It was July 20 2007, and Michael Rogers was dominating Stage 8 of the Tour de France.
Rogers was flying the virtual maillot jaune on the road and still gaining time as he rode in the break with Michael Rassmussen, Bernhard Kohl, David Arroyo, Antonio Colom and Stephane Goubert.
Cresting the top of climb of the day, Rogers seemed certain to be heading to a victory that could have set him on his way to Tour de France glory; but it was not to be.
Disaster struck on the descent as Rogers crashed, breaking his wrist in the process.
Thus ending his Tour assault, as Rassmussen climbed on to glory. At the time, viewers were devastated thinking that this was Australia’s best opportunity to win the Tour; but now, in hindsight, everyone can only think one thing – how did he do it?
Of the group Rogers was riding with, three of the riders have since been banned and/or have admitted to doping.
Michael Rassmussen was kicked off the race by his team for violating his whereabouts. At the time he denied all doping charges, but has since confessed to using drugs at the 2007 Tour.
Bernhard Kohl returned a positive test for CERA at the Tour in 2008. When he confessed to using drugs, Kohl stated that it is “impossible to win without doping”.
In 2009, Antonio Colom tested positive for EPO use and was handed a two-year ban. He later admitted to doping.
Rogers was the best rider of the group on the Cormet de Roselend.
A further discussion point was Rogers’s unexpected move from Team Sky to Saxo-Tinkoff was one that was claimed as being purely financial. Given Sky’s budget in cycling, this is unusual.
Sky made all of their riders and staff sign a declaration that they hadn’t and will not dope.
It is important to note that Michael Rogers has never failed a test. Neither has Lance Armstrong, nor the most recent disgraced rider, Stuart O’Grady.
In May 2011, a UCI report was leaked to the French daily sports newspaper L’Equipe. It was a list of the riders who competed in the 2010 Tour de France, ranking each on suspicion of doping.
Australians Michael Rogers, a triple world time-trial champion, and Matthew Lloyd were placed in a category that contained riders who showed “overwhelming evidence of some kind of doping, due to recurring anomalies, enormous variations in parameters, and even the identification of doping products or methods”.
Pre-race blood tests were compared with each rider’s UCI biological profile, with variations between the two determining the level of suspicion.
The UCI was quick to point out there had been no actual detection of illegal substances.
In a sworn affidavit American cyclist Levi Leipheimer, Armstrong’s former teammate, named Rogers as attending two training camps in 2005 run by Dr Michele Ferrari, Armstrong’s genius chemist.
Rogers has previously admitted it was an “error” to work with Ferrari, saying, “He didn’t have the best name in the industry, but that was the mistake I made. I can understand it tainted my reputation; but it’s an error I made.”
Bones506
Roar Guru
Evens caught that bunch on that day b/c of his superior descending skills from his MTB days - not his cl;imbing.
delbeato
Roar Guru
Rogers' fluctuations in form are probably more reasonably explained by his recurring accounts of suffering from Esptein-Barr virus. That doesn't mean he's clean or dirty though.
Lamby
Roar Rookie
Very old news. Evans was asked to go to Ferarri to do a series of one-off tests (his tests were ahead of his time - he used them to work out the effectiveness of doping) before he was signed with Saeco to see if he had the numbers to be a road biker, as opposed to a mountain biker (the numbers were as good as anybodies.) Evens said he never worked with him again.
liquor box
Guest
I have no doubt he is suspicious, but didn't Evans have a link to Ferarri? Why is this not a story? If you are going to bring up every cyclist that has a possibility of being linked to doping then include them all! Evans is praised for being able to win a TDF seemingly on his own due to his poor team, he also is praised for "going solo" after his famous mechanical and catching a world class group of cyclists to stay in contention. Why is Evans escaping your scrutiny?
Lamby
Roar Rookie
If you look at his career, the times when he has been competitive has been when he has been on 'dodgey' teams. He came from about 4-5 year of ordinary performances, joins Sky and is suddenly riding like he was at Deutsche Telekom during the Ulrich era. Which is why I am convinced that Sky are not clean.
Silver_Sovereign
Guest
where his legs are
Psych_ling
Guest
Rogers is dodgy. Why do you think he moved from Sky?
footsore
Guest
While circumstantial evidence can never lead to definite conclusions it has always been Michael Rogers that I've been most suspicious about. I find the level of success he had in the EPO era to be too high for questions not to be raised. In regard to PED use in cycling in that period I believe that, while not dismissing the seriousness of the deception, the outrage and disappointment shown by people and authorities is absurdly high. Surely there can no longer be any shock when someone's history is revealed. Perhaps we can start looking at that period of cycling like rock music in the 70s. You wouldn't be surprised to hear that a musician from that period took cocaine would you? While the cocaine may not have lead them to compose better music it was almost culturally unavoidable. Another comparison that I can think of, and it is an ugly one, is with the Catholic Church. Those that govern the church don't want to admit their errors, claim it was a few bad apples and carry on with business as usual. They reluctantly admit that there is a systematic problem and if they do they claim they can deal with it internally. Impartial outside observers can see that there is more nonsense to this than fact. Cycling, and I'd say sports in general, also has this problem. Until it is resolved there will be little faith in the sport, no matter how clean the riders are the suspicion of the system will always be too high for credibility to exist.