Noting that riders are using more and more medications, seeing this as a “gray area” from a regulatory point of view, the Movement for Credible Cycling sent a warning to the UCI.
Doping remains intrinsically linked to cycling. In a report recently published by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the discipline remains one of the most controlled for the year 2024 but this does not stop the suspicion regarding the performances of the riders. In a press release published at the beginning of the week, the Movement for Credible Cycling (MPCC) took a position regarding the “excessive use of medications” in the peloton and calls on the International Cyclist Union (UCI) to “act in the face of the gray zone which continues to expand”.
The group of professional teams mentions “substances and medical treatments which are not yet prohibited by WADA” which however raise “serious ethical questions when they are used by healthy athletes rather than by the sick patients for whom they are intended”.
The MPCC regrets “a regulatory void”
For the MPCC, a reaction from the UCI is urgent in order to “protect both the credibility of the sport and the health of the peloton” but also to avoid seeing a rider “forced to use questionable products simply to remain competitive”. Regretting “the often very long delays in anti-doping processes”, the MPCC member teams see this relative inertia leaving “a regulatory void every year”.
One of the examples highlighted is the use of ketones, about which this group alerted in 2017 with a “notice of non-recommendation” issued by the UCI in 2022. “Many teams and riders have ignored this recommendation, some even going so far as to establish commercial partnerships with ketone suppliers,” adds the MPCC.
The UCI called to react as quickly as possible
The case of “end of race cans” containing “questioning substances which would be mixed then distributed” is also mentioned in this press release, as is tapentadol, a product presented as “ten times more powerful than tramadol”. “Wouldn’t a safer approach be to ban a product during the investigation period and then, once it is established that it is healthy to prescribe it, to authorize its use? “, questions the movement which assures that “the excessive medicalization of runners is a major problem which requires concrete actions”.
But above all, the MPCC asks the UCI for “a clear and regulated position on a set of products belonging to the gray zone, or on specific products such as ketones”. The ball is in the court of the institution headed by David Lappartient.
