Bill,
Sorry for the delay in replying to your comment on the National Track Coach. We wanted to get the answer from Charlie Walsh. He is committed to the Australian team through to the year 2000.
So the rumours are now dispelled.
Marco Pantani who is just three days from winning the Tour de France now claims that the strike activity by riders has been badly thought out and a waste of time. He said that if riders were using drugs then justice demanded that they be dealt with appropriately by the judicial authorities.
He told the press that: "It is always difficult to know the truth. But solidarity in this case is useless because justice must be respected. Maybe the facts revealed in this doping scandal are not superficial. Maybe they reveal something deep within cycling and if some riders have committed offences, they must pay. We realised after we stopped that it was useless and that justice should keep on doing their job. I thought at first it was a mistake by the Festina masseur and it was not linked to cycling in general. We agreed with organisers we should go on. To stop would only make things worse and be like admitting we have things to hide. This Tour is the most difficult I have taken part in because, on top of the race, there has been the tension linked to the doping cases off the race.''
The reason for Pantani's extended reaction is probably because some of the riders who abandoned on Wednesday, particularly the Spanish and Italian riders, have criticised him for staying in the Tour. There have been allegations that he is more concerned with the yellow jersey and his own glory than he is with justice and riders' rights.
Medical checks to become compulsory
The UCI has announced that from 1999 all riders will have to undergo regular medical testing to keep their racing licences. The UCI have admitted, through their Vice-President Daniel Baal that they underestimated the problems and occurrence of EPO abuse some years ago when the issue of regular medical checks was first proposed.
ONCE - "Nous n'avons rien à cacher"
Jose Antonio Montero, the head of the ONCE organisation, has said that despite police raids, the team had nothing to hide. The team has strict medical controls and were cooperating with authorities to ensure that justice was being done. He said he understood that the team doctor Nicolas Terrados would not be released from custody until the results of tests on the drugs taken from the hotel rooms of the team were analysed.
The attention now being given to ONCE is believed to have arisen from statements that an ex-ONCE rider gave in Lille during the Festina investigation. He is believed to have admitted that systematic doping was common while he was at ONCE>
Massi
The French police discovered a corticoïde in the hotel room of Rodolfo Massi.
It seems odd that the riders would still have banned substances in their hotel rooms at this late stage, even if they had them there 3 weeks ago before Willy Voet was caught!
A snippet
Willy Voet was caught on a back road where there is no customs post. He drove his brightly marked Festina car through a small village and was caught by the customs officials who were on the look out for smugglers. A TV team has been to the village and interviewed residents. Some comments were "Oh, we see the cars of cycling teams coming through here regularly.!" And just while the TV crew were there, what should speed by but a cycling team car.... we couldn't tell from the footage whether it had any drugs in it though!
Denmark race cancelled
Jon Jay Neufeld from Denmark tells me that the usual "Tour de France Revenge" - a race held annually in Denmark since Bjarne Riis's victory in 96 - has been cancelled on the grounds that the main sponsor (Denmark's TV2) has gotten cold feet since the doping scandal heated up.
Men's Points Race: 1. Rob Hayles Team Brite 51 pts 2. Jon Clay Team Brite 35 pts 3. James Notley Team Amrbosia 28 pts 4. Phil West Adidas Scicon 24 pts 5. Colin Sturgess Team Brite 16 pts Time: 48:33.756, a new national record time Women's Pursuit: 1. Yvonne McGregor Adidas-Scicon 3:40.345 2. Michelle Ward Condor Cycles 3:48.557 3. Emma Davies Harry Hall Cycles 3:54.524 4. Sally Boyden Clarkes Contracts CRT 3:55.708 Girls Under 16 points race final (60 laps): 1. Nicole Cooke Cardiff Ajax CC 35 pts 2. Claire Dixon Mossley St Joseph CRT 16 pts 3. Danielle Andrew Mossley St Joseph CRT 15 pts at 1 lap 4. Laura Hewitt Mossley St Joseph CRT 5 pts at 1 lap Claire Dixon crashed with 11 laps to go but restarted. Boys Under 16 points race final (60 laps): 1. Nathan Harman Team Brite 22 pts 2. I. Redpath Farnborough & Camberley 20 pts 3. R Sutcliffe Team Brite 10 pts 4. K Page MCS RT 9 pts