More doping in the Tour?

Friday, January 28, 2011

I’ve been riding my bike for fun and sport since I was very young. I suppose the first long-distance trip I took was around the age of 10 when my cousin Donnie and I rode our bikes from his home in Massena, NY to visit our grandparents in Potsdam – a trip of around 20 miles. That doesn’t seem like all that much, but one of us was riding a banana seat (and if you don’t know what that is…you’re lucky…because you’re young).

I kept riding throughout my high school years…even after getting my driver’s license…and never really stopped. I’ve done a number of century rides (100 miles or more) over the years and probably logged over 50,000 miles by now. With al that riding…and maybe because of it… I’m still blown away by the Tour de France. For those of you who do not follow the sport of road cycling (99% of all Americans likely), it is probably the most grueling event in the world of sports with the competitors racing over 2,000 miles over the course of three weeks and climbing mountain roads my car would struggle to ascend.

It is also a sport that has been decimated by the performance-enhancing drugs for reasons I don’t completely understand. I suppose even the non-cycling sports fan has heard of Lance Armstrong, the only man to win the Tour seven times. Though he passed hundreds of drug tests during his seven-year reign as the world’s greatest cyclist, speculation about doping and cheating surrounds him still. He was most recently accused of cheating by 2006 winner and former teammate, Al Landis, but only after Landis admitted that he had, in fact, used the performance enhancing drug he was accused of using when he had his title stripped away after the 2006 win.

And now, four years later, Tour winner Alberto Contador is having his 2010 title stripped for having trace amounts of the banned drug, clenbuterol, in his system during the Tour. He is claiming that he is a victim of a tainted steak and in fairness; the hormone is used in beef cattle to increase the amount of meat they can produce.

I don’t know the answer to the drug issue and only hope that the day can come when tests for their presence (or absence) will be infallible…or better yet…everyone will just play fair…on every playing field. Welcome…to Fantasy Island.

I’d had a long day at work and only a mild headache for company. I drove to pick Heidi up in Kent before coming home and then managed a 45-minute bike ride…without performance enhancing drugs…including Advil. I’m trying to stay clean because you never know when someone is going to ask you to pee in a bottle for testing...and I have my image to protect.

Bike duration: 45 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 130.
Calories burned during workout: 675.