Michael Rasmussen, the overall leader in the Tour de France, was sacked by his Rabobank team late last night.
The Dane will not start today's 17th stage of the race after his team said the rider had lied about his training whereabouts in June. "He has violated the team's rules," a Rabobank spokesman said.
Rasmussen had already received two warnings from the sport's governing body, the UCI, for failing to provide the sport's governing body with his personal schedule.
"I cannot comment on the matter, as I have not been notified by Rabobank," said Pat McQuaid, the UCI president. "I am surprised that they did not discuss it with the UCI."
Christian Prudhomme, the Tour de France director, said: "The important thing is not that he has been sacked by his team but that he will not be at the start of the stage tomorrow."
Rabobank is a Dutch bank and, on Dutch TV, a team spokesman was quoted as saying: "It is not known if the rest of the team will start on Thursday for the 17th stage."
Theo de Rooy, the Rabobank director, said: "Several times he said where he was training and it proved to be wrong. The management of the team received that information several times and today we received new information."
Rasmussen's dismissal is the latest and possibly most damaging blow to the Tour's credibility.
He won yesterday's 16th stage and seemed on course to claim overall victory in the Tour, although the stage was once more completely overshadowed once more by a raft of doping issues.
The start was delayed by 10 minutes after riders from the six French and two German teams protested against doping in the sport and Rasmussen was jeered by the crowd in a reaction to news of his missed drugs tests.
The stage began without the Astana team, who had pulled out of the event on Tuesday after their leader, Alexandre Vinokourov tested positive for blood doping.
It ended with the news that the Italian, Cristian Moreni, had failed a drugs test for testosterone. His Cofidis team subsequently withdrew from the race too.
Rasmussen, of the Rabobank team, beat Discovery Channel's Levi Leipheimer of the United States by 26 seconds.
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YESTERDAY'S DETAILS
UCI. Tour de France. Stage 16 (218km, Orthez to Col d'Aubisque) 1 M Rasmussen (Den) Rabobank 6 hr 23 min 21sec, 2 L Leipheimer (US) Discovery Channel 26sec behind, 3 A Contador (Spa) Discovery Channel 35, 4 C Evans (Aus) Predictor-Lotto 43, 5 M Soler (Col) Barloworld 1min 25sec, 6 H Zubeldia (Spa) Euskaltel 1:52, 7 J J Cobo (Spa) Saunier Duval 1:54, 8 C Sastre (Spa) Team CSC 2:12, 9 O Pereiro (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 2:27, 10 A Valverde (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne same time, 11 Y Popovych (Ukr) Discovery Channel 3:11, 12 D Arroyo (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 3:37, 13 F Schleck (Lux) Team CSC 4:42, 14 M Boogerd (Ned) Rabobank 5:32, 15 K Kirchen (Lux) T-Mobile 6:02, 25 C Wegelius (GB) Liquigas 7:50, 135 B Wiggins (GB) Cofidis 41.49, 137 G Thomas (GB) Barloworld, 138 D Millar (GB) Saunier Duval-Prodir, both same time Overall 1 Rasmussen 76hr 15min 15sec, 2 Contador 3min 10sec behind, 3 Evans 5:03, 4 Leipheimer 5:59, 5 Sastre 9:12, 6 Zubeldia 9:39, 7 Valverde 13:28, 8 Kirchen 14:46, 9 Popovych 16:00, 10 Soler 16:41, 11 M Astarloza (Spa) Euskaltel 16:52, 12 Pereiro 17:17, 13 Arroyo 21:08, 14 I Mayo (Spa) Saunier Duval 25:24, 15 C Horner (US) Predictor-Lotto 26:22, 48 Wegelius 1hr 44min 15sec, 76 Millar 2.34.24, 131 Wiggins 3.24.29, 148 Thomas 3.42.07 Sprinters 1 T Boonen (Bel) Quick-Step 195pts, 2 R Hunter (SA) Barloworld 175, 3 E Zabel (Ger) Milram 174, 4 T Hushovd (Nor) Credit Agricole 132, 5 S Chavanel (Fra) Francaise des Jeux 127 King of the mountain 1 Soler 206pts, 2 Rasmussen 196, 3 Contador 129, 4 Popovych 104, 5 Evans 92 Youth 1 Contador 76hr 18min 25sec, 2 Soler 13:31, 3 A Txurruka (Spa) Euskaltel 45:54 Teams 1 Discovery Channel 229hr 09min 32sec, 2 Caisse d'Epargne 16:48, 3 Team CSC 25:01
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