“We know that Micera was being used on the Giro, so I’m not surprised that it’s also turned up at the Tour.”

Whoah, man.

Cycling’s image? A little more tarnished.

HOWEVER! Omigod, the battle for the polka dot jersey is gonna be SO on!

that it seems like the controls are catching up to the cheaters:

I do not know SHITE about doping at that level, but doesn’t it seem like all you’d have to do would be to subscribe to a couple diabetes journals to know what EPO was on the market, or would soon be on the market?

You know, like, “Oh, I see Lancet reporting that Proctor-Johnson is releasing F-EPO out of clinical trials in 6 months, perhaps we’ll add that to the list.”

/gross oversimplification

who is genuinely happy about this?

I mean, come on, this is really great news. The last two years cleaned out my generation (b 1970) to an amazing degree—it’s bizarre to sit here in the Green Zone and play my 2003 Tour DVD, on many levels. But cycling used Puerto, Landis, Vino, et al to sell the “new generation” at the same time that it let Valverde and Contador go untouched. Most of the young guns were obviously going to revert to doping when new products or masking agents came on line.

And now a 24-year old megatalented uberasshole gets nailed with an essentially career-ending bust with future GT wins ahead of him….two Spanish riders go down (one of them young enough to be cautionary), Claudio Corti and SDV go down in flames, and a whole new line of EPO possibly nipped in the bud.

This is fantastic, people.

The last two years saved Contador, Valverde, the Schlecks, Cunego—all of which I think are clean now but otherwise would not habe been. But someone young was going to cross the line…and that someone had to be taken down to make progress stick for a generation. And its Riccardo Ricco. Fan-fucking-tastic.

I’ll get out of Baghdad just in time to see the 2009 Tour and it’s going to be Epic.

So, who is going to be the next rider with a positive test? Is there any question that Saunier-Duval left because they knew someone else on that squad was going to have a CERA positive?
I really wanted Ricco to be for real, I love the brash personality and shit-talking. Oh well! I bet the organizers sure are glad they didn’t let big bad Astana in this year to embarass them.

a little less Millar.
Just got finished reading his take on cyclingnews. He thinks Ricco should name names; tell about the non-SD people who obviously pushed Ricco into this and told him (Ricco) he couldn’t get caught.
I don’t recall Millar ever doing so. Granted he is right; if Ricco and all the others name names, things might get better. And while Millar he has taken the straight road back, paid the price, and is apparently a model citizen, he didn’t name names either. So his act of “do as I say and do as I do” rings a little hollow.

Can’t help but wonder about the accountant – named in Operacion Puerto, sailing up the mountains last year with Rasmussen, winning the Giro wiith little training over Ricco.

And maybe Scott should rethink the name of their road bike now.