The list so far as published by El Pais the Spanish newspaper. News is that Ullrich will be suspended by T-Mobile along with his DS Rudy Pevenge and team rider Oscar Sevilla, not sure yet about Basso. This is very bad news for cycling and the Tour may struggle now with many stars named in the Fuentes dossier, they are:
Existing known suspended or retired riders: Roberto Heras, Angel Casero, Santiago Perez, Tyler Hamilton
AG2R: Francisco Mancebo
Astaná-Würth: Michele Scarponi, Marcos Serrano, David Etxebarria, Joseba Beloki, Angel Vicioso, Isidro Nozal, Unai Osa, Jörg Jaksche
CSC: Ivan Basso
Caisse d’Epargne-Illes Balears: Constantino Zaballa
Comunidad Valenciana: Vicente Ballester, David Bernabeu, David Blanco Rodriguez, Jose Adrian Bonillla, Juan Gomis Lopez, Eladio Jimenez, David Latasa, Javier Pascual, Ruben Plaza, J.Luis M. Jimenez
Saunier Duval: Carlos Zarate
Phonak: Jose Enrique Gutierrez, Jose Ignacio Gutierrez
T-Mobile: Jan Ullrich, Oscar Sevilla
Unibet.Com: Carlos Garcia Quesada
This from BikeBiz.com’s editor Carlton Reid:
Team sponsor demands suspension of Tour de France favourite
Jan Ullrich of the T-Mobile Team has this morning been pulled from the race, which starts tomorrow. Team-mate Oscar Sevilla and sporting director Rudy Pevenage have also been suspended. All are implicated in the Spanish doping scandal that is engulfing pro cycling. The Team Discovery director believes ‘Operacion Puerto’ will be much bigger than the Festina scandal of 1998 and could be the biggest doping scandal in sport ever. Team sponsors will be reevaluating the worth of investing in cycling. T-Mobile, the German communications firm, demanded that the Team T-Mobile management suspend with immediate effect Ullrich, Sevilla and Pevenge.
The team management complied with this demand. The riders and Pevenge are not yet accused of doping crimes but when ‘Operacion Puerto’ said there was a list of high-profile riders linked to the doctor at the heart of the scandal all T-Mobile riders were asked to sign written statements saying they’d never had contact with Dr Eufemiano Fuentes.
Christian Frommert, director of sports communication for T-Mobile International, said:
“Our stance was always unequivocal. If we were presented with evidence, which leads us to doubt the credibility of one or other of our riders, then we act upon it immediately. That is the case now.“
Team manager Olaf Ludwig was deeply disappointed: “We talked to the riders several times and even have their declarations of innocence in written form.
“There are clear guidelines arranged with the riders, which leave no room for interpretation. This was also clear to Jan Ullrich, Oscar Sevilla and Rudy Pevenage,” said Ludwig.
Against this background, the sponsor as well as the team management repeatedly questioned the riders and the sporting director. “At first we had no reason to doubt the riders’ statements. Therefore, we couldn’t make any decision merely based on speculations, rumours and guesses“, said Frommert.
“This situation has now changed profoundly. Accordingly, we will now live up to our responsibility towards making cycling a clean sport.”
Ullrich and Sevilla were told of their suspension on the team bus at 9.34am this morning. They were on the way to a pre-tour press conference.
Ullrich had been one of the favourites to win this year’s Tour de France, the first post-Lance Armstrong Tour. Eurosport commentator David Duffield had Ullrich down as his favourite for the yellow jersey so an audio-and-pix podcast interview with ‘Duffers’ is now seriously out-of-date even though it was conducted just a few days ago.
