How'd that slip in?

All 4 of our regular readers may recall that we have a habit of ripping ESPN's Tour coverage. It is in part because their Tour coverage blows, but also, admittedly, because we'd prefer if ESPN would just pay us to write a TdF blog. Cash would be good, but we'd settle for beer. Nevertheless, behold the first intelligently written Tour de France piece I have ever seen on ESPN's website.

Once you get beyond the fact that this is a journalist writing about how journalists view the Tour, Ms. DeSimone makes a couple great points.

We can write about teams with pockmarked histories or a remarkable surge in results. We shouldn't declare riders guilty until proved innocent, but we're entitled to rip them when they're shown to be charlatans.

People cheat across the board. We don't stop covering politics because candidates steal elections, we don't stop covering corporations because executives embezzle, and we keep writing love stories even though people stray from their partners. We shouldn't stop covering the Tour de France because some riders dope.

Vive le Tour.