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Tour absentees reflect cycling's crisis Posted: Wednesday July 03, 2002 6:09 AMUpdated: Thursday July 04, 2002 2:07 AM
PARIS (Reuters) -- A fourth win by Lance Armstrong in the Tour de France this month would be an extraordinary sporting feat but unfortunately for the larger-than-life American, his victory might be diminished by the absence of his most serious rivals. The U.S. Postal leader was the first to express concern at the apparent lack of opposition this year, as most of the interest of the race will rest on him. Without the men who have threatened him in past Tours, and without some of the riders poised to be future threats, the Texan will be more exposed than ever when the race begins in Luxembourg on Saturday. For Armstrong, a strong advocate of the sport and an acute observer of its ups and downs, the long list of absentees is all the more of a pity as it reflects the various aspects of the crisis that has rocked cycling in recent years. Doping offences have claimed their toll and 1998 winner Marco Pantani, whose Mercatone Uno team were not given a place in the Tour this year by organisers for lack of results, would not have been able to take part in any case. "The Pirate," who had challenged Armstrong in the mountains in 2000 before giving up, was recently banned for eight months for using insulin. Pantani protested his innocence but his career has been rocked by controversy since his 1998 Tour victory. His win that year was eclipsed by the biggest doping scandal in Tour history, when the entire Festina team were expelled. But the Italian had his own doping problems soon afterwards, being kicked out of the 1999 Giro d'Italia with the leader's jersey on his shoulders for failing a haematocrit test. Since then, two other Giro leaders have been thrown out on doping grounds -- Dario Frigo in 2001 and Stefano Garzelli this year. Garzelli's Mapei team had no plans to enter the 2000 Giro winner, who failed a test for probenecid, in the Tour this year but the new scandal prompted Mapei, cycling's biggest team for the past decade, to announce it was calling it quits at the end of the season. Ranking pressure Last year's Giro winner Gilberto Simoni also left the Italian race in shame after testing positive for cocaine. As a result, Tour organisers barred his Saeco team from taking part. Armstrong's other leading rival in recent Tours was German Jan Ullrich, who finished second three times, in 1998, 2000 and 2001. The 1997 winner and reigning Olympic road champion is missing the Tour through injury and his absence reflects, in the eyes of some cycling experts, one of the biggest wastes in the sport. With a Tour crown, a Vuelta victory, an Olympic gold medal and a time trial world title, Ullrich's record is excellent but far below what was expected of him five years ago. Probably the most naturally talented rider around, Ullrich has been accused of not training enough and enjoying partying too much. A recent drink driving incident, which led the Telekom team leader to lose his driving licence for a year, did not improve the German's image. Other leading cycling figures will be missing because their teams failed to qualify for the world's showcase race. The top 16 teams on the International Cycling Union (UCI) rankings qualify automatically and organisers award five wildcards. As a result, sprinter Mario Cipollini, winner of 12 stages in recent years, was left out, as was Pantani. Swiss Alex Zuelle, at his best in the recent Tour of Switzerland, will also watch the Tour on television despite second places in 1995 and 1999. French team BigMat Auber went bankrupt because of the decision by organisers not to select it for the Tour. The UCI rankings have been partly blamed for the doping trend of the last decade as teams, eager to take part in the biggest races on the calendar, put intense pressure on their riders to score points.
Copyright 2003 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. |
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