Tour de France winner admits doping

Today 2006 Tour de France winner Floyd Landis has finally admitted to doping. Not only has he admitted to a single incident of doping, but he has admitted to doping in numerous forms for lengthy periods beginning with his time with the US Postal team.

Landis was sensationally stripped of his 2006 Tour victory whilst riding for the Phonak team shortly after tests revealed that he had taken more amounts of testosterone than a Chinese female swimmer. It is the only time that a Tour winner has been stripped of the title.

This positive test was no surprise to many as he had crumbled dramatically in stage 16 of the 2006 Tour only to explode in stage 17 effectively riding a 125km time trial to win the stage and surge from 11th position in the general classification to 2nd place, only 30 seconds behind yellow jersey wearer Oscar Pereiro. Landis then rode on to gain the yellow jersey and hold it coming into Paris securing an unimaginable victory.

The media at the time hailed Landis as a modern day hero after a herculean effort. Secretly, however, there were rumblings in the cycling fraternity that his feats were not natural. His tests later revealed these rumblings were true.

The most ridiculous aspect to Landis' admission was that he spent approximately $2 million in legal fees arguing that he had not used performance enhancing drugs when all along he knew that he had. Who knows the reason behind his seemingly pointless and financially ridiculous argument, but it is clear that Landis went to the same school of honesty as sprinter Marion Jones. Whatever his reasoning, to the outsider he must be a dead certainty for a Darwin award.

The story, however, does not end there. Not satisfied with having wasted approximately $2 million in legal fees fighting to 'clear his name' Landis starting throwing mud in all directions and most obviously at former US Postal teammates Lance Armstrong and George Hincapie. These two have dismissed the claims saying Landis has no credibility and after having fought his legal fight dishonestly, you tend to agree with them. What's for sure is that after Landis' comments this years Tour will not necessarily be about the riding but more about who's clean and who's not.

Twenty 20 World Cup - England's fun in the sun

The West Indies was anything but "cool marn" for Australia last night in the T20 final. Australia's attempt to claim the one international trophy that has eluded them, started and ended with a whimper.

Paul Collingwood, the England T20 captain, won the toss and sent Australia in to bat. His decision paid immediate dividends as Australia was reeling at 3 for 8 after 13 balls, with Ryan Sidebottom the chief destroyer (2 for 26).

Shane Watson wafted at a wide ball early on and sent the edge flashing to the keeper, Craig Kieswetter, who parried the nick into the air, goalkeeper style, for Graeme Swann to dive and take a simple catch at first slip. Michael Clarke then arrived at the crease and proceeded to run out David Warner and almost run out Brad Haddin in the space of an over. Haddin was then unlucky to be given out attempting to glance a ball down the leg side. At first glance it looked like he had nicked it, but the replay showed that the ball had clearly hit his waist and he even showed the red mark to his teammates when he arrived back at the dug out. David Hussey (59) and Cameron White (30) added some respectability to the score, but Australia ended with what looked like a reachable target of 6 for 147.

The English started like Betty White from the starting blocks, losing one wicket (Lumb) in the second over, but then exploded with Kieswetter and Kevin Pietersen putting on a second wicket partnership of 117 runs including 14 boundaries. With that in the bank, the English only needed a little interest to roll slowly to the finish line and eventually won by an easy 7 wickets. It was fitting that Collingwood hit the winning runs to send English cricket into ecstasy as he has been the mainstay of the shorter forms of the game for some time and ended England's chase of a major trophy at the fifth attempt (3 ODI world cup losses and a loss in the Champions Trophy).

No doubt these cricketers will be welcomed home by the Queen and perhaps knighted ala the 2005 Ashes victors. Or perhaps Her Majesty is a traditionalist and does not enjoy the bastard child of cricket? Either way, England were comprehensively the better team and perhaps Nasser Hussein was correct in his pre-match interview with Clarke when he said that many believed Australia's final was the miraculous semi final win against Pakistan. All that together, it should make for an explosive ashes series coming up this Australian summer.

Monaco GP - Mark Webber's Principality in 2010.

Mark Webber started from pole for the second time in two races and despite having to restart the race more times than he would have liked due to crashes that took place in his rear-view mirror, he recorded fastest lap after fastest lap and stormed to victory.

With 3 laps to go in the race, Trulli and Chandok came together in a horrible crash just meters in front of Webber at the La Rascasse corner, and viewers and Red Bull supporters heart's were in their mouths. As a result of that crash, the safety car came out for the fourth time in the race and it was feared that Webber may not have the honour of racing over the line at full speed. However, the safety car came off the track with one corner before the finish line and Webber burnt the last of his tyres traction over the course of the following 300 meters. Despite the safety car incursions during the race, with 10 laps to go Webber was leading by nearly 6 seconds and was so far in front of second that the coverage had to go back to the field to find more viewer friendly competitive driving.

It was imperious driving from the Australian and when he crossed the finish line he became the first Australian to win the Monaco grand prix since 1959 (Sir Jack Brabham) and now finds himself equal leader in the F1 along with his teammate Sebastian Vettel. Webber has now picked up 50 points in 8 days and with Red Bull apparently making further changes to their car for the next race in Turkey it probably wont be the last points he picks up this season.

The Monaco grand prix is normally as unforgiving as Scarface and today's race was no different. For the uninitiated, the streets are not widened and the advantage is always with the driver at the front. There is very little room for error let alone overtaking and if you are trailing there are few opportunities to make up time and places. One of the ways to make up time is to rely on someone else crashing, which as is sure as seeing former Prime Minister John Howard at a sporting event in the Australian summer.

The sheer speed that the drivers reached on the street circuit was awe inspiring and terrifying at the same time. When Hulkenberg slammed into the wall in the tunnel on the first lap it was the first evidence of the risks of the course and sure enough Barrichello soon followed suit.  Another driver avoiding these crashes and other hurdles such as starting in the pits, due to crashing in qualifications, was Fernando Alonso who drove so aggressively that he made his way through the field like Jonah Lomu through an English rugby union team (circa 1995 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hN3KuenjmaY&NR=1) and eventually finished 7th.  Webber, however, was on another level as he tamed the circuit and after his Spanish victory last week he is clearly in a good vein of form and may be the dark horse in the championship.