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| Winner: Discovery Channel rider Alberto Contador of Spain led the final stage through Paris on Sunday. Philippe Wojazer/Reuters |
Tainted Tour de France finishes under cloud
Rampant doping cast a pall over the Tour de France's 104th year.
from the July 30, 2007 edition
Page 2 of 4
No country was rocked harder than Germany, which has had a love affair with cycling ever since 23-year-old Jan Ullrich won the Tour de France in 1997 while riding for the German Telekom team, now called T-Mobile.
After Spanish authorities found nine bags of his blood in the 2006 "Operation Puerto" doping bust, T-Mobile fired Ullrich. Several of his former T-Mobile teammates came forward this spring to admit using EPO in the 1990s, while Ullrich maintains his innocence.
The confessions were portrayed as a sign that cycling was on the mend. But some longtime observers didn't buy it.
"In my opinion it was mostly a confession for show. They told us some small parts of the doping reality," says Ralf Meutgens, a former German national coach and author of the book "Doping im Radsport" (Doping in Cycling), published this April. "The whole truth would be truly shocking for the public."
The scandals are hitting the sport where it hurts most – the wallet.
When the first doping scandal surfaced at this year's Tour de France, Germany's two public television networks, ARD and ZDF, pulled the plug on live coverage of the event. ZDF, which had been broadcasting the Tour since 1998, says the decision cost it as much as 400,000 euros ($545,880) in lost advertising.
Two-thirds of the station's viewers supported the move, ZDF editor in chief Nikolaus Brender says. "Our viewers have made it very clear: They are interested in the Tour de France, but in a Tour de France as a sports event. They are not interested in an event that is a pharmaceutical show."
More than most sports, cycling is dependent on sponsors. The sport doesn't generate revenue from ticket sales. Instead, almost a million people turn out to watch the Tour from curbside seats as it rolls through France, while millions more tune in on television.
But overall, cycling's viewership has taken a hit in the past year. IFM, a German market-research firm, calculated that the publicity value of sponsorships dropped 52 percent after the tainted 2006 Tour.
The seemingly nonstop scandals since have even longtime cycling sponsors like T-Mobile, Deutsche Bank, Credit Agricole, and Czech carmaker Skoda reconsidering their support for the sport.
"Now it's a very bad time for cycling and for sport in general," says T-Mobile spokesman Christian Frommert. "We are a big company in Germany, and we have to raise our voice about some of these things."
Mr. Frommert says the company is struggling to decide whether to end its cycling sponsorship after 16 years.
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