So we thought the 2008 Tour de France was finished and in the books. Typically there were cyclists like Manuel Beltran of Spain testing positive for EPO, and Dmitriy Fofonov of Kazakhstan testing positive for a banned stimulant. The winner is in the books, and we all move on....right? No.
Authorities report that the Tour will re-test doping samples for a more careful examination of the new CERA EPO. To the AP:
Several Tour de France riders are having their blood samples retested for traces of the banned blood-booster EPO.
The head of the French Anti-Doping Agency told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the testing involved riders who were already under scrutiny for suspicious urine samples. Pierre Bordry declined to name the cyclists.
The new blood tests will look for CERA, a third-generation variation of EPO. Italian rider Riccardo Ricco tested positive for the substance during the Tour.
"I have decided that we will retest — with blood testing — all those who showed up as suspicious during the urine samples," Bordry said by telephone. "When we did the urine samples of those athletes, we had a serious suspicion that there was CERA. The laboratory could not say definitively. The same analysis will be done, but in the blood samples."
Bordry asked for the blood samples to be sent from Lausanne, Switzerland, where they were tested during the Tour.
"All the blood tests have been repatriated to France," Bordry said, adding that they are currently being examined at the Chatenay-Malabry laboratory, outside Paris.
Testing has already begun and could take up to two weeks, Bordry said.
CERA EPO developed as a medical advance -- a molecule large enough not to be sucked out of the kidneys as quickly as the other versions of EPO. Cyclists thought the new version would go undetectable, however anti-doping agents were apparently almost ready for the drug.
As mentioned, Riccardo Ricco tested positive in the original Tour testing, while several other cyclists have suspicious results.
Bordry also said that Spanish rider Moises Duenas Nevado's "B" sample came back positive for EPO, confirming the original finding.
Also testing positive during the Tour were Manuel Beltran of Spain, for EPO, and Dmitriy Fofonov of Kazakhstan, for a banned stimulant.
Ricco and his teammate Leonardo Piepoli were fired by the Saunier Duval team — which also lost its sponsor.
Even though Piepoli did not test positive, he was released for violation of the team's ethical code. Spanish media later reported that Piepoli had admitted to his team that he took the same form of EPO as Ricco.
French cyclist Jimmy Casper tested positive for a banned steroid, but has since been cleared on grounds that he forgot to renew a prescription for a long-standing asthma problem.
I applaud the retest of the Tour samples. But their "random" tests were actually targeted based on performance, so some riders who didn't do anything dramatic may have slipped through. One expert said that they knew something was wrong at the Giro d'Italia but didn't have a test for it. I wish they'd use the new test on those samples, especially since some of the stars tested positive later in the summer.
Posted by: John | 09/17/2008 at 14:02
I applaud the retest of the Tour samples. But their "random" tests were actually targeted based on performance, so some riders who didn't do anything dramatic may have slipped through. One expert said that they knew something was wrong at the Giro d'Italia but didn't have a test for it. I wish they'd use the new test on those samples, especially since some of the stars tested positive later in the summer.
Posted by: John | 09/17/2008 at 14:02
I remember hearing about this during the tour, that the samples would be preserved for future testing. How many times can a sample be tested? The idea being that if a test comes out a few years later than they can go back and retroactively catch people who were previously under the radar. The problem is that some people don't trust the tests and the procedures. How do you ensure the samples aren't tampered with when they are held for so long?
Posted by: CheatorBeat.com | 09/17/2008 at 14:17
Samples could be tampered, or samples could degrade. Labs, however, should institute quality control measures and security measures in storing the samples.
How often can a given sample be tested? It doesn't take much urine to run through a Isoelectric focusing procedure...
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