The American specialist in doping, Max M. The use of strychnine, far from being banned, was thought necessary to survive demanding races, says the sports historian Alain Lunzenfichter. A track rider of the era said he had developed such a tolerance to the drug that he took doses large enough to kill smaller men. The American champion Major Taylor refused to continue the New York race, saying: 'I cannot go on with safety, for there is a man chasing me around the ring with a knife in his hand.' Īlso used was strychnine, which in small doses tightened tired muscles. Riders suffered hallucinations from the exhaustion and perhaps the drugs. Among the treatments they supplied was nitroglycerine, a drug used to stimulate the heart after cardiac attacks and which was credited with improving riders' breathing. The exhaustion of six-day races on the track was countered by the riders' soigneurs (the French word for 'carer'), helpers akin to seconds in boxing. 'It existed, it has always existed', said the French reporter and author, Pierre Chany, who followed 49 Tours before his death in 1996.

9 Doping histories of Top-10 finishers, 1997–2015ĭrug-taking in cycling predates the Tour de France.

8 Status of Tour de France winners since 1961.

4.1 First anti-doping test and a strike.

3 1950s–1960s: Early anti-doping stance.

2 1903-1940s: Doping as acceptable means.

Yet the fact remains great cyclists have been doping themselves, then and now.' For the past 30 years it has been officially prohibited. Journalist Hans Halter wrote in 1998 that 'For as long as the Tour has existed, since 1903, its participants have been doping themselves. Max Novich referred to the Tour de France in a 1973 issue of New York State Journal of Medicine as 'a cycling nightmare'. Those came shortly before the death of Tom Simpson in the Tour de France of 1967. Not until after World War II were sporting or even particularly health issues raised. Cycling, having been from the start a sport of extremes, whether of speed by being paced by tandems, motorcycles and even cars, or of distance, the suffering involved encouraged the means to alleviate it. Use of performance-enhancing drugs in cycling predates the Tour de France. Riders began using substances as a means of increasing performance rather than dulling the senses, and organizing bodies such as the Tour and the International Cycling Union (UCI), as well as government bodies, enacted policies to combat the practice. Early Tour riders consumed alcohol and used ether, among other substances, as a means of dulling the pain of competing in endurance cycling. There have been allegations of doping in the Tour de France since the race began in 1903.

Brothers in arms road to hill 30 cheats