L’Equipe calculates index of suspicion for teams and nations

As well as publishing an individual ‘index of suspicion’ for each of the 198 riders who rode the 2010 Tour de France, L’Equipe has used the data to calculate an index for the teams and rider nations.

The French newspaper points out that Cofidis tops the list of teams with the lowest total index, with a score of just four points from its nine riders. The four French teams in the 2010 Tour de France fill the top four places of the least suspicious list. Garmin is fifth and Cervelo sixth.

RadioShack is ranked 22nd and bottom of the table with 40 points. Astana is 21st with 39, while HTC-Columbia, BMC and Caisse d’Epargne are all ranked equal 18th with 32 points.

France tops the nations ranking, with an average score of 1.23 per rider based on the total of 35 French riders who rode the 2010 Tour de France.

L’Equipe suggested that this is because France is the most active in the fight against doping. The newspaper also drew up a list of the French riders, highlighting that Christophe Moreau had the highest index of suspicion (7.0) in his final Tour de France before retiring. 18 of the 35 French riders had an index of zero and only six were above the average of 2.4.

The Netherlands (1.25) is second in the ranking, ahead of Switzerland (1.60) and Portugal (2.0). The United States is ranked sixth with an average score of 2.37, while Great Britain is further down in 12th place, with an average score of 3.37. This is based on the scores of the eight British riders who ride the 2010 Tour de France, while Spain’s ranking, which is also 12th, is based on an average of 32 riders.

Italy is ranked 14th (3.70), Belarus is 15th (4.0), Russia is 16th (4.33), Kazakhstan and the Ukraine are equal 17th with a score of 5.33 based on the average of just three riders.

The ranking of the least suspicious teams:

1.Cofidis 4
2. Bbox Buoygues Telecom 14
3. FDJ 15
4. AG2R-La Mondiale 16
5. Garmin-Transitions 17
6. Cervelo 20
     Footon-Servetto 20
8. Rabobank 21
9. Liquigas 22
Team Sky 22
11. Milram 23
       Saxo Bank 23
13. Euskaltel-Euskadi 24
14. Katusha 26
15. Lampre 28
16. Quick Step 30
17. Omega Pharma-Lotto 31
18. HTC-Columbia 32
       BMC 32
Caisse d’Epargne 32
21. Astana 39
22. RadioShack 40

The ranking of the least suspicious nations:

1. France 1.23 (based on the average of 35 riders)
2. Netherlands 1.25 (8)
3. Switzerland 1.60 (5)
4. Portugal 2.0 (3)
5. Slovenia 2.25 (4)
6. USA 2.37 (8)
7. Belgium 2.69 (13)
8. Denmark 2.80 (5)
9. Austria 3.0 (3)
10. Germany 3.27 (15)
       Australia 3.27 (11)
12. Spain 3.27 (32)
       Great Britain 3.27 (8)
14. Italy 3.70 (17)
15. Belarus 4.0 (3)
16. Russia 4.33 (6)
17. Kazakhstan 5.33 (3)
       Ukraine 5.33 (3)