Interviews on Eurosport

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Emma suggested that someone could review whether there is something
about the Big Tours, which, apart from sheer greed, may make some
riders feel the need for performance enhancing
substances.
I wondered if that day after day slog or the crafty routing of the
hill climbs might be too much for some, but our young Geraint Thomas
was there at the head of the peleton in Paris, wasnt that great?

On the same programme Jonathon Vaughters from Slipstream was
interviewed. Now there is a
guy who knows his cycling.
He was full of ideas on how to run clean tours, such as to keep the
selected team all together as a unit both in the runup and during the
event. All the managers would then have the chance to advise and
report back on all the racers and any potential deviant moods would be
discussed.
He said he'd also be prepared to have an observer from one of the
testing agencies travel with the team and act as some sort of warden.

They also discussed the proposal to have several National Teams in the
2008 TdeF replacing
trade teams.
How do you feel about that?

 

[Mark]

> I wondered if that day after day slog or the crafty routing of the
> hill climbs might be too much for some

IIRC tour is about 1000km shorter it used to be.

I'm guessing that the people that dope are more likely to be those in with
a chance of winning. They've more incentive to cheat - the rewards are
bigger, whereas a domestic doesn't really gain much from moving up a few
places in the rankings.

> They also discussed the proposal to have several National Teams in the
> 2008 TdeF replacing
> trade teams.
> How do you feel about that?

Heh, it's just a way to get more French winners. It also has the problems
of unbalanced teams, 'lesser' athletes being chosen, the best athletes not
being in the national team (guessing national teams will have less money
than some of the corporate teams) and possibly less money for the riders.