PAU, France: Spain's Alberto Contador was wearing the Tour de France's yellow jersey at the start of Friday's stage, after the previous race leader was sacked by his own team in a row over doping tests.
No rider wore the emblematic yellow jersey designating the overall leader on Thursday, after the Rabobank team sensationally withdrew Denmark's Michael Rasmussen on suspicion of doping.
On Thursday the Dutch outfit's manager, Theo de Rooy, said Rasmussen, was not only out of the Tour but had also been sacked from the team.
The shocking announcement came after the Danish rider, who had worn the yellow jersey for over a week, appeared to have sealed overall victory when winning Wednesday's stage.
"He lied to me, that is the chief reason (for sacking him)," de Rooy said.
The presence in the race of 33-year-old Rasmussen had already been questioned after it was revealed he had missed four out-of-competition dope tests in the past 18 months.
Race organizers welcomed the action taken.
A group of fans joke with a fake syringe reading EPO during the 17th stage of the 94th Tour de France cycling race between Pau and Castelsarrasin on Thursday.
"Rasmussen's exit is the best thing that can happen to the Tour," race director Christian Prudhomme told reporters before the start of Thursday's stage.
The Danish rider, who insisted at a press conference earlier this week that he was clean, was left reeling.
"I'm disgusted, disgusted. My career is ruined. I don't know what to do, or where to go," the Dutch Het Algemeen Dagblad newspaper quoted him as saying.
"My boss is mad," he told the Danish newspaper B.T. "It's the work of a desperate man who is at the end of his nerves".
The yellow jersey was restored after Thursday's stage, going to Spaniard Alberto Contador.
While Rasmussen's departure now may have saved greater embarrassment later, it still added another layer of scandal to a Tour already straining to stay on course.
"The death of the Tour" was the unequivocal judgement of the French daily Liberation. Germany's top selling daily Bild said the time had come "to stop this farce."
But for three-time Tour champion, the American rider Greg LeMond, the latest scandal came as no surprise.
But LeMond, who won the Tour in 1986, 1989 and 1990, said that it was unfair to brand Rasmussen a cheat without looking at those around him.
"If Rasmussen got caught, and if you want to be equal, you have to implicate other riders too," LeMond said. "You have a lot of riders against whom there's a lot of evidence and relations to certain doctors. Those riders are getting away with it.
LeMond said he thought the Tour de France would be better served if it didn't name a champion this year.
"I would prefer to see a non Tour de France winner," he said. "It's more symbolic."
Diehard spectators were left disappointed and shocked by the events.
"Is it true there's no yellow jersey?" asked Denise, an elderly woman following the race from a wheelchair in the town of Castelsarrasin. "It's a shame. It's the first time I've seen something like this."
France's No 1 team Cofidis had already been forced to pull out on Wednesday after it was revealed that Italian Cristian Moreni had tested positive for testosterone.
Moreni was sacked on Thursday shortly after being released from police custody in the southwestern French town of Pau, where he had admitted using the banned hormone to improve his performance.
Prudhomme suggested it would have been unfair on the rest of the Rabobank team to suffer for Rasmussen's errors.
And the Frenchman said that even thinking about bringing the race to a premature end would unfairly punish the riders who have stayed clean.
No plan to ban cycling
Banning cycling from the Olympic Games is not being considered as a response to the doping scandals shaking the sport in the Tour de France, International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Jacques Rogge said on Friday.
"To exclude the sport from the Olympic Games is not a solution," he told reporters during a visit to Belgrade which is currently hosting the Youth Olympics.
"You have to put everything into perspective. What is happening now in the Tour de France is first of all a sign that the mentality of the athletes must change drastically, and rapidly," Rogge said.
"Secondly it is also proof that the system is working well - because if people are caught positive it's that the testing is very accurate and the testing is very good."
Rogge said the IOC planned to help the International Cycling Union (UCI) "as a trusted partner" to improve the sport.
"It is not the UCI that is cheating. It is the riders who are cheating," he added.
Some companies sponsoring Tour de France teams, such as Rabobank and France's Cofidis, are reconsidering their involvement in the sport because of doping scandals plaguing the world's greatest cycling race.