- A good friend, and great journalist, Pierre Ballester, sent me a copy of his latest work last week, ‘Tempetes sur la Tour’. A brilliant deconstruction on the state of the Tour, it makes for sad and sobering reading

- Take the withering statistics Ballester produces on doping. Would you believe that 85% of the winners since 1968 have, at one point or other, contravened the antidoping rules? Would you believe that 72.5% of those who stood on the podium have cheated? What about the top-tens? Sixty per cent sound right? The damage to the credibility of the race has been irreparable

- Take also the results of a recent survey (of a thousand French citizens) on their attitudes to the Tour… Doping has destroyed everything, I feel betrayed: 90% Because of doping, I no longer believe in the results of the Tour de France: 85% All top-level cyclists are doped: 69%

- Or study how different people responded in the same survey when asked to give the reason why they watch the race...

I watch the Tour de France for the scenery: 22%

I watch the Tour de France for the mountain stages: 20%

For the competition: 16%

For the doping scandals: 16%

For the exploits of the champions: 8%

Out of childhood nostalgia: 7%

Because it passes quite near my house: 5%

For the publicity caravan: 3%

- Is there any way back? First, the good news - the level of doping in the race appears to be falling: 2004: 27.5% 2005: 24.3% 2006: 21.2% 2007: 13.8%

- The bad news is that the dopers are still coming out on top. The Rasmussen affair last year - in which Tour leader Michael Rasmussen was sacked by his team and withdrawn from the race just days before it was due to end, after it emerged that he had missed out-of-competition drugs tests - was a fi sco. How long will it before we celebrate a scandal-free winner?

Don’t hold your breath

- There’s a tug of war at the moment between the teams who have embraced the need for change and those who still embrace the sorcerers and their potions. The banning of Tom Boonen (a cocaine infraction) and the Astana team (incessant cheating) has sent a very clear message. Yet the sport is teetering on the brink

- The ongoing power struggle between ASO, the tour organisers, and UCI, the governing body, has not been a healthy development. What the sport needs now is the progressive thinking of team directors like Jonathan Vaughters and the integrity of riders like Danny Pate. Team Garmin-Chipotle are not the only team worth cheering but they have certainly led the way

- Against this unfortunate backdrop, the rest of the sporting world can be forgiven if it watches this year’s Tour with an air of cynicism. We can only hope that by the end of July we have the winner this great competition deserves