Habemus Boonen, unfortunately

By Sal Ruibal
USA TODAY
May 10, 2009


Pro cycling can't seem to get out of its own way.
The beautiful Giro d'Italia started Saturday in Venice and an American-owned team with an international roster, Columbia-Highroad, won the opening team time trial. Astana, a Kazakhstan-owned team (for now) with a lot of big-name Americans on its roster, was third.
But away from the canals and gondolas, cycling was sinking faster than Venice: Classics king Tom Boonen had been suspended by his Quick-Step team after testing positive for cocaine.
Belgian Boonen is cycling's reigning rock star: handsome, fast and careless with the gifts and opportunities he's been given.
In 2005, after he'd left Lance Armstrong's U.S. Postal Service team, Boonen won the world championships, Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders.
He was so well-regarded in Belgium that fans lined race courses with signs that read "Habemus Boonen," a spin on "Habemus Papam", the Latin phrase used to signal the Roman Catholic faithful that a new Pope has been selected.
Quick-Step had great plans for Boonen that went beyond the one-day classics. His speed and power made him a threat in both sprint stages and breakaways, a perfect combination for winning the Tour de France green jersey that goes to the overall points leader.
But on May 26, 2008, he tested positive for cocaine. That drug is considered a recreational drug by sports doping agencies, so he didn't have a positive for a performance enhancing drug.
He denied using it and Belgian courts gave him a pass, but the Tour de France would not allow him to race.
Not quite a year later, the pampered prince has tested positive for cocaine again and he's denying it again and he'll be locked out of the Tour de France again. Thanks goodness he's not in the Giro.
Boonen has had great sponsors that have given him everything he could want or need as a cyclist. Quick-Step built a team of tough rouleurs to boost him through the cobblestone races and set him up for sprints. American bike-maker Specialized has spent a fortune making some of the world's most high-tech bicycles, custom-fit to his body and riding style.
I love Flanders and the racing there is, in my eyes, the most beautiful in the world.
But It is time for the rabid Belgian cycling fans to rise up and demand an end to that nation's history of coddling its drug-using cycling stars. From Johan Museeuw to Frank Vandebrouke and now Tom Boonen, the Liars of Flanders have been exposed as pumped-up pussycats who have no repect for the integrity of the sport.
Habemus Jerks.