Operah interview with Lance Armstrong...

I know it's not exactly running related ;o) but it does give an insight into what drug doping was like up to relatively recently in both cycling and other sports.

The nine part interview can be seen HERE.

Tour de France to buy Rock 'n' Roll Marathon Series..?

It was recently announced that the Competitor Group in the USA has put the hugely popular Rock 'n' Roll Half-Marathon and Marathon series up for sale. Competitor Group was formed in 2008 when Falconhead Capital, an equity fund firm, bought the Rock 'n' Roll series, other races and some media properties. In the last four years, Competitor Group has grown from 16 to 75 races, including some triathlons and non-US road races. In terms of races in the USA, this commercial operation is huge and they will be bringing a Rock 'n' Roll Half-Marathon to Dublin in August 2013.


A number of off-the-record running-industry sources are reporting the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon series will be sold to the owners of the world-famous Tour de France bicycle race. Several of the sources have referenced a column published a week ago at RunTex.com by Bob Wischnia, a former Runner’s World editor who now works for Mizuno.

The Tour de France is owned by the French company, Amaury Sports Organization, which also owns the Paris and Barcelona Marathons, as well as other bike races and L’equipe, the daily French-language sports newspaper. On its web site, the company says: “One of A.S.O.’s priority areas for growth is the organization of mass events open to the general public."

Alberto Contador stripped of his 2010 Tour de France title...

Perhaps not exactly a running story but it may well have an impact on the upcoming Olympic games. Back in Oct 2011 , I had a post up about the banned substance Clenbuterol and how athletes had traces of it in their bodies due to eating contaminated meat. The ruling made on Monday sends out a clear message to anyone using the banned substance that 'eating contaminated meat' won't work as an excuse for the upcoming games. The Contador story below...

MADRID (AP) - Alberto Contador was stripped of his 2010 Tour de France title Monday and banned for two years after sport's highest court found the Spanish cyclist guilty of doping. The Court of Arbitration for Sport suspended the three-time Tour champion after rejecting his claim that his positive test for clenbuterol was caused by eating contaminated meat on a 2010 Tour rest day. WADA President John Fahey described the court's judgment as "an appropriate decision ... which represents the effective nature of the World Anti-Doping Code."

The ruling came just three days after U.S. federal prosecutors dropped a doping investigation involving seven-time Tour winner Lance Armstrong. The American was a teammate of Contador during the Spaniard's 2009 Tour victory. The revised list of champions shows Armstrong and Contador combined to win nine of the 11 Tours from 1999-2009. Contador blamed steak bought from a Basque producer for his high reading of clenbuterol, which is sometimes used by farmers to fatten their livestock. To avoid a doping ban, he needed to prove how the anabolic drug entered his body and convince the panel he was not to blame.

In its ruling, CAS said the presence of clenbuterol was more likely caused by contaminated food supplement than by eating contaminated meat. "Unlike certain other countries, notably outside Europe, Spain is not known to have a contamination problem with clenbuterol in meat," CAS said in its ruling in Lausanne, Switzerland. "Furthermore, no other cases of athletes having tested positive to clenbuterol allegedly in connection with the consumption of Spanish meat are known."

Contador is one of only five cyclists to win the three Grand Tours - the Tour, the Giro and the Vuelta. He also won the Tour de France in 2007 and 2009. He becomes only the second Tour de France champion to be disqualified and stripped of victory for doping. The first was American Floyd Landis, who lost his 2006 title after testing positive for testosterone. Contador kept racing after his positive test on a 2010 Tour rest day. He will be stripped of all results from races in which he participated since Jan. 25, 2011 - the day the Spanish federation proposed a one-year ban. That period includes his Giro d'Italia victory last season.