Unbelievable P.S.

It's almost too good to be true,

but (further to all that stuff I typed yesterday about Alberto Salazar) it turns out that one of the pacemakers that Lance Armstrong (who I've only mentioned so far in passing but there's plenty more of him to come) used to help him to a sub-3 hour time at the New York City marathon in 2006 (? - might have the year wrong, but it's easily searchable) was...

...Alberto Salazar!

The way this is panning out, it looks as though pretty much all the drug stories - from the systematic cover-up (by the athletics authorities) of major athletes' positive tests in the 1980s*, through the BALCO, Trevor Graham and Nike's various involvements (including their current Oregon Project) - are linked by certain individuals and organisations. And that's just the ones that have been definitively documented (or are about to be, aren't they Alberto?), I've not mentioned the whole Eastern Bloc programme in the 1970s and 1980s, whatever the hell Flo-Jo was up to or any of the other rumours that follow certain other names around.

*  My favourite story surrounding drugs and athletics - and I really wish I had some documentary evidence to back it up - is that in the summer of 1987, there was a rumour circulating athletics circles in Europe; basically this rumour was that the athletics authorities wanted to prove that they were catching the cheats and ensuring that the sport was clean. As such, an edict was sent out that an example was to be made of a high-profile athlete (by exposing them as a drugs cheat) at the following year's Olympics: the highest-finishing non-US athlete in the men's 100m final would be busted**. And we all know what happened there...

**  I imagine the men's 100m final was chosen because it could be guaranteed that without cover-ups, you could have busted anyone out of that race.