Following the gruelling mountain stage of the Tour de France, cycling stars Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard were woken from their sleep. According to their own accounts, the two Tour winners were required to provide a doping sample during the night.
“I only got four hours’ sleep,” said the Slovenian Pogacar on Eurosport ahead of Stage 15. He had been tested at five o’clock in the morning. “I always go to bed late, but it was still a huge shock,” reported the 27-year-old.
Pogacar listens to hip-hop
“I had a lovely long morning; I didn’t go back to sleep. I just chilled out and listened to some old Eminem hits. And I had a coffee,” he said. “It definitely wasn’t nice being woken up in the middle of my sweet dreams,” said the star with a smile.
As the wearer of the yellow jersey for the overall leader, Pogacar is already being put through his paces every day during the stage. “I also feel sorry for the people who have to monitor us, because I can imagine that some riders get upset and angry. But it’s not their fault,” he clarified. They were just doing their job.
Vingegaard: “A big surprise”
His long-standing rival, Jonas Vingegaard, was also affected. The International Testing Agency (ITA) had ‘not allowed’ the Dane ‘to get much sleep’. “I’d slept well, but then someone rang my doorbell at two in the morning. That came as a big surprise to me,” he also said on Eurosport.
Unlike Pogacar, Vingegaard seemed somewhat contrite. “It’s good that they’re testing, but if it affects your performance and your sleep, then I don’t think it’s such a good thing. Hopefully I won’t be the only one in the end, because ultimately it should be the same for everyone. It’s not much fun at two o’clock,” he said. It took him 40 minutes to get back to bed.
From 1998 to 2009, various doping scandals in cycling had generated a flood of negative headlines. Doubts continue to surround the sport, not least due to the recent strong performances by top riders such as Pogacar. It was not immediately clear how many professional cyclists in total were affected by the night-time operation.
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