Well, would you look at that? The entire roster of Colombia’s Team Medellin–EPM, including former Grand Tour star Oscar Sevilla, has been handed a 30-day suspension.
It was the result for two riders on the squad being linked to anti-doping violations.
The suspension was announced on Tuesday by the International Testing Agency (ITA). The ITA is an independent anti-doping program on behalf of the UCI. The Colombian Continental squad will be benched from March 27 through April 25.
Multiple riders nailed
Under UCI anti-doping rules, a team can be temporarily suspended if two or more riders or staff members are notified of certain doping violations within the same 12-month period.
And that’s exactly what happened. Two of the riders were flagged through irregularities in their Athlete Biological Passports.
Aldemar Reyes Ortega was first notified of a potential violation on June 10. According to the ITA, Officials cited unexplained abnormalities in his biological passport from testing periods between February and August 2023.
Then there were two
And then, a second case. On Aug. 21., Fellow Colombian rider Fabio Andrés Duarte Arévalo was informed of similar concerns. His passport showed irregular values from February 2023 as well as from July to December 2024 and January 2025.
So since both cases fall within the same 12-month window, the whole team gets a suspension.
Sevilla, now 49, has been racing for almost three decades. He was one of the best climbers twenty years ago…but career hasn’t been without controversy. Known as El Niño for his youthful looks, he was implicated in the Operación Puerto doping scandal. Despite being mentioned early in the investigation, he still kept competing.
He even snagged a win at the Vuelta a Asturias. Right before the 2006 Tour de France, both Sevilla and former pro Jan Ullrich were directly tied to the case and banned from competing. T-Mobile ultimately fired him.
He also raced for the notorious Rock Racing team, an American squad that didn’t shy away from hiring riders who had similar…sketchy histories.
Sevilla raced at the 2025 Tour de Beauce, where, despite his age, he finished third against riders half his age. Granted, he may not have the kick he did in his prime, but he still made light work of most of the field on the Queen stage up Mont Mégantic. Although since the bad ole days of everybody in the pro peloton getting popped, Sevilla has not had any violations, however.
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