A Drug Free Giro d' Italia?

The centenary Giro d' Italia is slated to run from May 9-31, 2009. Everyone should be stoked as the Giro d' Italia is one of the paramount Grand Tours. Unfortunately, in cycling, great events have to be mired in senseless politics. RCS sport director Angelo Zomegnan slighted Italian national road race champion Filippo Simeoni and his Ceramica Flaminia Bossini Docce team with a non-invite to the Giro d' Italia. In response Filippo Simeoni ran his national champion jersey through the shredder and returned it in a box to the Italian Cycling Federation (FCI).

One thing that will not happen during the 2009 Giro d' Italia is a Filippo Simeoni escape with an enraged 'le patron' Lance Armstrong bridging the gap and ordering Simeoni to return to the peloton, or else! This odd incident happened in the 2004 Tour de France. Filippo Simeoni claimed that Lance Armstrong "threatened him" in retaliation for comments Simeoni made about the relationship Armstrong had with Dr. Michele Ferrari. Filippo Simeoni accused Dr. Michele Ferrari of giving Lance Armstrong recombinant erythropoietin (rEPO). Dr. Ferrari once famously made the statement that "rEPO used properly was no more dangerous than orange juice." Dr. Michele Farrari was convicted in an Italian court for doping cyclists. But Lance Armstrong always insisted that his relationship with Michele Farrari consisted of nothing more than mundane consultations on parameters of athletic performance quite common among professional cyclists. Lance Armstrong has always denied that Michele Ferrari ever gave him any prohibited substances.

Something else that won't happen in the 2009 Giro d' Italia; a Marco Pantani like hematocrit reading of 60%. The days of free for all doping where riders carried around thermos bottles full of ice and vials of rEPO are over. Doping with rEPO has become much more sophisticated. Riders now use micro doses of EPO that in many cases escape detection by modern laboratory tests. Modern riders (doctors) have few problems keeping total hematocrit levels below the 50% threshold level that is deemed unsafe by the International Cycling Union (UCI).

Even so, the odds of a positive test free 2009 Giro d' Italia are astronomical. Someone will roll the dice and lose, that is certain. We have the usual suspects that will not test positive. Lance Armstrong is promoting Livestrong he won't risk a positive test, no matter what Pierre Bordry and AFLD think. Saint David Millar will not test positive either, in spite of his past rEPO use. Millar is a spokesman of the anti-doping crusade. Saint Ivan Basso will ride clean as a whistle, he has confessed and repented his former Operation Puerto blood manipulation schemes to become the supra lab rat. Besides, the entire Italian nation is counting on Ivan Basso to win the Giro d' Italia over American rivals Lance Armstrong and Levi Leipheimer.

No the sucker who tests positive for a prohibited substance will be a stage winner or time trial winner or random rider.

The centenary Giro d' Italia will degenerate into more discussions on doping. The race will be ruined.

Life will go on. Until the next positive test for PEDs, probably during the 2009 Tour de France.