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@tinoflyer
Wiganwill, some good points there and I completely agree with you that not talking about drugs led to the position in the 90s and so on. But I am not saying that we should not talk about them - they should never be forgotten - I am just suggesting that perhaps we should not be so quick to believe that everyone is on drugs.
I am sure it is not clean, and history has taught us that doping controls (largely because the UCI were so reticent) were always behind the testing. But for the most part I would like to believe that riders were clean when winning events.
Drugs didn't ruin my enjoyment of cycling in the 90s, Pantani's climbing in 98 was something to behold - hindsight tells me why - Armstrong brought many new fans into the sport, but hindsight tells they have been brought on the back of a fraud. I enjoyed cycling at the time, I was fucking livid when I found out why. I am not going to maintain naivety but I am not going to tar everyone with the same brush. I want to believe in the blood DNA passport thing and to hope that Cycling and the testers are in control. I am still massively concerned that known dopers are still in the sport - how Riis can be a director is beyond me, a lot of the dodgy soigneurs are still active too. We still need much tougher punishments.
However, I want to believe whoever wins this vuelta is clean, as I want to believe that Evans and the Schlecks fought out an exciting tour (it was a good one). I want to think Evans had better tactics, and I want to believe that the Schlecks just messed up and are just weak. I don't want to think Evans' soigneur is better than the Schlecks.