Jan Ullrich about systematic doping in his days: "The sponsors knew everything, but they paid me well to not talk about it"
Cycling
Jan Ullrich has been quite openly speaking out about doping in the 'Armstrong era' recently. Speaking to the German public television WDR, the 1997 Tour winner confrimed that, for a long time, he had deliberately waited to confess to doping until his friend and former rival Lance Armstrong had admitted his guilt.
"I'm glad I gave in, now I can continue my work more easily," he sighs in relief. In his documentary 'Der Gejagte', Ullrich talks openly about his doping use, which culminated in his 1997 Tour victory. "There was so much speculation about it. I had to change something in my life, so I decided to talk about it. It was good for me, the burden became lighter and now I can continue with my work more easily."
"The documentary worked for me as a kind of therapy. Now I can talk about it with my children." Ullrich admits that he waited for the confessions of his great friend and rival Lance Armstrong before coming forward with his story.
"People now understand that doping was something systemic. The sponsors knew everything. I wouldn't call it silence, but they paid me well. It was a mutual agreement not to talk about it."
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- Which off-season are you referring to? The one after he won the Tour of California? The one after he won 3 stages and was on the podium of the Vuelta? The one after TJV screwed up, never put him away, and lost the Tour on the time trial? We've seen the guy hit the wall, lose energy, nearly fail, and lose races ("I'm dead") more than once. He's got a visible threshold and his fueling regimen is a clear weak spot. You'll need more detail to make this more than under defined insinuations .RidesHills19-12-2024
- Interesting analysis. And yet, I'm in the US, and at a recent wedding reception as a group of us older folks had to stand at a certain place to keep track of a thing, we got to talking, and every single one of us had a favorite rider, a favorite circuit of races, a moment when we fell in love with the sport, and a joy in the complexities of it all. None of us knew about the other's fandom until that moment. It's wonderful that these are my brothers-in-law, and we now know to talk about this when the spouses aren't listening. Point being: there are fans all over, and for US folks, the loss of GCN+ has been huge. As so often, it's the media bottleneck that matters more than anything else. Look at F1 in the US before Netflix, as an example.RidesHills19-12-2024
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- And it’s likely going to get worse. They are going all-out to drive away small local events which are where a lot of new riders come from. They want fee income and Olympic medals. That’s all.JoeyB19-12-2024
- Oh Lordspock12319-12-2024
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maria2024202419-12-2024