bicycle.net -- World Road Championships 2009 :: cycling news, product reviews, original essays, podcasts & video

Written by: Myles McCorry

The scandalized professional cyclist, the doper, the cheat, is still a bike rider.

He started out as a kid, loving the speed and friendship that only biking offers. His natural talent shone through in the local races. Cycling was easy and fast, and due to his genetic ability and determination, victories became commonplace. These wins encouraged training and dedication to our wonderful sport. All combined to national, then international amateur success.

At this point our biker is on top of the world and the Pro peloton came calling. A dream for the vast majority of us cyclists, who can only fantasize about riding for a living. Then something happened. The
pressure for victory or the threat of contract loss at the hard, high level- where every rider is a champion. Something that triggered a weakness in our rider. A desire for victory over took honour or an
offer for an easy win in a dark room- “’cause everyone was doing it”.

Regardless of the ‘Why’, the big essential element is the ‘How’. Professional athletes are just that, Athletes – not chemists, not doctors. They have skin suits and allen keys in their bags when they
turn pro – not a pharmacy. There has to be intermediaries. There has to be experienced dopers, passing on their knowledge. There has to be a supply chain of tight-lipped accomplices who supply and persuade. The ‘how’ can very quickly become the ‘why’. Director sportifs, who doped in their own career, would see it as normal for a rider to use performance enhancing drugs. They, the bosses, influence and push drugs, as a path to victory. In the last decade it became common place and sadly has a residual influence today.

Sanctions given to the rider (although important to dissuade repetition and as a punishment for damaging the sport) only will stop one more rider cheating. Cutting out the dealer, the bent doctor and the cheating management MUST be part of the solution to ending the use of drugs in sport. A solution that is necessary and its implementation urgent. We must protect another generation of riders from temptation
and another generation of fans from disappointment.

BikePure.org giving the clean riders a voice and the fans a petition for change.