Interesting to note that Lance's lawyers pretty much appear to have given up on contesting the doping "allegations." There is far too much evidence to try to deny that. Instead, they're going after technicalities, leading with the statute of limitations. I think USADA pretty well has that one down pat; Tygart is quite a thorough guy. And besides, let's accept for a moment the proposition that the statute of limitations holds, and that any evidence prior to 2007 or 2008 is inadmissable. It's still pretty clear in the public's mind that LA doped to win his Tours, and I sincerely doubt that he'd get back his sponsors. But I'm thinking it just might get him off the VERY serious perjury charges he'll be up against should he decide to come clean.

I think the far more interesting case is the corruption within the UCI. We need some forensic accountants looking into the small matter of this $500,000 transfer between Nike and Hein Verbruggen, and the separate $25K and $100K payments made by LA to the UCI, which McQuaid is trying desperately to downplay. (Does he take us for fools?)

Luis