It's Yer Brand-Spankin'-New Top Ten Tips for Dopers!

Sure, we here at racejunkie have generously offered our beloved riders free advice on this before, but each crop o' alleged losers seems to screw it up in exciting new ways all over again every year! So here, Yer Handy-Dandy Top Ten Tips for Dopers (and Wannabees):

1. If you're gonna dope, at least don't dope and *suck*. Have you *no* pride?

2. Valverde, man. Bow and learn, you incompetent nits!

3. Valverde, man. Wouldn't this motor thing just be *easier*?

4. Don't unleash a blood feud on someone who rats you out. Armstrong'd be a lot better off--or at least look like way less of an !@#hole--if he hadn't.

5. Motor in your bike frame: pathetic. *Real* cyclists use drugs. Two wires bad, four syringes good!

6. Y'ever see those inbred toothless morons on reality cop shows who get busted with a pile o' meth in their pants and go, "duuuuuuuh, it belongs to my friend"? Yeah, that's how it looks when *you* do it, too.

7. Shut up, Froome. Almost everybody already thinks you're doping anyway. Your righteous indignation ain't helping.

8. Omerta: bad in principle, great in practice. Ask (we still love) Roberto Heras--he'll give you 724,000 euros worth o' reasons why!

9. For the uninitiated, your pedals are supposed to stop moving at some point once you're off the bike. Flip the switch, !@#$head!

10. Yes, we *know* your team/DS/sponsor/mechanic is a lying sack of crap. But they're still gonna throw you under the bus, and win. Enjoy the next 50 years as an embarrassing footnote in the history books, sucker!

Really, you clowns--we're trying to *help* you here. At some point, we're gonna have to start charging for it!

My Fantasy No-Bull!@#$ Doping-Confession Press Conference #cycling

Good morning. I've called you all here today, even though nobody gives a crap about a minor ex-pro cyclist and current directeur sportif/trainer/bar owner/TV commentator/washed-up bitter !@#hole, because I've finally been busted for doping/my agent told me I might keep my current job if I do this/that rat-bastard ex-teammate of mine threw me under the bus to the narcs.

First, I'd like to address Denmark/Germany/Italy/are you *serious* that's all we're ever gonna get outta *Spain*?'s recent report on systemic doping in our country. At all times, I fully lied/deflected/minimized/covered up/pointed fingers at some other sap to the anti-doping authorities. Therefore, the fact that the report calls me out in only one/two/three sentences is a testament to their utter complicity/complete oafishness/general squeamishness/severe personal embarrassment in dealing with this scourge of our beloved cycling.

Next, I'd like to say that my farcical claim that I only doped during the "early" part of my career, when I sucked, then was perfectly clean when I was actually winning races, was to beat the statute of limitations/make my mom feel better/keep my most recent soigneur from hunting me down like a wildebeest/the most ludicrous horse-hockey ever conjured with a sleazy PR agent and desperate team management. In fact, I was taking PEDs up until 2 years ago/2 weeks ago/hell, I'm about to jam a needle in my !@# right after the press conference just to take a club ride.

As to the UCI, I'd like to offer my sincerest ennui/disdain/contempt/!@#$ you buddy! for their inept/ineffective/half-hearted/completely useless actions to clean up the sport. In particular, I'd like to extend my gratitude/shake their hands/kiss them like they've never been kissed before for tipping off my team boss about the impending midnight hotel-room drug checks/introducing the biological passport and providing a perfect roadmap to what I could get away with/buying that ridiculous story about how I just had a massive stomach virus/weird tropical parasite/pre-test sexual encounter/asthma attack.

Lastly, I'd like to thank my current team for supporting me/recognizing that my prior sins have nothing to do with them/understanding that the sport cannot move forward without an open and honest discussion of the past/promising not to have me whacked if I completely exonerated them from any wrongdoing. I mean....you're not gonna have me whacked now, right? Right?

So You Wanna Beat the Narcs: A Friendly Guide for What *Not* to Say for Cyclists

So, Grand Tour contender, you've been just been nailed by some vengeful data-wielding nerdling who's called your performances "suspicious," "miraculous," or even, if you're really lucky,"mutant." Yet, you *persist* in staying stupid !@#$ to the press that is guaranteed to freak the authorities into a state of high alert. Don't want a nightly invasion of needle-wielding narcs and urine-catching bathroom vultures derailing your nightly routine all July and dooming you to a life of Ricco-esque shame when you're caught? Then listen up and learn to keep 'em off the trail--and yeah, this means *you*, Froomey!

WRONG: I feel great.
RIGHT: The sensations are good.

WRONG: I'm going for the stage win today.
RIGHT: We'll see what happens.

WRONG: I'm exactly where I need to be at this point.
RIGHT: I'm really suffering from allergies. Hopefully, they won't be so bad in a few weeks.

WRONG: I'm confident I can win the Tour de France.
RIGHT: It's a long road to Paris.

WRONG: I could've won myself if I hadn't had to help the team leader up the mountains the whole tour.
RIGHT: It was an honor to ride for ______. I'm really grateful for the experience I gained.

WRONG (REALLY WRONG): I'm aiming for the next six or seven Tours.
RIGHT: I'm still young and I've got a lot to learn. I'm aiming for a high placing this year if everything goes right.

WRONG: My main rival is ______.
RIGHT: My main rivals are ______, _______, and ______. Of course, _____ and _____ are also very strong. And you can't discount guys like ______, _______, ________, or _______.

WRONG: I spent a lot of time in the off-season training at "altitude".
RIGHT: I spent a lot of time in the wind tunnel working on my time trial position in the off-season. I really hope it helps me this year.

WRONG: If my chain hadn't come off, I could have won the day.
RIGHT: I just didn't have the legs today.

WRONG: My team is phenomenal.
RIGHT: My teammates worked phenomenally hard today. But ______, _______, and _____ are incredible teams. We'll have to be very attentive.

WRONG: crossing the line with a long victory celebration, taking a quick swig from your water bottle, and conducting a lengthy, smiling TV interview in your second language before bounding up the steps for the podium presentation.
RIGHT: weakly raising a half-clenched fist two inches above the handlebars, dumping a whole water bottle over your head, and collapsing off your bike onto the ground in agony as the medical team runs to your side. Bonus points if you hurl on your soigneur!

All right, you Eddy Merckx wannabes, I've done my damndest to help protect you from yourselves. Now if you're gonna dope like a scumbag, at least don't bray like an !@# about it!

Holy Crap This Isn't a Joke: Lance is Yappin' on Oprah

Which can only mean one thing, dear reader(s): he's going for the I-couldn't-help-it-everyone-else-was-doing-it-I-was-just-trying-to-inspire-others-after-a-terrifying-illness-and-remarkable-comeback-so-now-you-can't-criticize-me-without-looking-like-a-colossal-!@#$wad-tearjerker-martyr-hero-gullible-fanboy-who-doesn't-give-a-rat's-!@#-about-cycling sympathy vote. Am I the only one who's just about two seconds and a strong personal sense of ladylike restraint away from hurling right now? Thought not! Still, it's gotta be tough faking your first human emotions, especially for the cameras, so in order to help Lance connect with the intended audience, I think he could use a few tips:

1. "I had a tough childhood." Who doesn't love kids?

2. "I discovered something I was good at." Self-esteem blossoms!

3. "Someone else believed in me." Validation!

4. "I worked really hard." He's grateful!

5. "I started winning, like, out of nowhere." Success!

6. "I hit the lowest of low points." Yes, and everyone, even everyone who hates you, is genuinely glad you're okay.

7. "I had to prove to myself I could do it." Yes, and everyone, even everyone who hates you, is genuinely glad you could.

8. "But I found out it wasn't so easy." Obstacles!

9. "Everyone else was doing it." Amoral European socialists!

10. "I trusted Johan." Vulnerability!

11. "He guided me." Lack of personal responsibility!

12. "It was the only way for a level playing field." Justification!

13. "I still beat them anyway." Proof you deserved it!

14. "I am so, so deeply sorry." Remorse!

15. "I've learned a precious lesson." Self-awareness!

16. "I hope to start anew." Redemption!

17. "For my family, for my fans, and all of cycling." Selflessness!

Well, Lance, that oughta tide you over, unless someone actually asks you to explain your years of vindictiveness, how it could possibly have been a level playing field with all your money power influence and doped-up superdomestiques, and your totally callous exploitation of others' sympathy for personal gain. And as you've surely considered carefully, that ain't gonna happen on Oprah. 'Til then, try not calling anyone a "liar" or a "whore," keep that $250,000 you offered to USADA in the bank, and you'll do juuuuuuuuuuuuust fine!

Bans Are For Sissies: A Comprehensive Approach to Anti-Doping Reform

Problem: "retroactive" bans clearly mean !@#$: the guy's back on the road in a coupla months. And banning a rider after 6 years of dithering is ridiculous: the man's either already retired, or well past his useful shelf life anyway. And some guys, no matter what they do, they never get banned at all. Either way, they're all laughing their !@#es off. Conclusion: unless the governing bodies are willing to ban first and apologize later, or you get some lily-livered crybaby who blubbers for mercy immediately in regret over being busted in hopes of a reduced sentence, bans are !@#$%$#. Solution: Chain gangs. Look, the death penalty, while tempting, is (1) frankly a little bit harsh for snarfing a jolt of pre-race joy juice and (2) some sort of whiny "human rights violation" if you're a simpering socialist brie-eating ivory-tower criminal-appeaser country unlike the United States or, say, Iran. But chain gangs? Benissimo! And not just *any* ol' chain gangs--they're ultra-deterrent super-humiliating ProTour chain gangs! Yes, Alberto, you and your fellow dope-suckin band o' miscreants will not only be wearing some rusty medieval 80-lb. shackles right where it'd hurt to hold the handlebars and clip into the pedals, but you'll be specially assigned to shame yourself right in front of the folks it'll crush you the most! That poor bastard walking around exactly in front of the final podium in the 100-degree sun in a grotesquely obvious prison outfit with a broom handle with a metal point attached to it pickin' up yellow confetti while the Official Andy Schleck Fan Club covers you in lougies and the man himself stands above you on high gleaming in his brand-new maillot jaune? That's *you*, baby--enjoy that fresh air and exercise, *and* be on the cover of every publication in sports the next day! Wah, wah, the verdict was wrong, you lost your dignity for life and 20 bazillion euros worth of winnings and product endorsements--nothin' an "oops, sorry!" straight from the mouth of Pat "Dick" when you win your appeal can't fix right up, right? So who's with me--baby Schleck, you got a vested interest in this one, so long as Joha--uh, I mean, you got a vested interest in this one!
Look, here's the crew for the Giro d'Italia! Hey...is that third-from-the-left Hinault?

And, A Shout-Out to Our Tom Boonen Fans: back on the Planet of Stuff That's Actually Relevant This Century, ain't it a real, genuine delight to see big Belgian babe-magnet Tom Boonen back on form and so confident once again at the Tour of Qatar? I *knew* getting him back into the discotheque and onto the white stuff (y'know...sugar) would get him back on top--way to go for once Quick Step, and who *knows* how that quiet Levi Leipheimer'll take off if he adopts this new training regimen! Oh, and feel better poor Cav...

A Rational, Measured Response to the Alberto Contador Verdict

Y'know, not to claim I'm psychic or nothin', because frankly I banked on CAS simping out with a one year ban, but I did have a dream about Alberto Contador last night, and while yes I *do* apparently need to get a life you wisenheimers, it was this: Contador's on his knees before Pat "Dick" McQuaid, clutching a big black UCI rulebook and wailing to the skies above with tears streaming down his face in one of those ostentatious and peculiarly American jailhouse conversions that totally coincidentally allows you to act like an !@#wipe your entire life then lets you off with just a crappy apology and still lets you rule over your family and like half the universe with an iron fist without any merit on your part whatsoever but you are ABSOLVED, baby, and Pat "Dick" had his hand on Alberto's head like he was a-drivin' the devil o' doping outta him and about to dunk him in the purifying waters of one of those foul contaminated oil-slicked bayou swamps because the skies above don't believe in environmental controls, and then I woke up this morning and whammo, Alberto was well and truly nailed and there Lance was on ESPN blitzed on whatever lite beer he's pushin' wearing a blurred-out "!@#$ You, Landis!" t-shirt and babbling on about how at least he wasn't that stupid back in the day and with the statute of limitations on doping about to run out Travis Tygart can just bite 'im and he's returning to the peloton and good luck nailin' him then either anyway.

So in this same spirit of thoughtful, reasoned analysis, let's proceed with our scientific review of the CAS decision. To summarize our hypothesis, I believe the technical term is "bull!@#$." You say flat out you think *both* UCI's paranoid plasticizer conspiracy and Alberto's "smoking cow" defense are equally unlikely, and the problem is he wholly unintentionally ingested a contaminated food supplement, and you're *still* banning him for two years? Y'know, I'll admit, I usually don't like "zero tolerance" policies, one because I don't personally want to get busted for anything and two because they tend to be used to treat a Cub Scout showing off the new jack-knife he got for Christmas like he's a triple-murderer perpetual-solitary feces-throwing sociopath trying to shank his prison guard with a filed-down toothbrush. But I can accept them as at least making some sense, until you say you *might* have made an exception to it if he'd *happened* to have made up the same ridiculous excuse for his positive that *you* just did. How the !@#$ does *that* make sense?

Yes, Contador's an arrogant, and probably intentionally performance-tweaking, twerp. One thing's likely, you didn't emerge at the very top of Manolo Saiz and Johan Bruyneel's snarling two-wheeled wolfpacks without *some* savant sommelier's knowledge of the finer points of the good stuff--if you wanted it. But the fact is that Andy Schleck could personally mainline him, Vinokourov, *and* Armstrong like some sort of repulsive bat-hybrid vampire, and he *still* wouldn't be the rider that an undoped Contador is. Righty-o, delusional rabid all-caps "CONTABITCH" haters, we'll see if that's still true in August, when Twerp comes back from his ban and obliterates the entire field in the Vuelta. One does wonder, though, if much-derided riders like Cadel and Leipheimer would've ever *quite* earned their prior reps as boring wheelsuckers *and* gotten even more wins, if Contador hadn't been somehow assisted in his startling powers of superacceleration. Unless this kid's truly an idiot, the end of the season'll tell us. My money, however, is on "aberrant if charmingly doe-eyed mutant genetic freak."

Still and all, even with the two-year ban, this really isn't as bad as it looks. Contador's actually being banned from riding for a grand total of six squat months, still allowing him to race, as noted, his own Grand Tour--even if Bjarne's team does go down in flames by then in a haze of sponsor abandonment UCI downgrades and tragic Riisian 24/7 meth-chasing, it's not like a Spanish squad won't pick him up by then. So it ain't like he's gonna have two straight years of no competition to lose his form, his rhythm, and the feel of riding in (and away from) a position-jockeying peloton. All he's losing are the victories. And sure, it'll look like crap in the history books, but really, what's a freakin' asterisk in Wikipedia and the skeptic's intellectual sense of dismay compared to the indelible, visceral raw footage of Contador whacking the crap outta everyone else in the mountains? So Scarponi (and don't even get me started on *that*), enjoy the hand-me-down maglia rosa, Andy, best regards for being a class act in your statements today, Cobo, sorry you won't get to make your memorable 2011 Vuelta a two-fer, and Armstrong, put down the champagne and the karaoke mike because one more !@#damn chorus of "We Are the Champions" and I swear I'm gonna yack!

My Fantasy CAS Press Conference

Good morning. We're here today, in response to significant criticism and in contravention to our usual policies, to discuss the repeated delays in the verdict in the Alberto Contador matter. First, let us state that nothing is more important that a careful, thorough, and impeccably fair resolution of this case/covering our !@#es since we're gonna piss someone important off no matter what we decide. Therefore, we are extremely grateful to both sides in this matter for their meticulous compilation of evidence/piling us with so much obfuscating bullhockey we can justify damn near anything.

There are other controversies which bear addressing, as well. As to RadioSkank's allegations that Bjarne Riis attempted to bribe the panel by deliberately holding training camp in Israel, home to one of our judges, such claims are not only outrageous and baseless, but slanderous/it's not like he pulled a Lance Armstrong and donated a !@#$load of incredibly expensive dope-testing equipment to our own lab for Chrissakes. And while we sympathize with the public frustration over the lack of a reliable test for the presence of plasticizers, we hope you'll understand that it would be patently unjust to allow or consider suspect evidence/it was totally an accident when we had all the scientists involved in the project grabbed outta their offices by black-booted thugs bundled into unmarked vans driven forty-six hours to an obscure foreign port and stuffed into shipping containers bound for Tibet. Last but not least, with regard to the sport's zero-tolerance policy on clenbuterol, that is a policy decision best left to the medical experts to whom we must respectfully defer/whaddaya want, a !@#damn ticker-tape parade every time you clowns successfully snort some masking agent?

We understand the broader implications of this decision, as well. Of course, we realize it may bother some people that Mr. Contador is free to compete and win in the Tour de San Luis while this matter remains unresolved/this whole sport looks like !@#$ when some clen-sucking slimeball is allowed to make the undoped riders look like concrete-legged weaklings and the whole cycling world a disgusting sham because we're too wussy to cough up a verdict. It's especially important that cyclists provide wholesome role models for young children/exact parameters for what other cheats can expect to get away with. Still, it behooves us all to remember that no sacrifice is too great for the cause of justice/Andy Schleck still wouldn't have won that 2010 yellow jersey he's jonesin' for anyway. In conclusion, we hope this scandal will be a flashpoint for open, honest discussion about the nature of and necessity for truly clean competition/be completely forgotten by everyone as soon as we release that Sinkewitz decision we know you've all been so desperately waiting for. Until then, we greatly appreciate your patience, understanding, and passionate commitment to the truth/not openly laughing your nuts off at us. Thank you all, and you can take any future questions and !@#$ them !@#$% *&^% !@#$%!

My Fantasy Alberto Contador Press Conference

Good morning. I've asked you all here today to discuss the Court of Arbitration for Sport's wise and just/outrageous and baseless decision that I will not/will serve a one-year ban for clenbuterol that I clearly ingested because some dirty Spanish rancher tainted my steak/my handlers were too stupid to test my pre-stored blood for this !@#$ before I shoved it back into my veins for the Tour.

First, I'd like to thank my fans for their unwavering belief in my innocence/total denial of how I became the Grand Tour-winning machine I am today. Next, I must sincerely express my gratitude to Bjarne Riis for his faithful support in the face of completely unfounded criticism/desperate if ill-fated attempt to bribe the Israeli judge on my behalf. I also want to reassure my sponsors that I will reward their trust with a trifecta victory in the Giro, the Tour, and the Vuelta this year/make sure as hell no-one can ever link them back to this scandal. To Cadel, Andy, and my other rivals, I promise to continue to compete with the highest standards of sportsmanship and honesty/coast along with you from now on while you struggle so I don't look like such an obviously cheating dirtball. Most of all, I would like to thank my brother Fran for pulling this miracle bunny outta the hat against all fairness, reasonableness, and odds/put a one million euro bounty on Fran's head for his catastrophic mismanagement and destruction of my life, career and legacy.

I understand that I unwittingly placed the sport of cycling in a difficult position by making the judges look like a pack of nutless pandering pansies, *again*/being the only Spaniard in the history of cycling ever to get busted for what we all usually do so skillfully. Therefore, in the spirit of reconciliation, I wish to swear once again on a stack o' Bibles how very, very committed I am to the eradication of all doping in the sport/the eradication of all doping in the sport by everyone but me.

It's been a very long year-and-a-half pursuing the path to clear my name/listening to that punk Schleck bitch and moan about how he would've kicked my !@# the whole time which we all know he couldn't do anyway. This has been an incredible victory for truth and justice over rumor and innuendo/a bone-crushing PR machine and batted eyelashes over truth and justice. It's now time to get back to work on my bicycle/spend the next twelve months in an undisclosed location adjusting my blood-value baseline for optimum performance when I return. In conclusion, I'd just like to say, "Bang, bang, mother!@#$ers!"

The Single Best Anti-Doping Interview Ever

Fine, he's being reviled by his own cycling fed, and, best of all, by Team "On the Fast Track to Sainthood" Liquigas, which hired "attempted doper" Ivan Basso about two years before his (apparently aspirational) 4-year ProTour ban was up. But not only is Italian narc emeritus Ettore Torri's interview about doping the funniest damn thing I've ever read on the subject--up to and including mocking that cowardly little weasel Riccardo Ricco' for likely planning to pass off his recent 50-pill doping stash as his grandma's, an excuse which has of course been used before--but *no-one* can honestly say that what he said isn't probably 100% true. These guys are almost all cheats? Horrors! Any couch spud can climb 6 mountains a day at 40 gazillion k an hour for three weeks straight on nothing but Wheaties and Clif Shots! The teams have been involved in systemic doping? Shocker! That ER's-worth of medical waste in the hotel garbage every night was just from, uh, the "IV Heroin-Head Club o' Europe" conventioneers down the hall! Riders keep trying to outwit the system? Hell no--that's got nuthin' to do with the peloton's 800 consecutive CERA pozes the day a reliable test for it came out! Trainers help riders dope? My butt, all those guys busted with buckets o' drugs in their apartments were really just stockpiling 50 pounds of St. Joseph's baby aspirin for the Apocalypse! If everyone's gonna cheat anyway, we oughta just make this !@#% legal if it won't hurt their health? Like *you* never thought it, and God forbid we should be able to trust that a rider either (1) isn't cheating or (2) isn't gonna drop dead from the unregulated untested crap they're taking just for the hope of a posthumous add-on to their palmares!

Unbelievable, you hypocrites. Sure, apologize to the clean one(s) for the general accusation, but kill the freakin' messenger why dontcha?

Top Doping Excuses of the Rich (or Stupid) and Famous

Look, forget the thoughtful, highly-scientific analysis of the issue at hand like "Bjarne Riis must've run crying like a baby to his momma last night" and "What kind of assclown stuffs an innocent bovine full of asthma meds" and "Calculate the velocity of the cork shooting out of Lance Armstrong's champagne bottle right now." Instead, for the benefit of needy dope-snorting riders and befoozled over-inundated cycling fans alike, what this sport could really use is a concise guide, in no particular order, to What to Expect (Or Say) the Morning After:

1. I drank so much water it flushed all the testosterone out of my system!
The Perp: Danilo "Strawberry Shortcake" DiLuca
The Lowdown: so *that's* why I mistook you for a podium babe after the stage!

2. I was having sex at the *exact moment* the narcs came by so my testosterone level was studly-high.
The Perp: Bjorn "Love Machine" Leukemanns
The Lowdown: Like Burt Reynolds, without the chest (or any, anywhere) hair, gold medallions, or cheap-porno handlebar moustache. Let's get it on!

3. !@#damn Spanish steak!
The Perp: Alberto Contador
The Lowdown: since many extremely expensive scientists seem to believe it's plausible, I say we give little Pistolero the benefit of the doubt. One word of advice for the future, twerp: "organic." What, they don't have a !@#$in' Whole Foods in Madrid?

4. Did not either. Give me your money!
The Perp: Floyd Landis
The Lowdown: yep, we all know how *that* one turned out.

5. My butt looks big in this chamois, so I took a cheap internet weight-loss supplement.
The Perp: Marta Bastianelli
The Lowdown: why be a hard-working athlete and an idol for thousands of schoolchildren when you could win Europe's Next Top Model?

6. I inhaled my fetal twin.
The Perp: Tyler Hamilton
The Lowdown: Can there *be* grosser mental imagery? Just...I'm glad you retired. We understand. We're all human, you know?

7. "Piti" is not even my dog.
The Perp: Alejandro Valverde
The Lowdown: but it *is* your bloodbag. Next time use Basso's dog's name, you idiot!

8. I'm diabetic and need insulin. Y'know, that 24-hour diabetes that's been going around!
The Perp: Bernard Kohl
The Lowdown: man, that's just !@#$in' *scummy.*

9. With all these cool tats, who's even gonna notice I doped?
The Perp: Kayle Leogrande
The Lowdown: well, now you're just another unemployed ex-cyclist sad-sack. Good luck gettin' a job at Wal-Mart with *that* !@#$ on your neck!

10. So what if I *did* do it? So did the rest of you !@#$in' hypocrites!
The Perp: Alexander Vinokourov
The Lowdown: Honey, if all your friends told you they were gonna jump off the Brooklyn Bridge, would you do it too? Yes, if it'd get me my damn Tour de France!

11. I just *tried* to dope. Look, I'm kissing babies!
The Perp: Ivan "St. Ivan of Varese" Basso
The Lowdown: with a face like mine and the truly cutest family on earth, who cares *what* I do?

12. Wah. Wah Wah Wah Wah Wah!
The Perp: St. David Millar.
The Lowdown: I forgive you, I forgive you! Now will you shut the hell up already so I don't have to put out my own eyes and jam chopsticks in my eardrums?

13. I'm a hero! How dare you question me!?
The Perp: ummmm.....
The Lowdown: Yes, you are. And nothing will or ever ought to change that. But that don't mean you weren't ever on the juice, pal!

14. Gaaaaaaassssspppp! Wheeeeeeeeezzzzzzeeeee! Gaaaaaaccccckkkk!
The Perp: Alessandro Petacchi.
The Lowdown: exercise-related asthma is a serious thing. Funny how three-quarters of the best athletes on earth seem to get it 100 yards from the finish line!

And finally: 15. Man, that !@#$ was *great*!
The Perp: Jacques Anquetil.
The Lowdown: Hey, no acting like it was fun back in the Wild West days, you hear me? NO FUN, EVER!

Well, that's all I got for now. But another poz, another hoser, another excuse--just wait 'til next week!

Oh No You Didn't, Alberto Contador!

Say it ain't so, you arrogant twerp--yes, multiple Grand Tour champ/2010 Tour de France winner Alberto Contador has tested positive for clenbuterol at this year's Tour de France. His excuse? Food contamination. Aaaaaaayyyyyuuuuuppppp! Clenbuterol, you might recall, is an oxygen-carrying enhancer somewhat along the lines of Alessandro "Wheezy" Petacchi's salbutamol, is frequently abused by scum-sucking weasel-athletes, and is not, so far as I can tell, a typical additive to either such guilty pleasures as Twinkies nor such handy rider standbys as pasta. But you keep trying there, Alberto!

Press conference is tomorrow. Y'know, I *thought* that new domestique he was hangin' with this past July looked funny...