For Gerard Guillaume, the doctor of the cosmopolitan Francaise des Jeux team of Bradley McGee and Baden Cooke, his riders simply can't keep up with a peloton whose speeds have amazed everyone in the first 12 days of the race.

The Tour, which American Lance Armstrong is bidding to win for a seventh consecutive time, has so far been raced at a punishing pace, leaving some complaining they are not all racing on the same level.

Although that can partly be explained by the fact the peloton benefited from favourable wind conditions as they raced from west to east in the first 10 days, speeds on the race left many, otherwise good climbers struggling to hang on in the tough Alpine cols.

"At the Dauphine Libere I had no problems in following the best climbers. At the Tour, I just can't," said Frenchman David Moncoutie after he won the 12th stage Thursday - a medium-difficulty climbing day.

"It's like that every year, but all I can say is 'too bad'."

For Guillaume, there's only one explanation.

"There's two Tours de France being raced at the moment. We're not in the same race as those who are at the front, that's for sure," he said in French daily L'Humanite Friday.

"Our best rider for the general classification, Sandy Casar, is already 15 minutes behind."

Cycling has been one of the sports to make the most progress in fighting doping since the 1998 Festina drugs scandal almost brought the Tour to its knees.

After years of dubious performances, it was finally revealed that crafty, illicit methods were being used to administer the banned but very effective blood boosting hormone EPO (erythropoietin).

EPO benefits athletes' b