Ricardo Blood Brother Ricco

So, after claiming he could win the Giro clean, he has now admitted to doctors in Italy that a dodgy self administered blood transfusion caused him to become critically ill at the weekend. FFS. We're not sure how much more we can take of Ricco here at the wagon. Well, we are sure, and if we were presidents of the UCI we'd have his achillies tendons shaved off, fried up and fed to Contador (since he himself is off the steak)

This is another fine mess Ricco has bought onto procycling. When will those who know in the peloton start pointing fingers and passing names on to people who care, like the police. It seems the UCI pretend to give a damn, but for a governing body of an incredibly popular sport then they just are not doing enough. Maybe the ASO, who also have rather a lot of clout in the pro cycling world can take a stand by booting out Vacansoleil from the tour and letting Geox, the sad faced Spanaird Sastre and Menchov have a go instead? Either way, for the time being this 'scandal' (though when looking at Riccos past form it isnt really all that surprising)  will only help tarninsh our blackened sport's reputation further. 

This is what we here at the wagon would like to see:

• Ricco arrested and jailed, and forced into sharing a cell with a sex starved gay pornstar with a penchant for dropping soap. In jail he somehow gets such severe injuries he can never sit on a bike seat again.
• Ricco banned from anything to do with cycling for life. No more racing, no commentating, nothing.

• Ricco gives authorities the full list of people helping him to carry out his transfusion program. Clearly not acting alone in this, so lets get all thoe involved booted out of sport and into jail NOW.
• Ricco is never ever ever given any more time in news stories regarding cycling. And dies.

The late great Aldo Sassi must be turning in his grave.

Swift-ly does it, leaving Cav in stitches. Lance, again. Tour de San Luis.

Sky's young buck Ben Swift managed to avoid the final 3km carnage and out sprinted Radioshack's vet paceman/jester Mcewen to the line. Cavendish and Goss both went down, with Cav looking like he'd had a night on the tiles back in Douglas. Unfortunately for Greipel it seems both Goss and Cav will be fit enough to ride the remainder of the tour.

Good to see a strong finish from 'Wagon fave Romain Felliu. If there is any justice in the peloton his Vaconsoleil team leader Ricco-ck will crash arse first onto a bollard or fence post sustaining awfully debilitating but none life threatening injuries allowing Felliu or Hoogerlands to take the captains armband. Pleeeeease.

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It seems the inverted iceberg shaped pedastal of honesty and integrity Lance has been teetering on for a few years now might soon give way. Yet more allegations about to published in Sports Illustrated (we didn't realise they did more than swimsuit editions either) Here is a preview of a larger article to be published on Jan 24th, with more allegations of Armstrong using a Ferrari (not the cars) to go faster. Since Lance will have re-retired his ego and his legs, he should have plenty of time to come up with reasons or excuses to refute the claims made by all these other people. We here at the Broom Wagon just don't know what to make of the Armstrong saga. Is it really possible that the greatest TDF rider of all time was doped? Or was it possible he was clean? Both arguments are entirely plausible. Doping involves too many traceable elements, and we don't mean in pee, blood or hair. The doctors, the emails, phone calls, text messages, meetings, payments. Its surely all too easy to be sold out by anyone of the people involved, which leads us (and desperately wants) to believe Lance rode, and won clean. Though we should also say that if Lance is proven guilty of having doped, it will be the last straw before his fall from grace. We don't know Lance, and the closest we have been to him is about 3ft from him at the 2009 TDF Annecy time trial, but we suspect, like he proclaims, he won't be 'losing any sleep'. And neither will we.

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Why is it that whilst I look out of my window onto another severe frost, there are people getting paid to ride bikes in really lovely places. By lovely I mean warm. Like in the Tour Down Under, and also just across the South Pacific ocean the Tour de San Luis is underway. Whilst not a Pro Tour even we find its worth tracking as some pro tour teams are taking part: Liquigas, Ag2r and Movistar. Stage 1 was taken by Roberto Ferrari, no relation to the above mentioned Dr. we hope. Stage two featured a mountain top finish, that sounds rather exciting. What a shame its not on any media over here in the Shire.

Pretty Vacant-soleil

Vacansoleil seem to have put out a firm statement of intent with the recruitment of convicted dopers Ricardo Ricco and Ezequiel Mosquera. Indeed, by promoting Ricco, or 'the Cobra' to give him his self appointed nickname, to team leader Vacansoleil have well and truly nailed their colours to the mast. Quite what impression this gives to the younger or harder-working members of Daan Luijk's squad is open to interpretation. Do the younger rider, such as Wout Poels, Pim Lithgart, or Martijn Keizer now pick up the message that it's ok to cheat? And what about the slightly older, hard working riders who've stayed clean throughout their careers? Riders such as Johnny Hoogerland, Stijn Devolder, and Matteo Carrara may now feel that they have somehow 'missed a trick' by not fuelling themselves up with a Floyd Landis special. It's one thing to offer a second chance to someone who has strayed, such as in the case of David Millar, who has repented his once questionable ethics and now works actively to try and clean the sport of cycling up. On the other hand though, to bestow the team leadership on such and unrepentant (not to mention arrogant and odious) wretch as Ricco? We find that hard to stomach.

Speaking of Johnny Hoogerland, he is a rider whom we hope to see much more of over the coming season. He falls into something of a niche category, along with riders such as Philippe Gilbert, Dan Martin, and Vincenzo Niballi, as rider who are hungry and attack-minded - ultimately a joy to watch! Las years Tour was, at times, almost nauseating due to the Contador-Schleck love story. In fact, there were times when the tactical bike-chess and blatant homo-eroticism looked as though it'd end up in a John and Yoko-esque bed-in.
Schleck is a rider who is infuriating for his obvious natural abililty, but complete lack of ruthlessness. After the infamous (and now tedious) chaingate affair Schleck promised us that he was angry and that he'd have his revenge, and we, like so many other deluded fools out there, expected him to come out fighting. In fact, he did quite the opposite and, despite a surprisingly good effort in his final time-trial, he seemed to gift the tour to Contador by not attacking. Ever. Andy Schleck may have won over a lot of new fans with the somewhat dignified way in which he took the moral high-ground over the chaingate affair (see Avram Grant at Chelsea/West Ham for a footballing equivalent), but we're sure he also lost a few fans too, with his passive response on the bike.

With the Tour Down Under kicking off a brand new season in the cycling world we find ourselves bouyant and excitedly optomistic (like a 16 year old whose girlfriend is coming over to stay whilst his parents are on holiday) as to what the coming year will bring. We pray (to the God of Thunder) that the sport that we love so much isn't let down by dour, negative racing and damning doping scandals.

For now, though, it's time to roll....