Cycling News and Opinions
Unfair and Unbalanced
June, 2013

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June 3: And so it goes. Vini Fantini had its second doping positive (OK, adverse analytical finding) when Mauro Santambrogio was found to have used EPO. The test was performed on the Giro's first day. Vini Fantini's Danilo Di Luca was found positive in an out-of-competition test just before the Giro began and was ejected the day the cancelled stage 19 was scheduled to have been run.

Santambrogio, a rider with a dodgey doping history, leaped to fame this year when he won the Giro's 14th stage.

Team director Luca Scinto, who was already furious over Danilo Di Luca's positive, said he was left in tears by the new bad news. Here's the story on the Italian site tuttobiciweb.com. You can use google translate if you don't read Italian. Scinto figures the project (I assume meaning the Vini Fantini pro team) is finished.

Scinto said, "What can I say. I'm desperate. I'm screwed...For us it is all over. We are all ruined." Scinto had defended Santambrogio in the face of rumors swirling about his doping and now feels terrible that he accepted the rider's assurances that all the talk was nothing more than jealousy.

What scares me is that we're only up to the test results for the first stage. What is in store as the lab goes through the samples for the next 20-odd stages? Is this it or are we going to have more positives?