Leopards don't change their spots

He told Italian newspaper La Stampa: "I don't know what may have happened. It is certainly a mistake. It is impossible that I tested positive." thtis is what rebellin has said, ok....so it is a mistake

Maybe they caught Schumacher on the doping he did for the Tour, and he didn't dose up for the Olympics - let's face it you would need to be spectacularly stupid to dope for an Olympic event.

As to your line of reasoning gandberg - history seems to suggest that the less exotic the name the less likely you are to be a doper - even the Americans who've been caught had fairly exotic handles: Floyd and Tyler.

My money is on Michael Barry. Because his name is the least exotic out of all 20. Drugs to make a name for himself. So Nicole Cooke isnt that exotic either, but because shes a girl then it doesnt matter.

So it looks like it was Schumacher that was the other CERA positive from the 2008 Olympic Road Race.

Makes you wonder why he bothered when this is the report that Reuters put up on the day of the race -

"The heat and humidity took its toll. Schumacher, also a favorite for Wednesday's time-trial, left on the fifth of the seven 24-km laps on the hilly circuit between two sections of the Great Wall of China."

"It's very, very hard with the heat and the humidity," Schumacher said after leaving the course.

"I have a very, very strong headache. I suppose it's the pollution. "Obviously I'm extremely disappointed."

"

The answer is staring us all in the face - the rider that finished 7th in the women's race… well, if life were as simple as 'it does what it says on the tin'

I'd have to choose Spain then Russia in list of likely suspects, but I can't beleive it was Sanchez, so I'm gonna go with Kolobnev. Russia were having all sorts of doping problems in the lead up to the Olympics, and he was a late replacement for Gusev after him getting booted out of Astana for failing internal dope tests, so I feel like tarring them all with the same brush.....Kolobnev

Botero has history...maybe him. Im hoping its not cancellara as he really impresses me. As for the womens side, I am sure it isnt Nicole Cooke.
The eastern europeans and old russian block athletes always seem to 'try' too hard for the olympics, look at blonska in the heptathlon...drugged up two times in seperate olympics so these countries could be possible.
My thoughts are still botero though.

I feel put in my place!

here's the top tens from the mens & ladies races, for a bit of inspiration:

2008 Men's Olympic Road Race Top 10
1 Samuel Sánchez (Spain) 06:23:49

2 Davide Rebellin (Italy)
3 Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland)
4 Alexandr Kolobnev (Russian Federation)
5 Andy Schleck (Luxembourg)

6 Michael Rogers (Australia)

7 Santiago Botero (Colombia)

8 Mario Aerts (Belgium) 

9 Michael Barry (Canada)
10 Robert Gesink (Netherlands)

2008 Women's Olympic Road Race Top 10
1 Nicole Cooke (Great Britain) 03:32:24

2 Emma Johansson (Sweden) 

3 Tatiana Guderzo (Italy) 

4 Christiane Soeder (Austria)

5 Linda Villumsen Serup (Denmark)
6 Marianne Vos (Netherlands)
7 Priska Doppmann (Switzerland) 

8 Paulina Brzezna (Poland) 

9 Edita Pucinskaite (Lithuania) 

10 Zulfiya Zabirova (Kazakhstan)

how's about a nice sweepstake? get your votes in, one a piece, by comment. first correct response for each naughty doper wins a bit of schwag (real schwag that is, like mugs and t shirts and stuff). go!

Is it too early to start a "who are the others?" angle on this story?

On a positive note its good that only 7 athletes out of 948 re-tests came back positive. Yes they only tested for a couple of drugs and there may well be others that there are no tests for but its a fairly small percentage who have been caught doing it. Idiots though.

Retrospective testing - the IOC keep all their samples and retrospectively test them as new tests become available.

To be fair to the UCI even if they wanted to, which I'm pretty sure they don't, probably only the IOC has the money and muscle to keep the samples for that long and to pay for the tests. The Tour retrospectively test, but that's off their own bat rather than the UCI's and they are dealing with a lot less samples.

How come the IOC/WADA can catch these people, and not the UCI?

Funnily enough when I posted the podium pic of Schleck on Monday the original caption said, " Let's also not forget David Rebellin who gets the best worried look by the man who came third award"

Then I thought 'nah, better not cos people will think we're saying he's a doper'

Not a very clever one if he was doping at the Olympics.