Armé won second stage Tour de la provence de Luxembourg

The Belgian Sander Armée (Profel-Ziegler) has won the second stage of Tour de la provence de Luxembourgh today. Armée was 27 seconds faster than Lucas Persson (Unibet.com CT) and Jérôme Giaux (Profel-Ziegler).

Lucas Persson (Unibet.com) is defended his lead in the general classification Persson ttok the lead after the Swedish rider won the opening stage on Wednesday.

Piepoli suspended by Saunier Duval

After the Saunier Duval - Prodir team received an official notification from the International Cycling Union (UCI) stating that the laboratory in Barcelona which studied Leonardo Piepoli´s samples reported to have been non-negative during the Giro d´Italia wasn´t able to identify whether the Salbutamol high dose had been administered via inhalation or subcutaneous injection. In compliance with the UCI Pro Tour code of ethics, Saunier Duval - Prodir has decided to preventively suspend the rider. Meanwhile, the UCI has filed all the relevant documents with the Monaco Cycling Federation.

Stanga not at Tour

As reported Milram team manager Gianluigi Stanga has been accused of organizing doping by two of his former riders. The anti-doping committee Italian Olympic committee  is investigating the case. Milram's commerlial manager, Gerry van Gerwen confirmed to reporters that Stanga will not be at the Tour de France. On Wednesday Milram decided that Alessandro Petacchi will not start at this years edition of the Tour, after Italian anti-doping authorities demanded a one year ban for the Italian sprinter.

Eight teams walk out of AIGCP meeting

The 6 French teams that will start at this years Tour de France and the German teams Gerolsteiner and T-Mobile left the AIGCP meeting on Thursday. Earlier Discovery Channel and Unibet.com completely left the organisation. Gerolsteiner team manager Hans-Michael Holczer was the first  team manager who left yesterdays meeting. According to Holczer a representative of a Spanish team said that 'Operacion Puerto' was not about doping but normal medical care. Holczer said: "A reprentative of a Spanish team really said that's ['Operacion Puerto'] not doping, that's medical care. That's were I stood up and left [the meeting]." Astana team manager Marc Biver told German TV station: "I did not hear that, Nobody said that." Holczer said the German and French teams founded a workgroup but will not completley leave the AIGCP, as Unibet.com and Discovery Channel earlier did.  Sources say that during the AIGCP meeting the teams debated the exclusion of Lampre - Fondital , Saunier Duval - Prodir and Caisse d’Epargne as well as the Pro-Continental teams Relax Gam and Karpin Galicia as these teams allegedly did not act by the code of ethics. According to our sources the discussion started as UCI president Pat McQuaid presented a list of eye-catching blood values of riders of these teams.