Tour de France anti-doping tests divide teams after Vingegaard crash
A new wave of evening anti-doping controls has deepened a rift in professional cycling over testing methods, pitting the sport's commercial guardians against rider welfare just days after a leading contender's race-ending crash.
Several leading Tour de France teams were subjected to anti-doping tests on Monday evening, escalating a bitter dispute over testing schedules. Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe had its eight riders tested at 10pm, while Decathlon CMA CGM's seven remaining riders faced controls at around 8.30pm.
"We were also visited last night, some riders were already asleep," Red Bull manager Ralph Denk told German television channel ZDF. Spokespeople confirmed that in some cases across the peloton, targeted riders had already gone to bed. Picnic-PostNL, Jayco-AlUla, Bahrain Victorious and Groupama-FDJ United were also tested.
The controls followed a highly controversial round of early-morning tests on Sunday. The International Testing Agency (ITA), the independent body handling controls for the International Cycling Union (UCI) since 2021, visited Jonas Vingegaard at 2am and Tadej Pogacar at 5am. Both tests occurred just hours before a major mountain stage.
The timing ignited a fierce debate after Vingegaard crashed on a bend that day, breaking his collarbone and abandoning the race. Pogacar speculated that his rival's disrupted sleep contributed to a lack of concentration. The teams involved represent major European corporate sponsors that rely on a stable race to protect their investments.
The CPA union representing professional cyclists called the night-time process counter-productive. Pogacar and Evenepoel had previously denounced the early-morning controls as "inhumane" and disrespectful.
Jonathan Vaughters, the manager of the EF Education team, offered a starkly different view. "2am testing is one of the very effective ways to prevent peptide (EPO, hGH) and testosterone micro dosing," he wrote on social media. "If UCI had tested us in 2001 at 2am? We'd all have been suspended and saved the sport 25 years of drama."
Vaughters, who in 2012 admitted to doping during his time on Lance Armstrong’s US Postal team, framed the aggressive testing as a necessary safeguard. The ITA petitioned a Paris judge to conduct tests outside the standard 5am to 11pm window. For a sport still haunted by the doping scandals of the 1990s and 2000s, strict enforcement is viewed as essential to maintaining its commercial credibility.
