Doping #1

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Shane Sutton storms out of medical tribunal after denying doping and lying


After multiple bombshells during two hours of dramatic testimony Shane Sutton, the Australian former head coach of British Cycling and Team Sky, stormed out of a medical tribunal on Tuesday having denied he was a serial liar, a bully and a doper.

Earlier Sutton had accused his former colleague Dr Richard Freeman, who is the defendant in a fit-to-practise case, of being spineless and a drunk whom others in British Cycling wanted dismissed.

Sutton finally boiled over after questions over an order of 30 sachets of the banned substance Testogel, sent to the Manchester velodrome in 2011, which he denied was to treat his alleged erectile dysfunction. “I would have no problem in telling you it was for me. You are telling the press I can’t get a hard on – my wife wants to testify that you are a bloody liar.

“I have never ordered any Testogel and I swear on my three-year-old daughter’s life,” said Sutton, who added that he would take a lie-detector test to prove it.

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O'Rourke also accused Sutton of having a laugh when he said that he had never heard of Testogel until it was reported in the press. "There's only one joker in the room and that's you," Sutton said.

However, when O'Rourke began picking over a statement Sutton had given the GMC last year, which she suggested meant he had assumed there was more than one box of Testogel, he finally boiled over.

"I am going to leave the hearing now," Sutton said. "I don't need to be dragged through this shitfight that this individual is trying to bring on me.

"I was asked to come here and answer whether I ordered Testogel. I did not. As far as I am concerned I am going back to my hole in Spain and enjoy my retirement and sleep at night knowing full well I've not ordered any patches."

Sutton then addressed Freeman, who was hidden behind a screen while he was giving evidence because he is considered a vulnerable witness. "The person lying is the man behind the screen and hopefully one day he will explain why," Sutton said.

"He's a good bloke, a good friend, I have no argument with him or anyone else. There was no one better bedside. I am happy with what I achieved in my career. I wish Richard all the best."

Sutton then turned viciously against Freeman. "This is a guy who the joint head of cycling wanted out the door because he turned up drunk on several occasions.

"Richard went through a messy divorce. He was like the Scarlet Pimpernel. I covered his backside while he was there. Two critical cases of athletes ill and we couldn't get hold of him. If you bring [the former British Cycling head of medicine] Steve Peters in, he would verify it all.

"I haven't lied. I'm not going to be dragged through this by a mindless individual who is defending someone who has already admitted lying. He's hiding behind a screen, which is spineless. Richard, you're a spineless individual."

After he left the tribunal Sutton said he was unsure whether he would come back to give evidence on Wednesday. He said he had become emotional partly because of a serious family matter involving one of his children.

If he does not return, Freeman's legal team could ask for Sutton's evidence to be struck from the record or given less weight.

The tribunal heard that the Daily Mail had acknowledged a request to give what O'Rourke claims is a secret affidavit from Sutton that is "totally inconsistent" with evidence he had given to a parliamentary inquiry into doping in sport.

O'Rourke has previously claimed that document was in the newspaper's managing editor's safe as "an insurance policy against any potential claims for defamation by Sir Bradley Wiggins, Freeman or Sir Dave Brailsford" and that it contained "a number of lies".

The tribunal continues.

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Op woensdag 13 november 2019 11:42 schreef DeeBee het volgende:
Zo rollen de oplichters van BC en de SkyGoden. Gewoon weglopen bij hearings en de duurbetaalde advocaten het laten oplossen. Pure blufpoker die ook werkte tegen de UCI in de Froome-casus.

twitter:

inrng twitterde op woensdag 13-11-2019 om 15:56:11 Four year ban for Kristijan Đurasek (UAE Emirates) for "anti‐doping rule violations committed from 2016 to 2019" linked to Operation Aderlass. He'd been provisionally suspended since May https://t.co/o0Mtf8PahY reageer retweet

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Op woensdag 13 november 2019 12:48 schreef _-_ratjetoe_-_ het volgende:

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Maar Sky/Freeman proberen het juist af te schuiven op Sutton.

Prachtig trouwens, een heel wielerteam voor hongerige testosteronwolven, en dan bestel je het alleen voor een eind-vijftiger met erectieproblemen

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British Cycling and Team Sky kept a stock of Viagra for riders in a cabinet because riding for so long gave them “nerve issues”, Dr Richard Freeman’s medical tribunal was told on Thursday.

On another day of revelations at the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service in Manchester it was also claimed both organisations put glory before athlete welfare and employed two senior staff members who could not be trusted.

The claims came as Dr Steve Peters, formerly the head of medicine at British Cycling, admitted mystery still surrounded the delivery of banned Testogel sent to the Manchester velodrome, which they shared with Team Sky in 2011.

Freeman has accepted 18 of the 22 charges against him from the General Medical Council, including ordering Testogel and lying to UK Anti-Doping and Peters about the order. But he insists he was bullied into doing so by the Team Sky and British Cycling head coach, Shane Sutton, to treat Sutton’s erectile dysfunction, an allegation denied by Sutton – who stormed out of the tribunal on Tuesday after being accused of being a “serial liar and a doper”, which he also denied.

When asked who was behind the Testogel delivery, Peters replied: “I feel like I am being made to solve the crime here. I have a man who has lied to me, I have another guy who is also untrustworthy.”

However, Peters appeared to display a lack of curiosity when Freeman alleged to him that the Testogel was for Sutton in 2017. “I didn’t ask why he had ordered it,” he admitted to the tribunal. He then advanced another theory: that Freeman had ordered the Testogel to treat himself and it had backfired when the order was discovered.

Mary O’Rourke, QC for Freeman, then revealed Viagra pills were regularly ordered into the velodrome “because athletes spending a long time in the saddle have nerve issues that require them”.

However, Peters denied the Viagra had been for performance reasons. He also revealed that British Cycling had brought back Sutton into the organisation despite serious incidents with riders after the Beijing 2008 Olympics because he was so good at helping the team win medals. “When he was good he was excellent, everyone said that, provided he wasn’t stressed,” Peters said, before describing Sutton’s “aggressive behaviour” and how he would “go on the warpath”.

He said: “He got so intense about the standards of the team, which led him into a stressed position . He could run for two months without an incident, then I would get someone coming in saying I think he is bullying me, or being aggressive. It was repeat behaviour.”

Peters also agreed with O’Rourke’s analysis that Sutton had a “tendency to be emotionally unstable and could lash out” especially when under pressure to live up to British Cycling’s “medal factory” status – which allowed the organisation to hit UK Sport’s performance target and therefore deliver more funding. “Richard and [former British Cycling physiotherapist] Phil Burt found it very hard to stand up to Shane’s aggression and that was true of a lot of the athletes,” he said.

Peters said he was sceptical of the GMC’s case that Freeman had ordered Testogel to dope a rider. “At no time did I see any evidence it was for a rider. That’s a ‘huge leap’.”

Peters also told O’Rourke he did not believe Dr Freeman would order it from Fit4Sport to dope a rider because he knew there would be a paper trail. “He could go to Asda, right across the velodrome and write a private prescription, right?” O’Rourke said. “Yes,” replied Peters.

“If he was doping for a favoured athlete he wouldn’t need to put it through British Cycling?” “Yes.”

The tribunal was also told Sutton has seven children by three or four partners and was fond of telling Mr Peters about his relationships. “My relationship with Shane is up and down, like anybody, but he is a very open book,” Peters said. “I was surprised when it was claimed that Testogel was for him. Shane was a very open man. He confided a lot in me with his relations.

“We have two men here, one of them is lying. For me there has to be an answer. I am still in the dark with bits of the jigsaw missing.”

The tribunal continues on Friday.

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Ineos will leave cycling if rules were broken, says Ratcliffe

Cyclingnews an hour ago

'I am not interested in the history, just our watch' says owner
Jim Ratcliffe has stated that Ineos would have no hesitation in pulling the plug on their WorldTour team if cheating was found within their ranks.

The comments come as former staff members of British Cycling and Team Sky – the previous name of Team Ineos - face questions relating to the General Medical Council's (GMC) case against doctor Richard Freeman. Despite initially denying the claims, Freeman has admitted that he ordered sachets of the testosterone drug Testogel to the British Cycling and Team Sky headquarters in Manchester in 2011. It’s alleged that the drug was ordered to treat an athlete, a claim that Freeman denies.

Freeman resigned from his post in 2017, and is now facing the Medical Practitioners Tribual Service after the GMC raised 22 allegations of misbehaviour, only four of which Freeman is contesting. All relate to the Testogel order and his motivations for making it.

Speaking to the Times, Ratcliffe reiterated his words from earlier in the year, stating that Ineos ran a clean operation and that they carried out thorough due diligence before taking over the sponsorship from Sky in the spring of this year.

“Dave [Brailsford] will have to deal with that side,” he said in relation to the GMC case. "And going forward. If there are any issues for Dave he will have to deal with those. There is nothing happening in our team," Ratcliffe told the Times.

According to Ratcliffe, his confidence in his team's current practices stem from the high levels of due diligence his legal team undertook before agreeing to sponsor Brailsford's team to the tune of around £40 million. The squad has won the Tour de France every year bar one since 2012 with their only blip coming in 2014 when Chris Froome crashed out. In 2019 Egan Bernal won the race in just his second attempt, while 2018 winner Geraint Thomas finished second. It was the second straight year in which the squad finished with two riders on the podium. “We checked all the procedures, everything, doctors’ records. You buy a cycling team, there wasn’t much legal work to do but we spent a lot of time on due diligence on the team. We had external lawyers do those checks, looking at the procedures, testing. We took it seriously. The regulations when we bought, and the procedures in Team Sky, were the most sophisticated and rigorous in the cycling world," Ratcliffe added.

“Our chief counsel, who looks at compliance across Ineos, was responsible for looking at compliance in cycling. And if he ever tells me he has a concern, that will be it done for us. The day any of that enters our world then we would leave cycling. I don’t think it will.”

Ratcliffe, Brailsford and Chris Froome presented the Team Ineos colours on the eve of the Tour de Yorkshire in May. Brailsford and Froome were asked about the team’s willingness to drop their Ocean Rescue livery from the 2018 season and work with one of the largest producers of plastics less than a year later. At the same time, Ratcliffe was asked about the credibility of the team he had just agreed to back.

A portion of Team Sky’s success came at a time when UKAD launched a 14-month investigation into a suspect package delivered to the team at the 2011 Critérium du Dauphiné. There was an accusation that the package contained the corticosteroid triamcinolone - banned in-competition without a Therapeutic Use Exemption - a claim that the team denied.

The UKAD investigation was closed without any anti-doping charges issued but a UK Parliamentary Select Committee later declared that "the credibility of Team Sky and British Cycling is in tatters - they are in a terrible position."

In 2017, an anti-doping case was brought against Chris Froome after his Vuelta a España win, though he was later cleared of any wrongdoing by the UCI and WADA.

"The day that any of that enters our world, we’ll be exiting that world,” Ratcliffe said back in May.

"I have no interest in using methods to enhance performance that you shouldn’t use. I have no problem with marginal gains - better chainrings or better aerodynamics, that’s fine, that’s all Formula 1 stuff - but I’ve got absolutely no interest in cheating. That’s not my game.”

The GMC case against Freeman continues.

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Op zondag 24 november 2019 12:40 schreef Momo het volgende:

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Cyclingnews

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Op maandag 25 november 2019 09:43 schreef DeeBee het volgende:
Gelukkig vertrouwt Ratcliffe de altijd liegende Brailsfraud om dit allemaal te leiden en is alles compleet anders sinds de dag dat het altijd onethische Ineos begon met sponsoren, zonder dat er maar iets is veranderd aan de renners en begeleiding.

Voor je kijken, doorlopen, zou Ratcliffe nog graag tegen iedereen willen zeggen!

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Op woensdag 13 november 2019 12:48 schreef _-_ratjetoe_-_ het volgende:

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Maar Sky/Freeman proberen het juist af te schuiven op Sutton.

Prachtig trouwens, een heel wielerteam voor hongerige testosteronwolven, en dan bestel je het alleen voor een eind-vijftiger met erectieproblemen

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Sofie De Vuyst is bij een “Out of Competition”-dopingcontrole positief test op exogene steroïden. De Belgische renster van Parkhotel Valkenburg is per direct op non-actief gesteld door haar team.

Later meer.

twitter:

NicoDick twitterde op dinsdag 26-11-2019 om 19:54:32 Sofie De Vuyst, onlangs nog verkozen tot Flandrienne 2019, testte in september positief buiten competitie... Die hadden we niet zien aankomen. De Vuyst zou volgend jaar voor Mitchelton-Scott rijden. https://t.co/HdiqBVKSLj reageer retweet

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Op dinsdag 26 november 2019 19:56 schreef Rellende_Rotscholier het volgende:

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Ach nee, de vriendin van Bart de Clercq.

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"Dit is een bericht dat ik nooit had willen schrijven", opent ze. "Tot mijn grote verbijstering kreeg ik gisteren het bericht dat ik tijdens een controle buiten competitie op 18 september positief heb getest op "exogene steroïden"."

"Bij mij heeft ethisch en verantwoord "proper" sporten altijd op de eerste plaats gestaan. Ik tast dan ook volledig in het duister hoe dit is kunnen gebeuren. Ik ben er helemaal kapot van, de ergst mogelijke nachtmerrie is me overkomen."

"Ik schreeuw dan ook mijn onschuld uit, al besef ik dat ik op veel ongeloof zal stoten. Ik zal er alles aan trachten te doen om mijn onschuld aan te tonen en mijn naam te zuiveren."

"De wielersport is een prachtige sport, dit bericht doet het imago van de sport helaas geen goed. Ook dat maakt me heel triest. Dat ook mijn huidige ploeg op deze manier negatief in de aandacht komt, raakt me persoonlijk. Deze zaken zijn dan ook een extra drijfveer om dit alles uit te klaren. Ook de sport en het team verdienen dit niet."

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Op dinsdag 26 november 2019 20:06 schreef wimderon het volgende:
Een lichtelijk opvallende sprong voorwaarts voor Sofie afgelopen seizoen.

[ afbeelding ]

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Op dinsdag 26 november 2019 20:06 schreef wimderon het volgende:
Een lichtelijk opvallende sprong voorwaarts voor Sofie afgelopen seizoen.

[ afbeelding ]

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UCI wil urine- en bloedstalen uit 2016 en 2017 opnieuw laten testen

De Internationale Wielerunie UCI heeft de Cycling Anti Doping Foundation (CADF) gevraagd om hercontroles op urine- en bloedstalen uit 2016 en 2017. De UCI diende dat verzoek in op basis van informatie en documenten die van de Oostenrijkse justitie werden ontvangen in de dopingzaak Operation Aderlass.

Naar aanleiding van die affaire zijn al meerdere renners geschorst, onder wie de Italiaan Alessandro Petacchi, de Slovenen Kristijan Koren en Borut Bozic, de Kroaat Kristijan Durasek en de Oostenrijkers Stefan Denifl en Georg Preidler. Zij waren klant bij de omstreden sportarts Mark Schmidt, de spilfiguur in het dopingschandaal dat eind februari uitbrak. De Duitse arts coördineerde vanuit zijn praktijk in Erfurt honderden illegale bloedtransfusies. Ten minste 21 atleten uit acht verschillende landen en vijf verschillende sporten kwamen op het lijstje met verdachten te staan.

Volgens de UCI zijn hertesten van oude monsters noodzakelijk om oude overtredingen van de dopingreglementen alsnog aan te tonen in het peloton.

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Op woensdag 27 november 2019 20:33 schreef wimderon het volgende:

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Zeg het maar jongens, wie hebben er een groot probleem?

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Op woensdag 27 november 2019 20:33 schreef wimderon het volgende:

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Zeg het maar jongens, wie hebben er een groot probleem?

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Op woensdag 27 november 2019 20:33 schreef wimderon het volgende:

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Zeg het maar jongens, wie hebben er een groot probleem?