Posted on 05/25/2007 3:31:02 PM PDT by ScaniaBoy
Excerpts translated from Swedish:
Eleven years ago Bjarne Riis was the hero of all of Denmark when he won the Tour de France bicycling event. This Friday Riis admitted that he had cheated using blood doping. [Actually not - but he used epo. SB]
.....
The Dane said he was not a worthy winner of the Tour in 1996. He also said that he had used doping preparations between 1993 - 1998.
This is just the last in a row of recent admissions by former top cyclists that they have used performance enhancing drugs. On Thursady Riis's former team-mate Erik Zabel admitted he had used epo. Another three former T-Mobile riders, Bert Dietz, Udo Boelts och Christian Henn, also admitted they had used epo during the mid-90s.
According to Diets and Henn this was taking place systematically in the team. The year after Riis's win his team-mate, the German Jan Ullrich won the Tour.
He on the other hand has consistently denied any allegations of doping.
.........
At least he didn't try to excuse himself. He took the whole blame, admitted he was a cheat, and whether he was assisted by anyone or not was not an issue. It was his decision to use drug.
In the end I think we are going to find out that for the last 10- 15 years the only clean winner of the Tour has been Lance Armstrong!!!
(OK, I just don't know about Landis. I find it very strange that would have used testosterone in the middle of the race - it just doesn't make any sense, but, unless he can show that the tests have been tampered with....)
Please ping the other Tour fans.
Sad news.
Hopefully this will help end the Armstrong-enduced following for bike riding and it will go back to playing the same role in the press as cricket, badminton, and ping poing.
Hey Guys;
The Tour de France is fixin’ to start on Saturday and I’ve checked into VS.com. They have the site and route up but no team/riders scoop yet other than some basic info. See a lot of names from the past few years.
What’s “the word” and will there be a ping list for this years ride?
You have FReepmail...
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