Category: Cycling

If having a bunch of the big name cyclists ousted on the eve of the Tour de France wasn’t enough, now there’s even more doping controversy with one of Landis’ drug tests showing elevated testosterone levels.

From the CBC article:

Tour de France winner Floyd Landis has tested positive for an elevated level of the male sex hormone testosterone, his Phonak team said Thursday.

Phonak was notified by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) of an unusual level of testosterone-epitestosterone ratio in a doping test taken by Landis after the 17th stage of the race.

I’m not one to jump to conclusions about anything, so I’m eagerly awaiting news on the results of testing on the backup sample.

Just past the half-way mark of the Tour and after the Pyrenees things have certainly been shaken up quite a bit. Iban Mayo, traditionally very strong in the mountains dropped out today, and Floyd Landis is in the yellow, with Team Discovery and George Hincapie nowhere to be found (near the top of the GC anyway). At over 23 minutes back in the GC, Hincapie and Discovery are going to have to kick it into high gear and start digging into some of that time deficit. It’s going to be tough to make that up before the Tour heads into the Alps next week, espcially if Landis keeps riding the way he has been so far.

The Tour starts tomorrow!

With the elimination of 3 of the top riders (and possibly more to come), this year’s tour is shaping up to be a very interesting one indeed.

The Tour starts tomorrow! I will have to see about setting up the TV in the office or something so I can watch it while we’re putting in our new hardwood floor over the next week or so.

It’s a hot toasty day after yesterday’s climbs devastated the group. Today is a relatively flat stage, which I’m sure will be used as a welcome rest stage after yesterday’s stage and in preparation for tomorrow’s stage heading into the Alps. I don’t expect too much of a change in the standings today unless something big happens. I expect Voekler may hang onto the yellow jersey for another day unless yesterday’s effort left him too drained to stay close to Armstrong.

Today’s OLN word of the day is BREAK AWAY.