Cycling doctor gave banned steroid to family and friends

THE doctor at the centre of the British Cycling drugs storm administered controversial medication not just to riders but to staff, family and friends.

The credibility of Team Sky and British Cycling has been left ‘in tatters’, a parliamentary committee concluded this week, after it emerged Dr Richard Freeman did not keep records of drugs given to Sir Bradley Wiggins and other elite cyclists.

UK Anti-Doping chief Nicole Sapstead told MPs that an investigation into the medical package delivered to France for Wiggins in June 2011 had uncovered orders for large quantities of corticosteroid triamcinolone — which can only be used in competition with a medical exemption — but no audit of what happened to it.

Sapstead said the investigation was sparked by an allegation that the package ordered by Freeman contained triamcinolone, the medication the British Olympic hero used with a medical exemption before he won the 2012 Tour de France.

Wiggins and Team Sky have denied committing any doping offence. But when Freeman was asked to explain when and to whom the quantity of triamciPrior nolone he ordered was administered, he is believed to have told UK Anti-Doping investigators that he had given the drug to patients other than cyclists, but was unable to provide them with any evidence.

It is believed he made the same claim to his former employers at Team Sky (he now works exclusively for British Cycling).

Both British Cycling and Team Sky declined to comment last night while some insiders offered a different version of events, saying it was a lack of communication between doctors that led to multiple orders of triamcinolone.

But Sapstead told MPs that Freeman’s record-keeping could yet amount to an issue for the General Medical Council, having revealed to MPs that the triamcinolone order was either ‘an excessive amount for one person or quite a few people had a similar problem’.

UK Sport chief executive Liz Nicholl last night said these are ‘shocking revelations’, adding a warning over funding. She said. ‘The funding agreements will be issued in March but those will contain conditions. And there will be timescales.’

Meanwhile, Jonathan Browning, the new chairman of British Cycling, launched a 39-point action plan yesterday that did not make a single reference to medical procedures.

Browning also admitted he did not know if the governing body still share a medicine store with Team Sky.

to appearing before the media at the National Cycling Centre in Manchester, it might have been prudent to respond to the revelations to MPs the previous day by finding out how things work in the building now.

But when asked about a room that sounded like a drug dealer’s lock-up in Westminster on Wednesday, Browning was unable to confirm whether Team Sky still store their medicine on the same shelves as British Cycling.

And when he asked the five or six British Cycling staff also dotted around the room, among them the acting CEO, if they knew, he was met by a blank response.

In fairness to Browning he was appointed only last month, having been a non-executive director for the previous two years. He would seem to have no involvement in the hugely damaging revelations that have all but destroyed the credibility of Team Sky and a British Cycling team that only last summer was being heralded as an example all others within the British Olympic family should follow.

But it was the sight of British Cycling staff then dashing off to determine that, no, the professional road team do not continue to share a single medical resource with the GB squad that remained troubling.

Nobody was quite sure when the arrangement stopped. So it remains a less than perfect marriage when Team Sky staff — at least until very recently — use the meeting and analysis rooms that form part of a medical suite that includes the store room where banned substances have been disappearing off shelves without being properly audited.

It was interesting inside the National Cycling Centre yesterday. There was Phil Burt, the physio who packed the jiffy bag sent out to France for Wiggins but who has told UK Anti-Doping chiefs he cannot remember what was in it.

And there were Team Sky staff understandably concerned about the future. It seems certain they will not be based in Manchester much longer and it is difficult to see how Sir Dave Brailsford can survive as team principal.

The timing of yesterday’s press conference seemed odd, and not just because Browning and UK Sport chief executive Nicholl had chosen to unveil their reforms for the crisis-hit governing body before the publication of an independent report into the issues, sparked by last year’s bullying allegations revealed by Sportsmail, that they are trying to address.

But they surely realised the focus was not going to be on staff restructuring but on the massive damage to the sport.

Nicholl eventually conceded that, yes, the revelations that emerged during the select committee hearing had been ‘shocking’ and that public trust in GB’s elite cyclists had been undermined.

But it was surprising that an action plan that contained reforms for best practice did not include a revision of medical protocols even if, as Browning stressed, such issues are not about to be raised by the independent review.

British Cycling has gone through a period of rapid change. New chairman, soon to be appointed new chief executive, new head of performance. In terms of moving on quickly from the darkest period in their history, a new leadership team will help. As will reforms that include greater levels of care for riders and even support after they finish riding.

To those who may have been bullied or suffered discrimination, Browning said: ‘Clearly, British Cycling has collectively achieved great things in the recent past but it’s also clear that some of the success has come at a high price.

‘We would like to place on record our apologies to those concerned. We sincerely regret any of those negative experiences.’

However, let us reflect on the response from cycling so far. An ill-conceived press conference about reforms not connected to these drug revelations, the sight of Wiggins ranting at a TV crew and a statement from Sky, on Wednesday, that failed to address one issue raised by the head of UK Anti-Doping in the House of Commons.

It is not enough and if they think this is where the story ends, they are very much mistaken.