Brief Update

The rumors of my dropping off the face of the earth are greatly exaggerated, to paraphrase Mark Twain. I’ve been busy proofing the galleys for Dope, which hasn’t left much free time to do a whole lot of ranting over the last few days.

Well, the proof reading is now over, and the last of the tasks before this puppy goes to print is completing the index. The finish line is in sight. Come next Monday, the index and the corrected pages will be back in the hands of the folks doing all the technical work to turn all those glowing electrons on my laptop’s screen into a real, printed book.

And I’ll be really relaxed.

Meantime, it’s nice to be able to read about bike racing without any stories of positive doping tests. Congrats to Tom Boonen, who rode a great race at Paris-Roubaix over the weekend. And to George Hincapie for still managing a top ten placing despite having to switch out a broken wheel at the same time the winning break went up the road.

Of course, not too many days can go by without some mention of doping in the world of cycling. Seems that Jan Ullrich has managed to escape relatively unscathed from all of the accusations against him over the last 18 months or so — as long as you consider paying a “fine” of something like €250,000 (roughly $350,000) escaping unscathed.

According to CyclingNews.com, Ullrich released the following statement:

“There can be no confession because I have never cheated anyone.” He said that he accepted the settlement in order “to free my family from the public pressure of the matter,” and he further noted, “financial considerations played a role.” But, he emphasized, “the payment is not an admission of guilt. The public attorneys never challenged me to make one.”

Prosecutors in Bonn, Germany, noted that:

[A]ny criminal actions by Ullrich “are considered to be minor, that since results of parallel investigations and other occurrences during this investigation (the confessions of other cyclists), it must be assumed that doping in cycling at the time under investigation was widespread.”

It appears that the prosecutors took into account not only whatever Ullrich might have done, but also the environment he labored in. Quite a novel approach in comparison to the way other agencies might have handled the matter.

Ullrich still faces an investigation by the Swiss Olympic Committee, who issued the German cyclist’s racing license during his last years of competition. But since he’s already retired, what real punishment can they put on him? Not much, I suspect. Having to fork over a large sum of money to settle the case in Germany, on the other hand, does put a crimp in Ullrich’s pocketbook.

Meanwhile, real honest-to-goodness bike racing continues on Wednesday, with a bunch of familiar names taking the start at the 96th Scheldeprijs Vlaanderen. The day job’s been a bit hectic lately, so I may not get to follow it live. But if I get time for a short break, I’ll be heading over to the CyclingNews.com site to check out the latest race action. Think of that. Following a bike race, instead of the latest scandal. What a concept.

Let’s just hope that it can stay this way, and that professional cycling truly has turned a corner. But the cynic in me suspects that we haven’t heard the last of doping scandals in cycling just yet.