Law & Order

Uh-Oh: Forget the national cycling federations, WADA, and UCI: Spain's parliament has passed the anti-doping legislation the country was lacking. The new law will create a national antidoping agency, and take effect by April. Worse for the team-coddling tools at UCI and WADA and their cocoon-protected proteges: there's prison sentences of 6 months to 2 years for those abetting the use of doping substances by athletes. Interestingly--and for once fairly--punishment for the jocks themselves is way lighter--3 month to 4 year bans and fines up to $15k, a drop in the bucket for most of these guys. Even better, the riders get actual bonus points for spitting out the names of their accomplices, from directeurs sportif on down. Lucky for the teams I guess that they genuinely provide no help whatsoever to the individual rogue cheating bastard riders who dope!

Of course--and I freely concede ignorance on Spanish law regarding retroactivity--this seems not to affect the fine gyno Dr. Fuentes, Manolo Saiz, or anyone else previously busted in the Op Puerto scandal (and damned lucky for them), but right on Spain for putting the blame on the suppliers for once!

And natch, the timing couldn't be better, just ahead of the Giro, most of the classics, and everyone's favorite doping target, the Tour de France. Better take that crap over the border and get your bloodwork done somewhere else, boys!