Kohl: blood-doping at the Tour
Bernhard Kohl not only used CERA during the 2008 Tour de France, but also blood doping. The Austrian underwent three transfusions of his own blood during the race, he said on German television Monday night, after announcing his
retirement from the sport. In another interview, he admitted that he first started doping at age 19 when he joined the military.
Appearing on the
Beckmann talk show, Kohl said that he received the EPO derivative CERA from a "sports colleague", whose name he did not publicly mention. Kohl was
suspended for two years after
testing positive for CERA at the Tour.
The Austrian's manager Stefan Matschiner brought two litres of blood and centrifuge to the Tour, Kohl said. He went to Matschiner's hotel room three times to receive transfusions of half a litre. "In a few quiet minutes between massage, interviews, eating. It went pretty fast, it was all over in 20 minutes."
Meanwhile, Kohl denied that there was any systematic doping at his former Team Gerolsteiner. "I can definitely say that there as no team-organised doping." But he wouldn't comment as to whether any team doctors were involved, saying only, "If a doctor can add one and one together, then he knows that this performance didn't happen honestly."
His first exposure to doping came at age 19, when he joined the Austrian military as an athlete-soldier. "At 19, I had got maybe three or four shots," he said in an interview widely printed in the Austrian media. Doping starts in the U23 days, he said, and not just in cycling.
His continued the use of performance-enhancing substances was not hindered by doping controls. "Out of 200 controls, 198 showed nothing. And I tell you, 100 of them should have been positive. "I would give myself a shot in the morning, the controllers came an hour later - so what."
Blood passport ineffective?
Kohl moreover said that the UCI's blood passport had been a big help to his career, implying that the system does not detect doping as expected. "I had the blood passport for a year and a half, and my blood values were A-1. That's why I got my super contract with Silence-Lotto."
The Belgian team
signed him after Gerolsteiner folded, but
annulled the contract after Kohl's positive test.
Kohl said that Silence-Lotto "saw my blood values and said, 'wow, he does that well!' Because they know that you don't finish third in the Tour simply from bread and water, that the medical aspect has to be there, too. They said, 'he's no risk, we can spend a lot of money on him.'"
(SW)
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