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Breaking point Problem-free Tour de France crucial for sport of cycling
Posted: Thursday July 01, 1999 09:09 PM
PARIS (AP) -- The 86th Tour de France will be more than a cycling race: It could make or break a sport. A year of doping scandals have dragged cycling through the mud, leaving riders furious, sponsors wary and fans disillusioned. "The whole sport is on very dangerous ground," said Guido van Caster, deputy sporting director at TVM, one of two teams banned from this year's Tour in the aftermath of the doping scandals. "Everyone is wondering what will happen during the Tour. In truth, nobody knows." Not only is the race fighting a bad image, it probably will suffer as a sporting event when it begins on July 3. Many of its top stars will not be competing. Organizers banned the entire TVM and Vini Caldirola teams, though the International Cycling Union (UCI) overturned the original ban on Richard Virenque, a former Tour runner-up and one of France's most popular riders. Defending champion Marco Pantani is another absentee. The Italian had said that he wouldn't defend his title because the course didn't suit him, but his place would have been in jeopardy in any case after a positive doping test saw him expelled from the recent Giro d'Italia. World Cup champion Michele Bartoli and 1997 Tour champion Jan Ulrich are both out injured. Laurent Jalabert declared that he would boycott the event in protest at the expulsion of his ONCE team's sporting director and doctor, though the top-ranked cyclist might now reconsider after the UCI ordered that ONCE officials should be able to work during the Tour. "The quality of the field will be much lower. Of the top 20 riders in the world maybe only only four will start," van Calster said. There will be as much attention on doping as racing but thre is still a race to be won. The field is weak -- but wide open. Cofidis starts among the favorites, with its team leader Frank Vandenbroucke one of the rising stars of cycling. But the Belgian also has been at the center of controversy, admitting last month that he received injections from Bernard Sainz, under formal investigation in the wake of last year's Festina affair. Cofidis banned Vandenbroucke and only gave him the go ahead to race in the Tour last week. Vandenbroucke's American teammate Bobby Julich, third in last year's Tour, must be confident of doing even better with so many notable absentees. Without its leader Virenque, Polti's challenge is weaker, but Giro winner Ivan Gotti should be a strong contender, along with Banesto, led by Michael Boogerd and ONCE, whose main challenge will likely come from Abraham Olano in Jalabert's absense. Cycling badly needs the headlines to be about racing and not doping, but if the last 12 months are anything to go by, drugs might again be the dominant theme. The 1998 Tour's travails -- which began when French customs officials caught Festina physio Willy Voet with a stash of erythropoietin (EPO) and anabolic steroids -- kick started the most painful year in cycling's history. Tour organizers expelled Festina after the team admitted to systematic doping. That, they hoped, would end the scandal: A few suspensions and fines and back to cycling. It didn't turn out that way. French authorities continued their crackdown, even raiding team hotels as cyclists slept between stages. The scandal seemed to spiral out of control, with riders staging a sitdown protest and six teams withdrawing from the race protesting the policing tactics. Since then it seems that cyclists and officials have spent as much time in police stations and courthouses as by trackside. Eleven peope remain under official investigation, with French Cycling Federation president Daniel Baal among those questioned and released. The Tour itself was on the brink. "The 1999 Tour will be one of construction," said Jean-Claude Killy, president of the Tour de France company. "To achieve this construction, we envisioned all hypotheses, including a year without the tour." "But why penalize the tour itself, which is not at all responsible for the problems? The Tour belongs to France. She would never have understood, since the Tour has only ever been stopped during the two world wars." There's little evidence to suggest construction in the sport. Indeed, as the Saturday start date approaches, teams are still resentful of the French police's tactics from last year -- and concerned that there might be a repeat. "The French authorities have had 365 days to mull over what happened last year," U.S. Postal team operations diretor Dan Osipow said. "We hope the late night raids and innuendo of last year won't happen again." "It was harsh for athletes in the biggest event of the year. The race is the superbowl of cycling. There must be a better way to deal with the situation than that," Osipow said. Teams might be hoping in vain. French Sports Minister Marie-George Buffet has said there'll be no let up in the fight against banned drugs, and during recent cycling events across Europe authorities have continued to pursue the sport. The Tour seems to be left with the worst of both worlds, without its top stars, yet under attack from banned riders and teams that have not been found guilty in a court of law. Governing bodies are being criticized for not acting firmly enough: only Voet, and former Festina offical Bruno Roussel remain banned from the sport. "The 1998 Tour de France revealed the cataclysm and the general trauma within the sport. Then there were other doping affairs even recently," said Jean-Marie Leblanc, general director of the Tour de France organizers. Leblanc concedes that doping has fundamentally change the sport in the last year. "In choosing teams 'sporting parameters' are no longer sufficient," he said. "I am tempted to add that they are no longer a priority. It is the sporting morality, ethics and complete and utter transparency that are now at the heart of the sport."
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