the door for his exclusion based on any behavior considered untoward. If Boonen were caught leaving a gay bathhouse on the cover of of Hello!, would it be fair to exclude him for that, too?

The personal decisions an athlete makes are just that—personal. Sometimes (as in this case) they aren’t the best choices, but so long as they don’t violate the codified rules of a sports regulatory body, they should have no impact on what events an athlete is—or is not—allowed to start. Credibility in cycling is a two-way street, and if organizers and enforcers can’t adhere to the rules they’ve set, the sport’s viability is lost all over again.