Odds, Ends, and my New Bike

It has been two weeks since I last wrote. I have had a lot of work to do and other things but there are a lot of odds and ends that I have gathered over the past few weeks.

Odds

Prosecutorial Misconduct

The biggest problem with WADA and its attempt to clean up sport is the fact that it has the least discreet attorney at its head. Canadian attorney Dick Pound has been in charge of WADA since its formation. Pound's recent comments on the Landis affair are completely unacceptable for someone in his position. Pound's comments were offensive and evidence the fact that Pound is lacking the temprament to be the head of the crusade against doping. If WADA wants to be relevant and wants to occupy the role as the moral authority of sport, then Dick Pound must go.

Just ask Mike Nifong, Durham County prosecutor, who is not only facing ethical sanctions for his out of court comments on the Duke lacrosse case but has also been removed from the case, about the impact that prosecutorial misconduct has on ensuring that justice is done. Both Pound and Nifong may be right and the individuals they are prosecuting may be guilty, however, the more prosecutors talk about matters under their jurisdiction and the more bombastic they are in their comments, the less right they appear to be and the less moral authority they have.

WADA Code Revisions

WADA also announced that it is working on revisions to its code which would strengthen testing procedures but also attempts to address issues related to athlete privacy. The new proposed revisions include language which Dick Pound is clearly incapable of following: "[no official] shall publicly comment on the specific facts of a pending case (as opposed to general description of process and science) except in response to public comments attributed to the Athlete, other Person or their representatives." Another potential change to the testosterone threshold test would likely have not resulted in a positive test for Floyd Landis had it been in place.

If WADA Won't do it then L'Equipe Will

In another interesting turn of events, Oscar Pereiro, who finished second to Floyd Landis at the Tour de France and who announced he would not take part in the race this year if he was not awarded the victory, confirmed French press reports that he tested positive for using salbutamol, an athsma medication, during the 14th and 16th stages of the Tour de France this year. Pereiro has a "theraputic use exemption" for the drug and has been prescribed it by his doctor. As such, the UCI does not necessarily view his tests as a positive. However, French racing, doping and media officials have over the past few years publically railed against the use of permitted substances by athletes.

Puerto Silliness

In more surreal news out of Spain, the lab conducting the analyses of the Operacion Puerto samples is refusing to perform any more tests until the Spanish proscutors pay more than 25,000 Euros. I guess the Spanish prosecutors have been a little slow in getting invoices paid.

ProTour Silliness

With the European season just around the corner, there is no end in sight to resolution of the dispute between the UCI, the ProTour teams, and the organizers of the Grand Tours. The ASO, organizer of the Tour de France, Paris-Nice, Paris-Roubaix, Liege-Bastogne-Liege and Fleche Wallone among other events, announced its invitees to this year's Paris-Nice and invited all of the ProTour teams except the newest ProTour edition, Unibet. That sent UCI officials into a fit over the failure of ASO to invite all ProTour teams. ASO officials responded by claiming that they had withdrawn from the ProTour two years ago. UCI officials had earlier gone to the European Commission claiming that the Grand Tour organizers are violating antitrust laws.

Ends

New Blog Link

Check out the blog by my friend BikeBoy, who rides his bike to work everyday, regardless of conditions here in Boise. He has moved his accounts of his riding from his website to his new blog "The Bike Nazi," which is rather ironic for how mild mannered and non-militant BikeBoy really is.

New Bike

I went and bought myself a new bike this week. I purchased a Trek 5200 from World Cycle this week. However, I have to go to a conference in Las Vegas this week and it has been particularly cold and icy here over the past few weeks, so I will not actually pick it up for a few weeks as they get my bike built and tuned. But riding a 5200 on Friday afternoon was really sweet. Smooth ride, smooth shifting, responsive in traffic. And best of all, since Trek has withdrawn the 5200 from its line for 2007, and because it was a 2006, it was on sale.