German doctors from the University of Freiburg, Lothar Heinrich and Andreas Schmid, have now admitted to doping cyclists of Team Telekom in the past.

This is a hugely disappointing admission but may hopefully provide the impetus to burst the festering pustule that is international cycling. With Operation Puerto and the Floyd Landis affair hanging like bleak clouds over the sport, the UCI needed the admissions like the proverbial hole in the head. How much more can the sport  withstand before it implodes?

The doctors' admissions, though, go further than implicating Team Telekom. In particular, Dr Schmid’s impressive research portfolio must now be called into question. A large part of his research has dealt with blood manipulation, therefore his admissions have obvious implications.

Cycling is sick, perhaps sicker than we think or know, and needs its own treatment; not by doctors, though, because it seems some of them are part of the doping problem. The admissions are damning any way you look at it, especially when you think that doctors are supposed to only give prescribed drugs to people who are sick, not healthy. While there may be calls to throw the book at them, I can’t believe that they did this without the tacit support by team managers and sponsors. The whole team should go down!

The whole doping phenomenon has cast doubt on just about every athlete and even spilled over to the testers themselves. They seem to be copping the blame, as well testified by the current ‘circus’ that is the Landis affair. While testers may be contributing to the problem by not having effective collection and testing procedures, not to mention the financial resources to mount effective research and testing programmes, they are not the cause of doping. The way some alleged cheats carry on, you’d think it was the testers who cheat and not them, a reason why the Landis case is compelling though (apart from the theatrics of the court case). We'll find out in due course who is the cheat.

Let it be known that I would be happy to ‘pull my head in’ if the court finds in favour of Landis. I have just as much disdain for sloppy laboratory processes because in my game, Medical Science, sloppy lab procedures could end up killing patients. The standards should be no different in anti-doping labs.