Austria's Bernhard Kohl is the latest pro cyclist to be accused of doping at the Tour de France after a French lab retested his urine samples taken during the race in July.
Kohl finished in 3rd place overall, wearing the King of the Mountains jersey at the time.
He's the fourth Tour cyclist accused of using CERA, a new form of EPO, and the second one from the Gerolsteiner team to flunk the test.
The doping tally for the 2008 Tour de France now stands at 7 cyclists, and counting. The French anti-doping agency is performing CERA retests on more cyclists' samples.
A statement from the French testing agency states:
“The AFLD confirms that its laboratory at Chatenay-Malabry has found two abnormal samples showing the presence of EPO Cera in blood tests done on 3 and 15 July, before and during the Tour de France, on Austrian cyclist Bernard Kohl.”
Manufactured by Roche Pharmaceuticals in Europe for kidney patients, the drug Continuous Erythropoiesis Receptor Activator (CERA) is a new form of EPO. It's sold by the name Micera. Roche recently worked with the World Anti-Doping Agency to create a way to detect its abuse by athletes.
The other three previously found positive for doping with CERA are Stefan Schumacher of Germany (Gerolsteiner) and Italians Leonardo Piepoli and Riccardo Ricco, both of Saunier Duval. Three others removed from the Tour for other doping were Manuel Beltran of Liquigas, Moises Duenas of Barloworld and Dmitri Fofonov of Credit Agricole.
Naturally B samples will be checked and the cyclists have the opportunity to dispute the findings.
Alarmed by its use in the peloton, CERA is the focus of retests by the International Olympic Committee of some 1,000 samples taken during the Beijing Olympics.
See also: “Tour de France doping revisited: 2 more cyclists accused”
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