So far it's been over a year since I stopped going to college. I started writing these weekly columns in part to help stimulate my brain, make it turn the few rusty cogs I still have left and keep my mind intellectually poignant. Wait, that was a big word right there. This writing deal must help. I'm going to try to expand off of the simple, "This weekends race was…." Into more meaningful concoctions of random words known as the "Homeboy in Belgium" diaries.

    This weeks topic: Doping and cycling.

    Doping is now becoming a synonymous word with cycling. It's hard to read most any cycling news publication without some new and tabloid style headline about drugs in cycling. So what can be said about drugs that hasn't been said before. Not much.

    Testing ... not really that effective as the creator of the new EPO test has even admitted to its shortcomings . You get to bust a few guys, but the really smart ones make it through. Hotel searches ... a thing of the past; it's now a spousal duty to carry your dope as Rumsas has proven. Wait he's not guilty of anything. Yea, just like VDB's dog, the super puppy of all Belgium. Short of a Big Brother scenario where a riders diet is regulated and lives are taped 24/7 you will never have a fully clean peloton.

    I sit here and write these words, knowing the list of guys (and girls too, there is no sexism going on here) busted for using banned substances and wonder, WHY? I know the damages that can happen when you use dope. Just a month ago a junior here in Belgium collapses and dies, no heart rate for 10 minutes, only to be brought back. The reason, he was on amphetamines.

    I started off my ride today thinking of stuff to write, but it all really came down to one point. People who dope in cycling are cowards, they chose the easy way out. Cycling is a hard sport and this is the reason people dope. They take the easy way out and don't want to put the miles and hours it takes to become a great cyclist.

    If for me the difference between becoming a superstar cyclist and a great cyclist is dope, I chose to be a great cyclist. I want to be able to wake up in the mourning and look in the mirror at someone that isn't a coward and takes the easy way out. No amount of fame and money can make up for the shame I would feel for doping.

    What can be done ... I don't know. Cheaters will be cheaters and cycling is already one of the most tested sport in the world. Short of the Big Brother idea it's going to be a problem for cycling for years to come.

    Well there's my rant for the week ... nothing to exciting for me in the last week. Just a bunch of typical Belgian weather and some Kermesin' every couple of days. By the way, for people in more tropical areas is the sun still there? It's been kinda MIA over the last week here.

    Till next week, Tot Ziens.

    -Gregg Germer-