Cycling is under assault by the dope show. Being a mountain biker, roadie, downhiller whatever, you can’t help being drawn into this and being tarnished with the poisoned needle. I cannot agree more with the harsh penalties being dished out, there must be consequences and standards, and if you want to win the game you must play by the rules.
But it makes me wonder if it is going to make it all go away. Are we treating the cause or are we treating the symptom. The big stick approach seldom works because often you are beating an already broken man. Should we not be trying to fix this broken man. I wonder if we really understand this doping thing, I mean really understand it. Where does it all start, what drives someone like Vino to dope knowing the risks of being caught? What is someone’s state of mind when they make this decision?
Why is taking an illegal substance worse than taking a legal substance, are you not improving your performance artificially in both cases?
David Miller a reformed doper talks about and understands these things. He points out how grey the area is that when these guys start it is not for the glory and the money but more like desperation, obligations etc. Only they will know, and when no one is really talking how will we ever know what it really is all about.
But I guess for now the only route is the UCI stick route, but somehow that just seems to damage and make for the worst PR ever.
Maybe the pain we all feel is the way it is meant to be. Fact is it is happening everywhere, denying that is they got here in the first place. So the fact that everyday someone gets booted out is the right thing for now, but it can’t be the only long term solution.
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