On my way to the press room in Pau today I decided to take a quiet country road rather than the highway. I stopped to fill up with diesel. It’s cheaper than unleaded gas but a tank still cost $68. After paying I noticed a small local newspaper in the gas station’s rack. The front page headline read: “Le Tour en péril?”

That question was going through my head on reaching this rest-day press room, which is set up in the Palais Beaumont, an elegant pastel-painted palace with a terrace looking out toward the high peaks of the Pyrenées. The moment I arrived, a press conference that featured race leader Michael Rasmussen was just breaking up. At the entrance I chatted with the International Herald Tribune’s Sam Abt, who was taking a short break. He told me the news conference was dominated by a lawyer for Rasmussen’s Rabobank team. Sam thought the lawyer didn’t really convey his thoughts well in English and that his discourse was far too technical, and that the words didn’t convince him that Rasmussen is blameless in his not reporting his whereabouts correctly to the anti-doping authorities.

Inside the palace, the palm-tree-motifed banqueting hall — which is doubling as the press room — was abuzz with the chatter of hundreds of journalists sharing their views on Rasmussen’s “administrative errors.” Many were filing stories or editing tape before sending the news to newspapers, magazines, Web sites, TV and radio stations all over the world.

I chose a spot in the press room that looks out at the snow-streaked mountains. At least I could see them an hour or so ago. Then, in the middle of a press conference in which the Saunier Duval-Prodir team manager Mauro Gianetti presented a diplomat from the West African nation of Mali with a check that will pay for another 300,000 trees the team is planting there, a black thunder began to loom over the Pyrénées.

Moments later, in a question-and-answer session with Saunier Duval riders Iban Mayo and David Millar, a journalist asked Millar to comment on a report just posted on the Web site of L’Équipe that Alexander Vinokourov has tested positive for blood doping. Millar was shattered, his voice breaking with emotion as he said that Vino’ was one of his heroes and that if indeed he has been caught cheating then everyone at the Tour should pack their bags and go home.

We’re still here. Writing our stories. Late-evening sunshine bathes the terrace outside the palace’s tall picture windows. The dark cloud over the mountains has intensified, as if its blackness is related to the words spoken an hour ago, at another press conference, by the Tour’s big boss, Amaury Sport Organisation president Patrice Clerc. He said that Vino’s positive test and the suspicions concerning Rasmussen have sent the Tour into a black period.

Clerc had harsh words for the cycling authorities, saying the current system in professional cycling, particularly the ProTour’s ethical charter, has completely failed, and that there needs to be a revolution to save the sport’s marquee events like the Tour. “Where there’s a will there’s a way,” he said.

And yet it was Clerc who said that Vino’s Astana team is not a member of the UCI ProTour and then invited the Kazakh-sponsored, Swiss-registered formation to the Tour as a wild-card team. He can’t blame that decision on the UCI. But he was right in saying that the Tour is a beautiful event and that it will survive this latest dark period just has it has done in the past.

Yes, cycling is at a crossroads. Perhaps half of the Tour peloton — including reformed riders like Millar — is vehemently against the cheaters and their doping methods. The other half is probably on the edge. Not sure whether doping is still a viable option for helping you perform at a higher level. And at what cost. I hope that today’s revelations will convince them that cheating is not viable.

The press corps is optimistic. A Danish sportswriter named Lars has just brought two bottles of triple sec into the press room with a half-dozen wine glasses. He filled a glass and raised it, toasting, “Vino.” That could have been a toast to thank Vino for making it more likely that cycling will be heading toward a cleaner future, or it may have been thanking the Kazakh for giving him a big story to report on during this otherwise quiet rest day.

This evening, the VeloNews reporters here will be joining other American journalists at a Pau restaurant to honor Sam Abt, who’s reporting his 31st and what he says is his final Tour de France. His story is as much part of the Tour de France as those made by the racers. It will be a good time to enjoy the flavor of France and exchange memories of a Tour that is 104 years old … and counting.

No, the Tour is not in peril. It’s the cheaters who are in peril. The ones who try to operate on 99-octane fuel rather than good old diesel.

Vive le Tour!