Tour de France Riders Test Positive for Drugs

P A R I S, Aug. 8 -- The Tour de France may face anotherscandal after 45 percent of riders who provided samples for aFrench anti-drug agency during this year’s race showed traces ofdrugs in their systems, the agency said today.

Michel Boyon, president for the Council for Prevention ofDrug Use, or CPLD, said in a statement that after the first resultsof tests taken during the race: “Analyses of samples at thenational laboratory at Chatenay-Malabray revealed the presenceof doping products in 45 percent of the urine tests.”

Boyon said 96 tests had been performed on 71 cyclists duringthe race. Four riders were tested for each of the first 15stages and the rest in the closing stages.

Boyon said 28 tests were positive for cortico-steroids,which reduce fatigue and act as painkillers, and 10 tests werepositive for stimulants salbutamol and terbutaline, which aidbreathing. He said five tests revealed the presence of bothtypes of drug.

No Names Revealed

He did not reveal the names of the riders who had testedpositive for banned substances and said some could have hadmedical reasons for using the drugs.

Six samples taken were declared invalid because of faultytesting procedures.

The drug agency said it had used French government standardsin compiling its results. The International Cycling Union saidlast week that all the tests it carried out during the Tour hadproved negative.

Three riders, however, were sent home before the start ofthe Tour after blood tests proved they had illegal levels ofhematacrite — which suggests use use of the banned hormoneerythropoietin, or EPO.

Tour de France officials were not immediately available today for comment on the CPLD report.

Drug testing during the race has been stepped up since thesacndal-ridden 1998 edition.

The CPLD, set up by the French government in the wake ofthat scandal, is an independent body that carries out its owntesting.

It has the right under French law to impose sanctions onboth French and foreign riders if it is not satisfied with theactions taken by sporting bodies.