Five cyclists and team officials have been placed under formal investigation for using or helping riders to use artificial substances to boost their performance. As the police widened their probe, a Dutch team and all four Spanish teams indignantly quit the race, and the remaining riders staged two unsportsmanlike slowdowns in protest. The drug scandal may have been an embarrassment to France, but nobody who reads the sports pages could have been terribly surprised. Although the use of performance enhancers is prohibited in most sports, it isn't just a question of cheating. Yet they keep taking the stuff, relying on so-called drug gurus to dose them in undetectable ways, and on ever more elaborate strategies to beat drug tests.
Users can thus pump iron more often and bulk up faster.
The major known side effects are dizziness, diarrhea and cramping. This is the drug under investigation at the Tour de France. EPO is a natural protein that stimulates production of red blood cells, which carry oxygen. Taken as a supplement, it loads the blood with red cells and delivers more oxygen, permitting greater endurance. Some two dozen heart-attack deaths have reportedly been linked to EPO use.