| |
 Off the hook Italy's Mapei cycling team cleared after doping probe
Posted: Thursday April 01, 1999 06:48 PM
BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) -- Belgian investigators said suspicions of doping involving Italy's Mapei cycling team were unfounded and released the racers and management Thursday after questioning. One Italian member of the team's medical staff remained in custody on suspicion of sending banned drugs to a contact in Italy not linked to the team. "We've always been a team that makes an effort to show what we are doing," team manager Patrick Lefevere said after leaving the police station in the western Belgian city of Kortrijk. "If you have 55 people in the team, there's no way you can avoid having one bad apple." Mapei, one of he leading competitors on the professional cycling circuit, was dramatically pulled from a race in the North Sea resort of De Panne by police Thursday morning and hauled in for questioning. The authorities acted after intercepting a package sent from the team's Kortrijk hotel to an address in Italy. The package contained five vials of banned amphetamines hidden in a video cassette, investigators said. After questioning team members for some 10 hours, searching the team's hotel and subjecting the racers to doping controls, Kortrijk state prosecutor Louis Deneckere said there was no evidence linking the cyclists or the team management to the banned substances. He praised the team for its cooperation with the investigation. Belgian news media quoted Deneckere saying it appeared the medical staff member, whose name was not released, was acting alone, without the knowledge of the rest of the team. The Mapei team includes Belgium's Johan Museeuw, a multiple World Cup winner and former world champion; current World Cup holder Michele Bartoli of Italy; and Alex Merckx, son of former cycling star Eddy Merckx. Team members said Mapei intends to compete as planned in the Tour of Flanders classic Sunday, the second event on the 1999 World Cup circuit. The team was competing in the traditional De Panne Three Day race in preparation for the Tour of Flanders. The De Panne event was temporarily suspended as other teams refused to race in a show of support for Mapei. The shadow of doping has hung over professional cycling since the sport's blue ribbon event, the Tour de France was marred by scandal last year. The Festina team from France was expelled from the Tour for admitting to the use of banned drugs; other teams withdrew from the race and some remain under suspicion. A French judge Thursday placed Daniel Baal, the head of the French Cycling Federation, under formal investigation for his role in the Tour de France scandal.
| |||||||||||||||||
Copyright © 1999 CNN/SI. A Time Warner Company. Terms under which this service is provided to you.
| |||||||||||||||||
