Tommeke has tested positive for cocaine! Look at the state of him, over here on the left. Clearly coked out of his box... It was out of competition, so the UCI didn't sanction him, but that didn't stop the Tour of Switzerland banning him, and now the ASO have followed suit. The former World Champion and last year's Green Jersey winner will not be at the Tour de France. Great. One less reason to watch it. (Also, I hear Cav might not be there either, because he's focusing on training for his track events at the Olympics. At least he's got his priorities straight!)Good move, Tom. You're a professional sportsman in probably the most drug-tested sport in the world, and you go off and have a little bit of charlie on your holidays. Genius. Personally, I don't really care. I'd be more upset if he was caught doping, but a bit of recreational coke use doesn't really surprise me, especially not by a bloke who has his own techno song (skip to 2mins, the start is woeful). As someone else said "Classics wins, cocaine, schoolgirls, Lamborghinis, alcohol, world championships, multi-million euro contracts..... Where did it all go wrong?"
Where indeed? Thankfully, Josh of Team Pegasus whipped up a bumper sticker so people can demonstrate their support of Tommeke. I don't speak Belgian, but he assures me it says "Let Tom Ride."
4 comments:
That song is slowly becoming one of my top 25 tracks on my mp3 player.
More arbitrary fucking bullcrap from the ASO. Either you follow your own rules or you don't. It was out of competition, he didn't violate any UCI or ASO rules, and yet the ASO is still free to arbitrarily kick him out of the biggest race of the year. When he would absolutely have been set to defend green. This is so frustrating. What ever happened to the rule of law? Not that Boonen was right to take a snarf, but I hate that the ASO is free to do whatever they want.
Same thing with Astana. Love em or hate em, they didn't violate any rules that would keep them out of the '08 tour. The Tour doesn't belong to the ASO alone, and they need to add a dose of fairness and transparency to the way they enforce the 'rules', if you can call it that.
Ben, if you mean the Tour doesn't belong to the ASO alone in the sense that, as cycling fans, we each have an interest in the greatest race in the sport's history, then I agree with you.
But, in reality, ASO owns the Tour outright, and they can do what they feckin' want with it. Which sucks, in my opinion, and frankly I'm secretly delighted that all those people who backed the ASO over the UCI in the recent fight are now watching their chickens come home to roost. No rules, inviting whomever they want, barring whomever they want, running the race under the auspices of the French Federation, who they have in their pocket, it's all a farce, a farce with money and power at the centre.
The amazing thing to me is that Boonen got caught thanks to another biker confessing to who got him the drugs in the first place. I'm all for a clean sport, but the tactics used to find dopers seem a little extreme. For other examples see David Millar, and pretty much all of Operation Puerto.
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