OK, let’s get this straight as reported in Velonews. T-Mobile fields a top tier cycling team for about $12 million (a mentioned figure of the cost for a top tier team, I don’t know the real numbers). They also dump $1 million Euros into sponsoring the Tour de France within Germany.
Now, because of the smell of drug offal, a lot of it from historical T-Mobile itself (Ullrich, Zabel, Riis … bla bla bla … bla bla bla ) has so filled the air, they want OUT of their public display of their involvement and advertising of the Tour in Germany.
lede:
German telecommunications company T-Mobile announced on Saturday that it wants to withdraw its sponsorship of the Tour de France’s television coverage in Germany in a damage-limitation exercise.
Cyling’s image in Germany has been rocked by several high-profile doping admissions from cyclists competing for the former Team Telekom, now known as Team T-Mobile, and the company is keen to prevent any further damage to its image.
Oh yeah! The state of pro racing is thriving! Like Anna Nicole’s baby before she over dosed fatally.
The images that circulate in my brain in times like this are of Tyler Hamilton. His stoicism as the sports quiet hardman. Working, working, working, and then having success between the times of misfortune and disappointment. Except the reality was:
The second page of the file allegedly showed that he won Liège-Bastogne-Liège six days after a double transfusion of blood, won the Tour de Romandie shortly afterwards, and prepared for the Tour by not racing in May and taking anabolics and EPO. He then raced only the Dauphiné Libéré in June – completely anonymously, and didn’t even start the final stage. At the time, he claimed to be suffering from stomach problems all week, but El Pais alleged that according to Dr Fuentes files, it was during another period of blood extraction. In the final lead up to the Tour, he was to take more growth hormone and re-infuse the blood, as well as doing so on the first rest day of the race. Source.
The internal lie has spilled out and the days of stoicism and image cloaked heroism are not with us now. Instead the sports arguably biggest sponsor is trying to cover their association with the sport. Like putting makeup on needle tracks. The sport has been murdered by its own spawn, who now lament its passing.
Everything follows the money. As the sponsors leave, so everything will leave. The sport has a choice that must be made in some sort of group consciousness way. Either follow the Law of Omerta and continue doping, or go to 1) amnesty and reconciliation & 2) persistent blood profiling. If you can’t carry the extra oxygen in the blood, the playing field gets awfully close to level.