It was quiet surprising that le Tour de France passed without any doping yet, but now the T-mobile cyclist Patrick Sinkewitz (GER) who hit a person with his bike days ago (happened on the way back to the hotel. The German is now in a hospital at Hamburg (GER) with massive injuries in the face, the 78 years old person fell into coma) got a positive A test for doping!
Because of that, the German TV chanals ARD and ZDF stopped the live coverage. Until the B test results will be released there won't be a live broadcasting! The sponsors "T-Mobile" and "Gerolsteiner" will decide after the Tour weather they maintain sponsoring the cycling sport. (the reason was somekind of "contract" between the two chanals all German cycling teams (incl. T-Mobile). The German teams promised that this Tour would be clean.)

If you ask me they won't if Sinkewitz is realy doped. The main sponsor of an big local cycling event for profis and amateurs probably decides that this year is the last for this (local) event.

can somebody tell me why these stupid idiots do something like that to this sport? They do not only destroy the Pro Events, they destroy the youth and amateur Events as well!

Im sure that more than half of the drivers are doped. Just with a stuff that you cant detect yet. The whole cycling sport has become a farce.

They should just cut their losses and allow full body conversion cyborgs and all possible doping.

Would make some interesting watching. (From a safe distance... like on TV.)

Quote from zeugnimod :

Im sure that more than half of the drivers are doped. Just with a stuff that you cant detect yet. The whole cycling sport has become a farce.

more than 90% of the field have (i don't know the englisch word nor how to spell in in German ) "Asthma" (-> a desease where you cannot breath in and out when you have stress or when you're doing to much sport). This can't be. One of my friends have this kind of desease. He sometimes get problems after playing 30min rugby/soccer/am.football/basketball. The cyclists in the field are racing over hours!

Quote from TFalke55 :

more than 90% of the field have (i don't know the englisch word nor how to spell in in German ) "Astma"

Asthma

Dope de France!

Quote from deggis :

Asthma

thx

so thats why it isn't showing anymore :\, sad im gettin into the sport :P

Well today (24 hours after this boycott) Sat.1 a privat chanal shows the Tour de France again. After the first few minutes I can say, they are just broadcasting the "international broadcast" with German commentators. (ARD and ZDF made a little summary at the beginning of the broadcast, Sat.1 did not but it's they first day)

I think they have seen how many people watched Eurosport after the boycott.

Now Sat.1 have got the rights to broadcast the rest of the Tour. That means luckyly: No Talk Shows!

EDIT: It can happen that the Cycling World Championship (planned for Stuttgart this year) won't take place.

I'm a big fan of the Tour, but all this doping talk is killing the sport. We have Paul Sherwin and Phill Liggett as commentators for ITV in the UK, and they keep going on about how FAST the average speed is going up. It makes you wonder how year in year out they can keep on maintaining these speeds without some sort of enhancing drugs.

I know these guys are at the top of their sport and that they train all year BUT you cant help but wonder sometimes......

The other strange thing is Bjarne Riis (sp?) admitting taking EPO. He is now trying to tell us his team are the cleanest because they are posting all their test results on the internet for us all to see.!!!!

Lance Armstrong was allegedly one of the most dope tested athletes ever and nothing was found, is he super fit or did he have some very clever people in his team.

The discussion about this will drag on for as long as cycling exists as a sport.

Well, how stupid and arrogant is this? 2 channels don't show the tour de cheat anymore, and ONLY because of the money a private channel jumps in, no matter what had happened?

EVERY F***ING ONE of the drivers and teams knows what's going on, and I'd bet my balls that over 95% have at least doped once. Controls are not strict at all, I could go to my doctor, give him some money, then he'll write that I once had a steel pan welded to my forehead and therefore NEED to take epo, otherwise I'll die. Off to the track I'd go!

I'm not into big arse cheating, damn moneymakers!

greetz

der pissed-off butz

Tour de France sucks.
Yeye, I understand that it is an extreme accomplishment to cycle that far on that short amont of time, but the damn Tour takes up the program on TV the whole day :/

I mean, on one of the biggest channels here in Norway, they showed that damn Tour for like 6 hours. First long before the race with analyzis, and then the race, AND THEN all the aftermath stuff, talking with the riders and analyzes again, damn it`s almost as crappy now on the TV as when the Football is at it`s worst.

Where in the love of god are the motorsport releated stuff on the telly today?

Quote from The Very End :

Where in the love of god are the motorsport releated stuff on the telly today?

Because of the Tour they put the DTM Race in the evening. So they started 17:30 and because of the Tour, who finished about 20mins latert, the German television joined the DTM coverage with this 20min delay.

Speed Channel usually has some good racing on, about 1 hour a day, at most(unless NASCAR or F1 are on). And they still consider themselves a racing channel.

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/070725/2/u79o.html

This is getting crazy

Ah, now they finally managed to make a complete joke of the Tour. :thumbsdow

Quote from zeugnimod :

Ah, now they finally managed to make a complete joke of the Tour. :thumbsdow

Sadly but true :doh:

they also got another doping cyclist today (moreni) he was tested positive last week
and now the french police busted him after his finish. the real joke: he was one
of the guys who did the "sit-in" for a doping free sport at the start of todays race

its just a big farce and a corrupt system there, doping racers, managers who doped also
back when they where racers and strange medics who seem to have absolutely no sense for the sport

If this is going to continue, then I would like to say that I belive that the complete Tour De France is a great dope-fest, where everyone or most of the riders use some kinds of illegal drugs to imrpove.

Fu3 Tour De France!
What ones was a great sport, where archivment and glory was the winning factor has become a dope-fest and a money-whore-ing race.

Rasmussen also out. :banghead:



http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/ ... r-rabobank-wield-axe.html

i read that they are considering dropping cycling from the olympics because of all this. a bit extreme, but on the other hand, nothing else has worked so far to discourage doping in cycling.

Quote from evilgeek :

i read that they are considering dropping cycling from the olympics because of all this. a bit extreme, but on the other hand, nothing else has worked so far to discourage doping in cycling.

Thats not extreme at all.
Cycling has lost all it`s pride when ****ers like the ones on this tour are with it. And I can swear that most of them are like that ones in the tour, they just don`t get cought.

Quote from The Very End :

If this is going to continue, then I would like to say that I belive that the complete Tour De France is a great dope-fest, where everyone or most of the riders use some kinds of illegal drugs to imrpove.

At least they have been caught.

I wonder if there are any professional sports which are absolutely doping free...

It is more a chemical engineering contest than a sport. A new step is going to be crossed since soon it will become a genetic engineering competition

Welcome to the National Vanity Fair.

Having tried long distance running and bike orienteering, I can't but wonder how boring cycling on a long distance is.

Of course, in cycling there is a lot of draft tactics involved. But every time it looks the same: they all go in a group, then some guys push and escape from the group. So the escape is all about efforts and stamina. I know that by myself in long distance running: you just push, push, push, and all the time through the distance calculate your efforts, if you can accelerate by a hair. Indeed, some time you find it interesting and pleasant to do much and fast, if you run/ride by yourself, but in total... it is so boooring!

Just wonder some people really watch it live on TV and DTM is delayed.

Quote from Maelstrom :

It is more a chemical engineering contest than a sport. A new step is going to be crossed since soon it will become a genetic engineering competition

Lol, so true .)