Because the plague affects the whole of the sports

In the next few days, the International Cycling Union (UCI) should officially disclose the names of 50 runners in the report of the operation "Puerto", the matter of doping that erupted in Spain late may on professional teams. To date, only nine of them were revealed which those champions Ivan Basso of CSC, Jan Ullrich and Oscar Sevilla of T - Mobile, Francisco Mancebo of AG2R, which have been banned from Tour de France by their sports directors. "This will be for each team to decide whether his or her cited runners should be excluded from the competition," warns the UCI President Pat McQuaid. Without waiting for information, the subject took provisions under the pressure of sponsors.

T Mobile fired the offending riders, and has been granted a new four-year ProTour license, allowing the German team to participate in the most important events of the professional circuit out of the three large towers (France, Italy, Spain). "We will continue to contribute actively to the fight against doping, to restore credibility to the cycling", provides, in Exchange, Ulli Gritzuhn, Director of international marketing of the telephone operator. The owner of team Phonak, Andy Rihs, decided to dissolve the formation of the American Floyd Landis, threatened to withdraw his victory on the last Tour of France after his positive test for testosterone. "I am extremely disappointed that this sport is synonymous with doping," said the pattern of the Swiss brand of hearing devices confronted during the six years of existence of the team to several cases of this type.

His withdrawal is the second withdrawal of a sponsor this year. In June, the American insurer Liberty Seguros has ended his contract (8 million euros per year), after the manager of the Iberian team, Manolo Saiz, had been officially implicated by Spanish justice in the case of Puerto. "All these scandals have increased our awareness, it is the perversity of the system," said disappointed Andy Rihs genuine passion for the "little Queen", has seen his firm turnover multiplied by four since 2000.

Jacques Rogge, President of the international Olympic Committee (IOC), said that "doping is the sport that crime is society". "". "Those who control the trafficking of doping products are the same as those who organize trafficking in narcotic drugs", says Sandro Donati, Member of a "task force" set up by the Directorate national antimafia in Italy ("the world" from January 17). According to a study supported by the European Union in 2002, the black market in this area is estimated "at several billion euros in Europe." Because the plague affects the whole of the sports.

After cycling, Athletics which seems the most threatened, and the US anti-doping Agency (Usada) is well determined to cleaning up the sport across the Atlantic: she comes to stay eight years Justin Gatlin, Olympic champion and 100 m world, declared positive after a control. His compatriot Marion Jones, the American sprint Queen, was unmasked by controllers who accuse him of having used EPO (erythropoietin). The fall of these two stars, but also others (Tim Montgomery, Kelly White), is linked to the Balco case, this laboratory founded by Victor Conte, who has admitted, in July, have distributed doping to the fine flower of the sport American including the grand champion of the American football and baseball Barry Bonds Bill Romanowski.

France, the French middle-distance runners are picks the finger by the leaders of the national athletics, suspecting a chain connected to the Morocco where the runners are going to train. Latifa Essarokh, the recordwoman of the 1,500 metres, has been suspended and banned from participation in the Gothenburg Championships of Europe, competition where particularly shone Russian athletes, which raised questions. "It reminds me of Chinese women (Editor's Note: they had sprayed the middle-distance world records in 1993 before disappearing from the competition).". Bernard Amsalem, the President of the French Federation expressed concern "It issues arise on these performance".

Tennis is not spared, in particular in Argentina where he was splashed by several cases. In rugby, 396 checks have been carried out in 2005 among amateurs and professionals revealing 11 positives. Half it's use of cannabis, but for the first time appeared the cocaine and the Stanozelol (the "Olympic Midi" of August 7). Rest the case of football where the International Federation (Fifa) is the only one to not allow the World Anti-Doping Agency ($ 23.8 million in 2006) to carry out unannounced checks out of competitions. In the world, German each urine sampling, once the declared negative sample, was destroyed at the end of the competition. The World Anti-Doping Code yet advocates to keep during eight years in order to detect tomorrow substances or undetectable processes with techniques in force today. No blood control was made during the World Cup to detect possible transfusion. Several footballers, in Italy, recognized resort to improve their performance. Would football be above the law