The Cycliste Moderne, October 10, 2005

Paris-Tours Recap

The penultimate ProTour race of the season ended Sunday with the traditional bunch sprint in Tours, France. Paris-Tours is the race for sprinters as it is a flat course with a 3km finishing straight, made for the teams of the big sprinters to deliver their leaders to the line. However, in recent years, Paris-Tours has been won by a rider on a long breakaway with the power to hold off a hard charging pack. With the long season wrapping up and Alessandro Petacchi and Tom Boonen having concluded their seasons, it was a perfect day for Erik Zabel to try and win his third Paris-Tours in his last race with T-Mobile.

Zabel has spent thirteen years with Deutsche Telekom/Telekom/T-Mobile team. He is moving to the new German-Italian Milram team next year. Milram is the successor sponsor to the Domina Vacanze team. The team keeps Domina Vacanze’s ProTour license and is thus guaranteed entry in all the Grand Tours and ProTour races. With Alessandro Petacchi and Erik Zabel joining the team, it will clearly be built for winning field sprints. Zabel will have the type of support he has not had for years at the Tour de France, although you have to wonder if he stayed with T-Mobile a few years too long.

At 35, Erik Zabel is not too old to win bike races, as other cyclists such as Johann Museeuw and Andrei Tchmil had success in one day races after that age. Zabel may be too old, however to mix it up day after day in field sprints with the younger faster riders, especially with Robbie McEwen, Alessandro Petacchi, Thor Hushovd and Tom Boonen having increasingly occupied the position that Zabel once did in field sprints. Zabel will benefit from being on a team designed for speed. With all the racing required of ProTour teams, you would think there will be enough opportunities for victories for both Zabel and Petacchi. However, both riders have won Milan-San Remo and next year’s event will give some indication as to how the sprinting superteam will function.

The bunch finish almost did not happen as Discovery Channel’s emerging Belgian talent, Stijn Devolder, and Philippe Gilbert of Francaise de Jeux managed to get away and gain almost a minute on the pack. However, the two quit working together late in the race and were caught by the bunch less than 200 meters to the finish. Devolder was following the instructions of his team not to take any pulls at the front and as a result lost. Erik Zabel beat Daniele Bennati (Lampre-Caffita) by half a wheel, with Alan Davis (Liberty Seguros) taking third.

Dopes on Doping I

Both Procycling.com and Cyclingnews.com reported on the results of a survey underwritten by L’Equipe regarding European views of doping. According to the results of the survey, 48% of French respondents thought that a majority of professional cyclists dope. That was significantly higher than the percentages reported for Italian, German and Spanish respondents. German respondents demonstrated a greater belief that cycling was getting cleaner with only 12% of respondents stating that a majority of professional cyclists dope and 50% indicating their belief that doping occurred among only a limited number of riders in the peleton.

What was most surprising was the belief of French respondents that it is impossible to have success in the Tour de France without the use of illegal drugs. 71% of French respondents agreed that it was impossible for a cyclist to have a strong performance at the Tour without doping. Ultimately, 97% of French respondents indicated that cycling was the sport they most associated with doping.

If those views are statistically valid, then you have to wonder why the French continue their strong support of the Tour de France. The Tour remains a national holiday in France. The country stops every afternoon for the daily race finish. The crowds on the mountain stages, while international in make-up, are still predominantly French. The crowds on Bastille Day remain huge. Every village and every town that is passed by the Tour stops for the momentary passage of the peleton. The French love affair with the Tour de France is utterly inconsistent with the public beliefs on doping. Certainly, French media reports regarding doping has influenced public opinions.

As discussed before, the French have adopted the view that the nation’s lack of cycling success is due to the fact that the rest of the world dopes. That is not consistent, however, with the continued war on drugs in cycling. French cyclists continue to be suspended at a rate consistent with other nations. French cycling has not had a strong Tour de France rider since 1989. The belief that French riders and French teams are “clean” has for too many years been used by French cycling as an excuse for poor preparation, poor tactics, and poor talent. Assuming the Festina matter represented the worst in doping in the sport, the French seem to forget that Festina was a French team, loved by the French for its strong riders and strong results. If the French are truly disillusioned by drugs in cycling, then they need to make their objections known by not supporting the sport.

Dopes on Doping II

Saturday, Prentice Steffen, an American doctor who worked for US Postal Service in the mid 1990’s retracted statements he had made to L’Equipe regarding his experiences and knowledge of doping practices. Steffen had been acting as the team doctor for Jonathan Vaughter’s Team TIAA-CREF, which has a strong anti drug ethos.

In 2004, Steffen was interviewed by L’Equipe and indicated that team members had asked him how they could improve their performance during the 1996 Tour de Suisse. Steffen claimed that his refusal to provide doping products resulted in his termination after the 1996 season. US Postal Service vigorously defended the team’s ethics and painted Steffen as a disgruntled former employee. This past week, L’Equipe published an interview with Steffen where he outlined how riders are continuing to evade drug tests in the European peleton. Steffen went on to state in the L’Equipe interview that if Armstrong and Tyler Hamilton were not punished that he would leave cycling forever.

It is important to note that Steffen was never employed by the team while Lance Armstrong was on the team and that Steffen’s own biography indicates that while he has continued to provide medical support to other domestic cycling teams, he has had little or no experience in the European peleton over the last nine seasons. That said, Steffen was interviewed by L’Equipe and made statements earlier this week regarding doping practices in the European peleton, including the use of transfusions to raise and lower hematocrit levels. He claimed his information was from an unnamed “well placed source.” The only confirmation of his claims was a doping expert who stated that the methods Steffen described were plausible and possible.

However, Steffen’s description of significant numbers of transfusions being used by riders to raise and lower hematocrit levels is lacking evidentiary support. If Steffen is correct and teams are using transfusions in such a manner then you have to wonder where the evidence is. It is clear that French and Italian police have aggressively monitored cycling races and have conducted numerous raids and investigations. Blood transfusions require significant amounts of medical equipment, require storage of blood and most importantly generate significant amounts of medical waste. None of which have ever been found in any of the police raids and investigations. During the 2002 Winter Olympics medical waste was the basis for doping actions against various cross country skiers who utilized transfusions to avoid doping detection or to increase their own hematocrit levels. Medical waste is not something that you put in the garbage and no one notices.

Saturday, he published a retraction of his statements and indicated that he was no longer working for Team TIAA-CREF. It would appear that Steffen received a letter from Armstrong’s legal team during the week as he retracted all statements about Armstrong. Here is the text of his retraction from Velonews.com.

I do not fault Steffen for wanting to clean up the sport. I do fault him for the witch hunt mentality that has been furthered by WADA chief Dick Pound. Rumor, innuendo, and suspicion without any factual or legal basis for such will not clean up the sport. Such conduct makes the public more suspicious, makes the peleton more isolated, and detracts from legitimate efforts to clean up the sport. Do not think that I am soft on doping. I think the one thing I got from being a death penalty prosecutor when I graduated from law school is an appreciation for due process. Even the guilty have the right to have their guilt proven before they are convicted.

Dopes on Doping III

Cyclingnews.com is reporting that Stefan Van Dijk of Belgian continental pro team MrBookmaker.com is facing suspension for failing to take a drug test. Everyone should know by now that failure to take a drug test or attempts to evade a drug test will be treated as a positive doping event. Reports out of Belgium are that Van Dijk returned home to find a random drug test team waiting for him. He fled in his vehicle, although he testified to Belgian authorities that he was not home at the time of the random tests. Apparently Van Dijk recognized the yellow drug test van outside of his home and just kept driving by to avoid having to take the test. Belgian doping authorities may need to rethink their need for a bright yellow doping van if they really want to catch drug cheats. This raises issues on so many levels, but that is all the doping news for now.