Our race columnist on the latest events
As two riders are provisionally suspended for doping, Jens inds history repeating itself
Again? Really? I thought we would never have to deal with this again. It was a not a good week for sport in general, and for cycling as well. The case of blood doping in Austria has hit cycling. Two riders from the country have confessed that they were involved in this affair - Stefan Denifl and Georg Preidler.
I was under the hope that something like blood doping would be a thing from the past, that the new and younger generation would have learned from history and that nobody in modern cycling would go back there. I was sad, mad and disappointed when I read the news. Now, one can say it’s not only cycling, but other sports as well. Yes, but why does our sport have to be involved again? Why can it not be that no cyclist at all could be involved? What is going wrong in the sport that we still have cases like these? Why do athletes still feel that there is no other way for them to continue than using illegal methods or drugs? And why do some people apparently not look at history and learn its lessons? You just don’t get away with it any more in this day and age.
We have controls, biological passports, target testing… You can’t escape the system if you do illegal things. It is really frustrating to find out that people still try to take a shortcut to success, money and fame, or that people are still desperate enough to try.
Will this case kill our sport? No, for sure it will not. But cycling just got another stain on it and again we all have to deal with it, and we all will have to answer questions. Our friends, colleagues, families, partners, team members, sponsors and journalists will ask us about it. For the wrongdoing of a few, all of us will get punished. We all have to go through the stress of having to explain and defend our sport.
It also has a knock-on effect on the whole sport, not just the pros. Maybe we’ll lose a few young cyclists from junior teams if their parents think they should stop this sport because of seeing the doping cases. Almost every
“It is really frustrating to ind out that people still try to take a shortcut to success, money and fame, or that people are still desperate enough to try these things”
cyclist is affected by this – I am really over it, that a few people can hurt us all again. You’ll agree with me that we don’t need any more cases like this. However, there are a few good points to take away, maybe. This case does show that it’s possible to catch people who are not following the rules. And, of course, we can say that the sport is cleaner without these cyclists. But it would be so much better to have a clean sport in the first place, without more scandals and doping cases.
I just hope that all athletes in all sports learn from this and simply don’t do illegal things any more. I don’t blame cycling – it’s always just the doing of a few people, not the whole sport, or even the whole team. Just a few individuals. I hope that we don’t have any more cases like this in the future. Our sport is too beautiful to be tainted by the actions of a few people going the wrong way. I will keep my fingers and toes crosses that I never have to write about this again. Ever. Period.
Jens Voigt retired in 2014 following an 18-year career as one of the sport's most loved and attacking riders. He held the Hour Record for 42 days. Commentators never did agree how to pronounce his name.