ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - The International Cycling Union (UCI) was fault free in their handling of the Lance Armstrong doping affair that severely tarnished the sport's reputation and triggered harsh criticism of the federation, UCI president Pat McQuaid said.

Speaking to a small group of reporters at an international sports conference in Russia, McQuaid said the UCI had always been at the forefront in the battle against doping during the American's years of domination from the late 1990s to the mid-2000s.

"I do not think the UCI made mistakes," said McQuaid, who took over as president in 2005, the year of Armstrong's last Tour de France victory.

"The statistics show the UCI was the most advanced in the fight against doping."

Cancer survivor Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and banned for life from cycling in 2012 after a report by the United State Anti-doping Agency (USADA) accused him of doping for years.

In January, Armstrong admitted in a television interview that he used banned substances in all of his Tour victories.

"I was fooled," McQuaid said. "I believed the was no way a man so close to death would go and start putting stuff into his body that could be dangerous.

"My experiences as a cyclist convinced me he was real."

Critics accused the UCI of not doing enough to catch the American, who faced several years of doping accusations, while the USADA report also alleged that the body could have done more.

McQuaid, seeking a third term as UCI president, defended his organization by saying the UCI had tested Armstrong 200 times between 1999 and 2005, while USADA had only conducted 12 tests.

The Irishman admitted, though, the tests were no match for the advanced methods used by Armstrong.

"There were no tests available for the products. Ten or 15 years ago the armory (against doping) was weaker. The doping system was weak."

DANGEROUS STUFF

Asked whether he considered resigning over the affair, the Irishman was defiant.

"No, because I firmly believe I am making a difference. I want to eradicate doping. I want to see this thing through. I want to finish what I started."

"There is a change in the peloton. Every little thing I am bringing in is making a difference."

McQuaid said he was still waiting for was an apology from Armstrong and hoped the American would give back to the sport by helping with inquiries.

"I would like to see him jump on his private plane and come to Switzerland (UCI headquarters) and say 'what can I do?'

"He has not apologized to the sport of cycling. Everyone accepts he has not come clean. If he has information that is valuable to the sport he has to come forward."

"He should sit down and work with us ... with USADA and the world Anti-doping Agency (WADA)."

McQuaid said cycling would move past the Armstrong affair as the sport continues to expand into new markets despite the whirlwind of negativity the incident brought.

"We will go beyond it. Cycling has got new champions and it is getting global. It is growing dramatically. I am very positive about cycling and the future," he said.

"Africa, for example has huge potential. It may not have a commercial potential but it has damned good athletes," he said.

"There will be a black African athlete on the podium of a major tour within six years."

(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann. Editing by Patrick Johnston)

Trustees also warned President Gordon Gee that any future inappropriate comments could result in punishment including dismissal.

"The board will have no choice but to take such action," according to a copy of the March 11 letter obtained Friday by The Associated Press.

An AP report this week revealed remarks Gee made to the university's Athletic Council in December, saying that Notre Dame wasn't allowed to join the Big Ten because its leaders were not good partners. He criticized its Roman Catholic priests as "holy hell" on days other than Sunday and joked "those damn Catholics" can't be trusted.

He also questioned the academic integrity of schools in the SEC and the University of Kentucky.

Gee apologized in a statement Thursday and again on Twitter Thursday night.

"I am truly sorry for my comments_such attempts at humor do not reflect Ohio State values, nor my role as its president," the tweet said.

In their letter, the trustees laid out steps Gee must take including issuing personal apologies, getting help from professionals to revisit his personal communications and speechwriting processes and rethinking what speaking engagements he accepts.

Trustees told Gee that his attempts "to bring a bit of levity" to significant issues have had the opposite effect at times.

"As a result, instead of your words promoting and uniting us, they have sometimes embarrassed and divided us," trustee chairman Robert Schottenstein and trustee Alex Shumate, who led the search committee that hired Gee in 2007, said in the three-page letter obtained through a records request.

"Such comments are not befitting a great university like Ohio State or its leadership," the letter continued. It added: "Although we do not believe that you intended harm, such comments risk diminishing the effectiveness of our collective efforts and of your good work."

The letter said Gee is making progress on the board's list of requirements.

"Your willingness to seek guidance and counsel on multiple levels, from a variety of sources, on how to adapt and grow is a hallmark of your leadership style and one that we value highly," the letter said.

University and athletic conference officials have almost universally called Gee's remarks inappropriate but also said his apology has been accepted.

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Associated Press writers John Seewer in Toledo, Tom Coyne in South Bend, Ind., Janet Cappiello in Louisville, Ky., Stephen Hawkins in Irving, Texas, and Mark Long in Destin, Fla., contributed to this report. Andrew Welsh-Huggins can be reached on Twitter at https://twitter.com/awhcolumbus .

Gordon Gee also took shots at schools in the Southeastern Conference and the University of Louisville, according to the recording of the December meeting of the school's Athletic Council that The Associated Press obtained under a public records request.

The university called the statements inappropriate and said Gee is undergoing a "remediation plan" because of the remarks.

Gee was on a long-planned family vacation and unavailable for comment, Ohio State spokeswoman Gayle Saunders said. He apologized in a statement released to the AP.

"The comments I made were just plain wrong, and in no way do they reflect what the university stands for," he said in the statement. "They were a poor attempt at humor and entirely inappropriate. There is no excuse for this and I am deeply sorry."

Gee, who has taken heat before for uncouth remarks, told members of the council that he negotiated with Notre Dame officials during his first term at Ohio State, which began more than two decades ago.

"The fathers are holy on Sunday, and they're holy hell on the rest of the week," Gee said to laughter at the Dec. 5 meeting attended by Athletic Director Gene Smith, several other athletic department members, professors and students.

"You just can't trust those damn Catholics on a Thursday or a Friday, and so, literally, I can say that," said Gee, a Mormon.

The Big Ten had for years courted Notre Dame, but the school resisted as it sought to retain its independent status in college football. In September, the school announced that it would join the Atlantic Coast Conference in all sports except football and hockey but would play five football games each year against ACC teams.

In the recording, Gee referred specifically to dealing with the Rev. Ned Joyce, Notre Dame's longtime executive vice president, who died in 2004.

"Father Joyce was one of those people who ran the university for many, many years," Gee said.

Gee said the Atlantic Coast Conference added Notre Dame at a time when it was feeling vulnerable.

"Notre Dame wanted to have its cake and eat it, too," Gee said, according to the recording and a copy of the meeting's minutes.

Notre Dame spokesman Dennis Brown called the remarks regrettable, especially the reference to Joyce, "who served Notre Dame and collegiate athletics so well and for so long." Gee contacted Notre Dame's president, the Rev. John Jenkins, to offer an apology, which was accepted, Brown said Thursday in an email, declining to say when the apology was made.

Notre Dame has a storied collegiate football history and is perhaps the nation's pre-eminent Roman Catholic university. Ohio State, with about 56,000 students on its main campus, is among the country's biggest universities, and it has its own long football tradition.

A message was left with Smith, the Ohio State athletic director who attended the December meeting and who also is a 1977 Notre Dame graduate. NCAA President Mark Emmert declined to comment, saying he hadn't heard the remarks.

Ohio State's Athletic Council meets monthly during the fall, winter and spring and makes recommendations on athletic policy including ticket prices. December's meeting was at Ohio Stadium.

Gee was introduced by Athletic Council then-chairman Charlie Wilson, and Gee's name and introduction are included in written minutes of the meeting. His comments drew laughter, at times loud, occasionally nervous, but no rebukes, according to the audio.

Ohio State trustees learned of Gee's "offensive statements" in January, met with the president at length and created the remediation plan for Gee to "address his behavior," board president Robert Schottenstein said in a statement.

Comments by a university leader about "particular groups, classes of people or individuals are wholly unacceptable," Schottenstein said. "These statements were inappropriate, were not presidential in nature and do not comport with the core values of the university."

Gee has gotten in trouble before for offhand remarks, most recently during a memorabilia-for-cash and tattoos scandal under football coach Jim Tressel's watch.

Gee was asked in March 2011 whether he had considered firing Tressel. He responded: "No, are you kidding? Let me just be very clear: I'm just hopeful the coach doesn't dismiss me." Tressel stepped down three months later.

In November 2010, Gee boasted that Ohio State's football schedule didn't include teams on par with the "Little Sisters of the Poor." An apologetic Gee later sent a personal check to the real Little Sisters of the Poor in northwest Ohio and followed up with a visit to the nuns months later.

Last year, Gee apologized for comparing the problem of coordinating the school's many divisions to the Polish army, a remark that a Polish-American group called bigoted and ignorant.

In 1992, in a moment of frustration over higher-education funding, Gee told a student newspaper reporter, "the governor's a damn dummy." Then-Gov. George Voinovich laughed it off, and the two became allies.

Gee was named the country's best college president in 2010 by Time magazine, and he has one of the highest-profile resumes of any college leader in recent history. He has held the top job at West Virginia University, the University of Colorado, Brown University and Vanderbilt University. He was Ohio State president from 1990 to 1997 and returned in 2007.

Gee, 69, earns about $1.9 million annually in base pay, deferred and performance compensation and retirement benefits.

He is a prolific fundraiser and is leading a $2.5 billion campaign at Ohio State. He is omnipresent on campus, attending everything from faculty awards events to dormitory pizza parties. He is known for his bow ties he has hundreds and his horn-rimmed glasses.

During his comments to the Athletic Council, Gee also questioned the academic integrity of schools in the Southeastern Conference and the University of Louisville.

The top goal of Big Ten presidents is to "make certain that we have institutions of like-minded academic integrity," Gee said. "So you won't see us adding Louisville," which is also joining the ACC.

After a pause followed by laughter from the audience, Gee added that the Big Ten wouldn't add the University of Kentucky, either.

Louisville spokesman Mark Hebert said the university accepted Gee's apology but planned to forward Gee information about the upward trajectory of its academic and athletic programs. Kentucky president Eli Capilouto declined to comment.

During the meeting, Gee also said he thought it was a mistake not to include Missouri and Kansas in earlier Big Ten expansion plans. Missouri has since joined the SEC.

"You tell the SEC when they can learn to read and write, then they can figure out what we're doing," Gee said when asked by a questioner how to respond to SEC fans who say the Big Ten can't count because it now has 14 members.

Gee noted he was chairman of the SEC during his time as Vanderbilt University chancellor. He also told the audience that speculation about the SEC "remains right here," according to the recording.

Despite his SEC comments, Gee gave the commencement address at an SEC institution Louisiana State University's Health Sciences Center on May 16, Ohio State confirmed. Gee's daughter is assistant professor of Public Health and Medicine at Louisiana State University.

Gee took a swipe at Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany, one of the most powerful leaders in college athletics, when he answered a question about preserving Ohio State's financial interests in light of Big Ten revenue-sharing plans.

"No one admires Jim Delany more than I do. I chaired the committee that brought him here," Gee said. "Jim is very aggressive, and we need to make certain he keeps his hands out of our pockets while we support him."

Gee's comments "were inappropriate and in no way represent the opinions of the conference," Delany said in a statement, adding he had apologized to Notre Dame and the SEC.

SEC Commissioner Mike Slive said Gee called to apologize for the comments about a week ago, saying they might become public. Delany called after that, also to apologize. Both apologies were accepted, Slive said.

"Our focus is on the SEC," he said Thursday. "Our goal is to make us better, and we've been very successful and we're comfortable here. There really isn't much more to add to that."

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Associated Press writers John Seewer in Toledo, Tom Coyne in South Bend, Ind., Janet Cappiello in Louisville, Ky., Stephen Hawkins in Irving, Texas, and Mark Long in Destin, Fla., contributed to this report.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Zynga Inc announced on Monday its biggest ever round of layoffs and warned of weak bookings for the current quarter, raising doubts about the social game developer's attempt at a recovery.

Zynga said it will cut about 520 jobs, or roughly one-fifth of its work force, and close some offices in the United States.

Analysts said the latest warning on quarterly bookings, a measure of sales, boded poorly for the "FarmVille" developer, which began trimming staff late last year.

Zynga's shares slid as much as 15 percent in frantic trade before closing down 12 percent at $2.99, near its four-month low.

"I admire them for aligning costs with revenue," Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter said. But Monday's bookings forecast, following a series of downward revisions in the past year, prompted new and increasingly urgent questions about Zynga's ability to retain players, he said.

Investors "thought they were already guiding to a low number that they would sail over, but it's coming in even lighter," Pachter said. "Are they in a state of persistent revenue declines? One quarter doesn't tell the story, but we need to hear what else they're doing."

One of the first firms to seize upon Facebook as a game-publishing platform years ago, Zynga has struggled to keep hold of players as people increasingly turn to their mobile devices - and games from Zynga's rivals - for entertainment. Zynga's chief executive, Mark Pincus, has shut studios, retired more than a dozen games and laid off hundreds of employees as part of a turnaround effort that focuses resources on developing mobile games.

As the company began notifying laid-off employees on Monday afternoon, Pincus issued a company-wide memo that acknowledged Zynga's ongoing struggle to adapt to the mobile world.

"The scale that served us so well in building and delivering the leading social gaming service on the Web is now making it hard to successfully lead across mobile and multi-platform, which is where social games are going to be played," said Pincus, who founded the company in 2007 and still maintains majority control.

The series of cuts contrast starkly with Zynga in early 2012, when it paid $183 million to acquire game studio OMGPOP, which became its New York studio, and total headcount ballooned to nearly 3,000.

Zynga has lost 70 percent of its market value since its 2011 debut.

Trading was briefly suspended twice on Monday afternoon, and the stock drop marked Zynga's largest single-day loss since July 26, when it badly missed earnings expectations and shares plunged 37 percent.

The new wave of cuts will bring headcount down to around 2,300 and will see the shuttering of the New York, Los Angeles and Dallas studios, according to people with knowledge of the matter. In October, Zynga closed its Boston office while cutting staff by 5 percent.

"None of us ever expected to face a day like today, especially when so much of our culture has been about growth," Pincus said in his memo. "But I think we all know this is necessary to move forward."

The company said its second-quarter bookings are expected to be in the lower half of the outlook range it provided in April, of $180 million to $190 million. Bookings, which account for the vast majority of Zynga's revenues, are the sales of virtual goods bought by game players in order to enhance game play, such as the purchase of virtual cows used in farm games.

Zynga does not charge for playing its games. It also derives revenue from advertising.

Zynga said it now sees a second-quarter net loss of between $39 million and $28.5 million, reflecting restructuring charges due to the job cuts. It had previously projected a net loss of $36.5 million to $26.5 million. Despite the revised outlook for the second quarter, the company reaffirmed its full-year outlook.

The job cuts will save $70 million to $80 million, according to the company.

In a research note after Zynga's announcement, Macquarie analyst Ben Schachter said the company's challenges remained unchanged.

"Despite today's pullback, we see no turnaround on the horizon," he said.

(Reporting by Gerry Shih; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Watched by Klitschko's elder brother and WBC champion Vitaly, Povetkin floored the lanky Pole with a right hook in round two, then sent his opponent to the canvas again in the following round before finishing the job a few seconds later.

The 33-year-old Russian improved his record to 26-0, including 18 by knockout, while Wawrzyk suffered his first defeat in 28 professional fights.

"It was a good workout. I didn't aim for an early knockout, it just happened," Povetkin told Russian television.

Asked if he was now ready to fight Ukrainian Klitschko, Povetkin said: "Yes, let's do it."

Povetkin's manager Vladimir Khryunov added: "The Klitschko fight will be held here in Moscow, probably in early October."

Russia's WBA cruiserweight champion Denis Lebedev takes on former title holder Guillermo Jones of Panama later on Friday. (Reporting by Gennady Fyodorov, editing by Pritha Sarkar)