OPlease!

Jan Ullrich Contract Watch: who gives a rat's @#$? We love Joseba Beloki may have to @#%%&^% retire because he can't get a contract this year! @$$%! Sure, he's not recovered as we dearly wish he had from his excruciating leg-snap in the melting tar of the 2004 Tour. And sure, Manolo Saiz is a heinous allegedly dope-distributing control freak who's managed to smack the career of every poor sap in his employ without a single positive test (outside of the 'renegade' Heras he wussily denies any responsibility for). But Beloki's at least perservered, and come back to be a worthy superdomestique in the mountains, more'n some folks who've gotten contracts this year. And if the unsupported sketchy Operacion Puerto allegations are really the dealbreaker, then why the hell, no offense meant, is @$%^&&*! Allan Davis reportedly about to sign with @#*&^%! Discovery and @@#$%&*% Beloki's the only one from Liberty Seguros who can't get a contract?! $#@*!

EPOh No I Didn't: Frank Vandenbroucke's alleged confessional statement in his new book, "EPO? Everyone did it. Me too," has been brusquely retracted and blamed on the ecstatic excesses of doofus publicists, though sadly there's no such luck for retracting Frank's prior claim that the drugs he was busted with in about 2002 were in fact destined for his dog, apparently because he was getting cruelly mocked at the park by the other dogs and dope-slapped in the press about his pathetic stamina in playing fetch, and, cracking under the relentless pressure, had no choice but to succumb to the filthy lure of EPO. Is anyone else thinking that Dr. Eufemiano Fuentes took a page from that playbook?

I Love You, Spartacus: Finally, I see Belgian teen-dream (and quite a fine sprinter, I've heard) Tom Boonen's kicking off his lucrative Northwave ad campaign with a studly skirted photographic homage to the iconic movie "Gladiator." Yes, because if his sword-bearing nemeses had had to take on Russell Crowe while he was wearing Northwave cleats instead of sandals, they'd have doubly gotten their @$$# kicked. Wouldn't, say, Dorothy on her little Toto-bearing basketed bicycle have been a more relevant movie icon to copy? Then again, I suppose even Tom mightn't've looked quite so manly in blue gingham...