2007 Tour de France - Doping Scandals

Doping Scandals

The first scandal arrived when it was made public on 18 July that rider Patrik Sinkewitz from the T-Mobile Team had tested positive one month before the Tour started. Sinkewitz had already withdrawn from the race having incurred an injury during the 8th stage. The scandal was big enough to prompt German TV broadcasters ZDF and ARD to drop their coverage.

The Tour was dealt a major blow when the first-place Astana team withdrew from the race on 24 July 2007, after team member and pre-race favorite Alexander Vinokourov from Kazakhstan tested positive for an illegal blood transfusion. Vinokourov's teammates Andreas Klöden and Andrey Kashechkin were in 5th and 7th place respectively at the time.

At the start of the 16th stage on 25 July, some teams made a protest against the laxness of the official attitude to doping in the race. After the stage, race officials announced that Cofidis team member Cristian Moreni of Italy had tested positive for elevated levels of testosterone, and the Cofidis team withdrew from the race.

Spanish cyclist Iban Mayo tested positive for EPO on the second rest day of the Tour, on 24 July.

French prosecutors wanted to start a legal case against Vinokourov, Mayo and Moreni, and requested the UCI to hand over the doping samples. The UCI refused to give them, and in May 2011 the investigation was stopped.