Fallout from the Beltran EPO bust on the Tour de France

Manuel Beltran's dope bust may lead to interesting story lines.  Here are a few:

1.  The Franch newspapers underplayed the development.  From the BBC:

Certainly Saturday's L'Equipe had dispatched his story, which they broke before the Tour organisers even knew about it, to an inside page, choosing instead to plaster the front of their paper with a giant photo of Luis Leon Sanchez crossing the line in Aurillac on Friday.

L'Equipe is normally a good barometer of French feeling and they're underplaying the news while still reporting the facts.

2.  Is Beltran the top of the iceberg, and how big is the iceberg?  (BBC too):

The discovery of the Spaniard's misdemeanors may not be the end of things, of course, but unless - and until - that becomes fact we have to assume that Manuel Beltran, like Lee Harvey Oswald, acted alone.

If he did, then, to quote one commentator on French Radio last night, "he's crazy".

He's crazy for any number of reasons. The doping controls are so stringent, especially for EPO, that he could never have hoped to escape undetected.

At 37 he's risked the reputation of a half decent career, and he'll certainly never ride professionally again.

But like with Oswald, there are more conspiracy theories than you can shake a stick at.

Beltran's Liquigas team has already aroused suspicion, first with Danelo Di Luca, and then the signing of Ivan Basso, and despite all their denials that they knew nothing about his actions, there are those who won't be convinced.

3. Liquigas maintains innocence.  (from the LA Times)

AP reported that Beltran was released at 12:30 a.m after being questioned by police for two hours. A police official who wanted to remain anonymous because he wasn't authorized to discuss the case said that Beltran maintained his innocence.

Liquigas team manager Roberto Amadio told AP that “we have a very hard line of doping in the team. It is unthinkable. (Beltran) said it is impossible and he doesn’t know what happened. We have the right to a second test and we have 10 days before (finding out the result).”

4.  David Millar vents on the media, but says this is not the last of the doping (Cycling Weekly)

But Millar implicitly criticised the media storm that has blown up since news of Beltran's positive was announced.

“It makes me pissed off when people are surprised that this happens. We've spent a decade getting to this point, and if everybody is naïve and foolish enough to think that we are never going to have a positive control again, then you may as well go home and not cover this race.”

“The media have a responsibility to understand that this is no way the last doping positive we are going to have. It's going to go on for years.”

“What we have to do is handle it, carry on and do the right thing,” he continued.

Yahoo Sports says this could be a drawn-out scandal.

Manuel Beltran has insisted he must be considered innocent unless the results of his failed dope test at this year's Tour de France are confirmed.

Beltran, a 37-year-old Spanish climber, was removed from the race by his Liquigas team on Friday after a urine sample taken from the first stage of the race, from Brest to Plumelec, was found to include traces of the banned substance Erythropoetin (EPO).

If a 'B' sample proves his guilt, Beltran will be the first rider to fail a drugs test during the this year's Tour, 12 months after one of the most tainted races in history.