Jumbo-Visma team manager Richard Plugge has spoken about doping in cycling and specifically about the ‘black day’ during the summer when the team learned that Michel Hessmann returning a positive anti-doping test for an unnamed diuretic, the team’s first anti-doping case for a decade.
The Dutch team provisionally suspended Hessmann two months after an out-of-competition test on June 14 in Germany detected a banned substance. The 22-year-old is also under investigation by German police.
“August 16, 2023 was a black day for our team,” said Plugge in his column for WielerFlits’ RIDE Magazine.
“For the first time in ten years, we received the message that a rider from our team, Michel Hessmann, had taken a positive doping test.
“It remains an open topic of discussion and the riders also keep each other on their toes. Unfortunately, it went wrong and then a lot came our way.
“We have to look in the mirror ourselves, are we doing everything right?”
Hessmann needs to explains why he tested positive for the diuretic or potentially face a ban of up to four years under the World Anti-Doping Agency code. He still faces a two-year if can prove he unknowingly took the banned substance via an contaminated supplement. Doping is a criminal offence in Germany but the 2015 law has not led to any incarceration of German athletes.
“Everyone involved in and with our organization must be aware of everything,” Plugge said of Jumbo-Visma’s stance and internal rules.
“Germany has a doping law, so the public prosecutor’s office is automatically involved. Criminal law has the presumption of innocence, while disciplinary law reasons the other way around. It is up to the athlete to prove that he has done nothing wrong.”
Plugge spoke retrospectively of the team’s past right back to their former sponsor Rabobank and cycling’s dark days of doping in the 1990s and 2000s with reference to the team’s rebrand in 2013 as Blanco and his aims to “build a cycling team from a blank sheet of paper” and “end an era”.
Hessmann’s positive test has damaged the team’s reputation in recent weeks especially amidst their total domination of the Vuelta a España, taking out the top three spots on the podium with Sepp Kuss, Jonas Vingegaard and Primož Roglič, while also completing the trilogy of Grand Tour victories in one season with the three riders mentioned.
Vingegaard echoed his sentiments from this year’s Tour de France at the Vuelta, insisting that he…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CyclingNews RSS Feed…