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PARIS - The French Government has vowed to clean up the Tour de France as yet another rider was added to the shame file of the race's 94th edition.
Sports Minister Roselyne Bachelot said the cycling classic would be "clean and renovated" in 2008, with tougher sanctions for doping, unannounced hotel room searches and other measures to avoid a repeat of this year's event.
Her comments came as it emerged Spanish rider Iban Mayo had tested positive for the endurance-boosting EPO during a rest day in the final week of the Tour. He has been suspended by his Saunier Duval team pending analysis of the B sample. If confirmed, he will be the third rider to return a positive test during the race.
Spaniard Alberto Contador beat Australia's Cadel Evans by 23s in the second-closest finish in the event's history but most of the publicity surrounding the three-week Tour centred on doping scandals.
The day after the race, Bachelot met Tour officials to plan a new beginning for the world's premier cycling event.
"We have laid the first stones that will give us a clean and renovated 2008 Tour," she said. "We must be without pity in the fight against doping."
Proposing tougher laws to fight doping, Bachelot said French law limited what the Government could do because performance-enhancing substances were not necessarily illegal to buy, transport or store.
"We must increase synergy between the sporting world, the justice and the police," she said.
Tour organiser Patrice Clerc said next year's race would be the first step in rebuilding.
"The 2008 Tour will not be like the 2007 Tour," he said. "I commit myself to that."
The latest tour is still reeling from the expulsion of yellow jersey holder Michael Rasmussen, who was kicked out by his team amid accusations that he lied about his whereabouts to evade doping tests before the tour. Rasmussen denies any wrongdoing.
It was the biggest in a handful of expulsions that also saw pre-race favourite Alexandre Vinokourov, of Kazakhstan, and his Astana teammates forced out when he tested positive for blood doping after winning the 13th stage.
Italian Cristian Moreni tested positive for testosterone and his Cofidis team also left the race.
Clerc suggested that reintroducing national teams, which last appeared in 1968, could help clean up the Tour by edging out potentially suspect professional sides.
He is considering a mixed format, featuring national sides alongside sponsored teams.
- AAP
