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Electric bikes? Call for checks at Tour de France
HESPERANGE, Luxembourg – French cycling team chief Alain Deloeil called for checks at the Tour de France to ensure that racers are not cheating by using motors hidden in their bike frames.
Recent speculation has focused on Swiss rider Fabian Cancellara, who denied this week he won Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders this year with the help of an electric bike.
Deloeil, sports director of the Cofidis team, said Thursday that checks should be carried out on the Tour to prevent "mechanical doping."
But former top rider Johan Museeuw says the whole idea of racers using hidden motors was not plausible, even though the technology exists.
Speaking at the start of the Tour of Luxembourg's first stage, Deloeil urged the International Cycling Union (UCI) to develop a technology to detect motors in frames.
"I hope they will make sure that no rider will use them on this year's Tour de France," he said. "If it's true, this is mechanical doping. Cycling is about men riding their bikes, with their physical strength. If you add a motor, we'll soon be riding the 24 Hours of Le Mans Moto."
A video posted on different websites appears to show Cancellara pushing a button on the handlebars of his bike during both races.
Museeuw, a past winner of the Paris-Roubaix and Tour of Flanders races, doubted that bike manufacturers would have developed such a device for racers, but said he could see why Cancellara's behavior might have seemed suspicious.
"The system is available," Museeuw said. "I saw it at a bicycle showroom at Las Vegas last year.
"I don't know if Cancellara used it, but when you see the video on the Internet, you can see that Cancellara makes a strange move twice. He also changed his bike twice. So even if I don't believe he cheated, it can be suspicious."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100603/ap_on_sp_ot/cyc_mechanical_doping_1
HESPERANGE, Luxembourg – French cycling team chief Alain Deloeil called for checks at the Tour de France to ensure that racers are not cheating by using motors hidden in their bike frames.
Recent speculation has focused on Swiss rider Fabian Cancellara, who denied this week he won Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders this year with the help of an electric bike.
Deloeil, sports director of the Cofidis team, said Thursday that checks should be carried out on the Tour to prevent "mechanical doping."
But former top rider Johan Museeuw says the whole idea of racers using hidden motors was not plausible, even though the technology exists.
Speaking at the start of the Tour of Luxembourg's first stage, Deloeil urged the International Cycling Union (UCI) to develop a technology to detect motors in frames.
"I hope they will make sure that no rider will use them on this year's Tour de France," he said. "If it's true, this is mechanical doping. Cycling is about men riding their bikes, with their physical strength. If you add a motor, we'll soon be riding the 24 Hours of Le Mans Moto."
A video posted on different websites appears to show Cancellara pushing a button on the handlebars of his bike during both races.
Museeuw, a past winner of the Paris-Roubaix and Tour of Flanders races, doubted that bike manufacturers would have developed such a device for racers, but said he could see why Cancellara's behavior might have seemed suspicious.
"The system is available," Museeuw said. "I saw it at a bicycle showroom at Las Vegas last year.
"I don't know if Cancellara used it, but when you see the video on the Internet, you can see that Cancellara makes a strange move twice. He also changed his bike twice. So even if I don't believe he cheated, it can be suspicious."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100603/ap_on_sp_ot/cyc_mechanical_doping_1