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The Tour is in a shambles. I hardly need say it, but just to recapitulate: for several Tours in a row now, several of the favorites have been disqualified even before the start, several teams have been disqualified during the race, and at least one ostensible winner was disqualified after the finish. Not only cycling, by many other sports as well have been tarnished by doping. The sports authorities have responded by instituting testing of athletes. This has not had the desired effect of eliminating doping from the sport. On the contrary, we must now assume that, for many teams, the question is not whether to dope, but how to dope more cleverly, how to dope without getting detected. More testing will not solve the problem. For every new test, there will be a new undetectable drug. It is a vicious cycle with no end. Fundamentally, the problem is not a technical one, it merely appears as a technical symptom. The real problem lies elsewhere, therefore the solution must also lie elsewhere.
I propose a radical solution: not more dope testing, but less testing, is the answer. Now, before you write me off as a complete crank, consider this: the human body has a physical limit. By which I mean the professionally trained, but undoped and unmanipulated, human body. And consider further that we have probably already reached it. The sad truth is, we missed it when it happened because somebody rigged the game. Not ever-more invasive testing, but simple acceptance of human limits, is the clue to the solution to the problem of doping in sports.
Benchmarks. What I propose is this. Before the Tour is run, let two teams run a Pre-Tour de France. Exactly the same stages in the same order. They shall be Team A and Team B and they shall compete against each other. They shall be professionally coached and trained and consist of a mix of internationally recognized riders and promising new-comers. They shall be transparent: by which I mean, it shall be known what they ingest and what they excrete, down to the last molecule. They shall be squeeky clean: no drugs of any kind whatsoever. Not even aspirin if they have headache. These two teams shall run the Pre-Tour a week or two before the real Tour, and they shall set a benchmark for each stage. Thus, we shall know what a professionally trained, but undoped and unmanipulated, human body is really capable of.
The Tour. Then the Tour is run. Any rider or team which turns in a stage-time equal to or worse than the benchmark shall be deemed legitimate. Any rider or team which turns in a single stage-time up to 5% better than the benchmark, shall be deemed legitimate. However, any rider or team which turns in a stage-time faster than 5% better than the benchmark, or rider or team which turns in any three stage-times faster than the benchmark (however tiny the percent), shall face a mandatory and exclusive choice: either
1) accept the benchmark time for the stage(s) in question, or
2) submit to dope tests, or
3) 'voluntary withdrawal' from the race.
The Advantage. The advantage is obvious: only two teams need ever be dope tested: the two benchmark teams. Every other team can dope all it wants, so long as it doesn't win. This will produce a level playing field, whether drugs are in play or not. By setting a realistic limit, doping ceases to offer any advantage.
The members of the two benchmark teams should not be prohibited from competing in the real Tour, but it might be better if they were prohibited from competing on the same team together or for the same sponsor.
Titans. Every so often, and maybe only once in a decade, the world is graced by an athlete of surpassing ability, one who, by natural (genetic) endowment and psychological determination, stands head and shoulders above his comrades. In chess, it was Bobby Fischer. On the balance beam, it was little Olga. In swimming, it was Mark Spitz. In cycling, Merckx, Indurain, and Armstrong come to mind. It also sometimes happens that a particular team develops a special comaraderie and everything 'just clicks' for them. Though no one member shines, they work together exceptionally well, like a well-oiled machine. They push the mark a notch higher. All due respect to them.
The Fatal Myth. But we are easily captive to a myth: namely, that every Tour and every Olympiad must necessarily shove the mark higher still, that the mark can be set indefinitely higher, that every record can, indeed must be beaten, if only by one-millionth of a second. What this myth amounts to, in plain text, is this: that the human has no limits. This is false. This is dangerously false. This is what leads to doping, this mania for ever-better, ever-faster, ever-higher records.
Further Advantages. The benchmark system would not penalize genuine titans (or well-oiled teams) who bettered the benchmark by more than some arbitrary percent. Insofaras their victories were due to natural endowment (viz. teamwork) and not doping, dope testing would validate their supremacy.
Another advantage of a benchamrk system is this: every titan has his day and is invincible for a time; but every titan also passes, and once he passes, the benchamrk system would restore a normal, non-titanic, level. It would counter-act the pressure to keep ratcheting the mark up and up and up, to the point where only doping (or, what next, genetic engineering? eugenics?) would suffice to reach it. Benchmarking would give us a continuous reality check.
A benchmark system is flexible. I do not insist on 5%. That is arbitrary. It could be adjusted from race to race or even stage or stage. I appreciate that the atmosphere of the real Tour, the roar of the crowd and the smell of the greasepaint, has an effect on the riders, encouraging them and possibly improving their times by more than 5% over the benchmark team. Make it 6% if you want, or 5.38%. Nor do I insist that a single benchmark must stand forever as inviolable; clearly Merckx on a modern machine, with 20 indexed speeds, carbon cranks, and dual-pivot brakes, would have been much faster than he was on the machines he actually rode. Benchmarks can be adjusted to take account of such improvements in technology.
I am confident that after five years of systematic benchmarking, we would know what a professionally trained, undoped and unmanipulated, human is really capable of. Some tolerance must be reckoned, whether it be 5% or some other, for every rider and team can have a good day or a bad day. But we simply must accept the fact that the human body has a finite limit, and that, in all probability, we have already reached it. There is simply no point in shaving another millionth of a second off that; the victory would be both fraudulent and unhealthy.
So what would be left of the Tour, if we could not expect another new record every year? Everything that ever made the Tour worthwhile in the past! The roar of the crowd, the smell of the greasepaint, the strategy, and above all, the sheer determination to finish. It is and remains the most gruelling mass-sporting event in the world.
Exceptions. It may be that some particular athletes have by nature a higher level of some naturally occuring chemical, testosterone or whatever. If so, this should be documented and made known to the appropriate authorities before professional races, not after.
We All Win. One theoretical consequence of a benchmark system with some arbitrary limit of betterment is that there might be multiple winners of any given event. That is, several riders/teams might fall within the tolerance of X% above the benchmark. They should be declared co-winners. This principle is well known in cycling: all riders who cross the line within the peloton are granted the same time, regardless whether they were at the head or the tail of the peloton.
A similar system could be applied to many other sports.
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