Time to now get the other cheaters in cycling

So finally a cheat is stripped of his medal at the Tour de France. Despite his protests and claims of innocence, this year’s winner Floyd Landis is punished after testing positive for tested positive for the hormone testosterone.

He becomes the first winner of this prestigious race to be stripped of his title. This action by the organizers finally shows some resolve in their part to rid the drugs problems from cycling.

Before the race this year, Jan Ullrich of Germany and Italian Ivan Basso and several riders were forced to pull out because of links to a Spanish doping investigation.

Previous seven-time winner Lance Armstrong remains untouched despite strong links with drugs. French media had shown proof that he had failed a drugs test or two. But still the man remains a cycling legend although his reputation is deeply soiled.

Other racers too have been long suspected of taking drugs to enhance their performance and despite the odd positive results here and there, the cycling governing body has been unable to totally clean the sports from drugs.

Just last week the World Anti-Doping Agency leader Dick Pound criticized the cycling body saying that there were defects in the way the body did its tests.

He added:

"The first thing is for them to acknowledge that there is a problem that they have not be able to control. There is no sport that is immune but cycling certainly has a high proportion of doping."

Now that Landis, a champion at that, has been punished and stripped of his title, lets hope the cycling body will be courageous to continue the good work by unmasking more culprits, even if they are legends.