The following quotes are from an extensive interview by Rasmus Bech from Politiken from the morning of the 8th of July. I have tried to translate as accurately as possible, but keep in mind that this is a translation, and meanings may not always come across well.

In the interview, Bjarne Riis shows that he is in good spirits, and says that he is not losing sleep over the Basso case.

“I don’t feel good about all of this, I think everyone can see that. I don’t want to pretend either that it does not pain me that we have ended in this situation, for ever since I started working with CSC, I have built up the team to achieve a triumph at the Tour. But it seems that it just cannot happen, at least not right now.

“[One month ago,]I could not have imagined it in my wildest imagination [that the Tour would end like this]. we were in the middle of out best year, the biggest year, and Basso was so strong that I would not hesitate to call him one of the world’s best cyclists – and I still think so, regardless of what he has done,” says Riis.

“We have followed Basso closely throught the season, and all training, all tests, and all bloodtests are fine; nothing indicated that there was anything wrong. Everything was simply right, and this is what makes this entire case so incredibly. I mean – Basso is simply so good [as an athlete] that he has no need to dope [to be competitive].”

The journalist asks whether Riis feels Basso has let him down. Riis strongly disagrees, and feels that it is a bad question. Basso must have his chance to defend himself against all the accusations, and only after that can innocence or guilt be ascertained.

Riis comments that he keeps contact with Basso, but that they do not talk together every day, as the discussions tend to end up going in circles due to paucity of information. The journalist then asks whether Riis has “interrogated” Basso on all the accusations put forward in the media.

Riis answers yes. The journalists asks what the answers are.

“Basso says that he has not had anything to do with Fuentes, and has not visited him. And he answers precisely and clearly. He doesn’t hesitate for a moment, and he appears completely in balance,” comments Riis.

“And I have also asked whether he has a dog named Birillo, and he told me no.”

“What is it called, then?” the journalist asks.

“I don’t know. I don’t recall whether he told me that,” answers Riis.

The journalist asks whether Riis believes as much in Basso today, as he did a month ago.

“There is nothing that I want to do more,” Riis says. “But when I read and hear all the information that is printed in the media, even I cannot avoid a little bit of doubt.”

“When you see Basso with the kind eyes and the winning, charming smile, you really can’t think of him as a ‘criminal’, can you Bjarne, but isn’t this the same story we have seen with many riders?” Bech asks.

“Yes, one must say that,” answers Riis.

“But why did you suspend Basso? He is not charged of anything thing, it is not him, but Fuentes, who is under investigation……. Why did you not just let him continue?”

“Because,” Riis answers, “at the same time as I saw Basso’s name in the spanish report, which I only got the opportunity to read for a few seconds, the sports directors came to the agreement – we all did when the spanish report was made public – that we had to follow the ethical charter we had decided on ourself. Someone read from the rules, and I had no choice; I had to make a quick decision, and therefore I suspended Basso. I simply did not have time to thoroughly investigate the case.”

“If you had more time,” Bech asks, “would you have let Basso start the Tour?”

“I can not say that at this time, but just think about that if I had gone against the decision of the collected sports directors of all the protour teams, the uproar would have been enormeous.

“So here we are, we have to go on with the race, and that is what I am contentrating on now.”

The journalist ask whether Riis thinks it is pure coincidence that the report appears just before the Tour, rather than in march or in three months time. The journalist wonders whether there is a hidden agenda at work.

“That is a very dangerous question to answer, because I do not really know. But of course there are politics involved in the case,” Riis comments. “There are a fantastic amount of rumors flying around, about everything.”

“Can you imagine that there might be someone using this case against you? That since they can not get at you, they try and do it indirectly through Basso?” the journalist asks.

“Do you have a particular person in mind,” Riis asks with a smile? The journalist assures him no. “I don’t think so. I do not feel hunted – even if certain parts of the danish press try hard to discredit me.”

“Can you understand, Bjarne, that people feel involved? The great CSC hero was not allowed to start, and Tour-lovers says ‘the summer is ruined’, and others that you can’t trust cyclists. The curiosity is enormeous,” the journalist explains.

“I understand it – also that emotions are split. And that people want an answer to it all. So do I. Especially why the hell this continues to go on,” Riis answers.

“You said earlier that Basso has no need to dope himself. But let us assume that he has doped, why would he do it? What could make him do that?” the journalist queries.

“What can I say… lack of belief in himself, perhaps, maybe uncertainty. But if he has done it, it would beyond understanding.”

The journalist asks the big question: “A boss, who owns a company with 70 employees and annual revenues of 100-120 million danish crowns, as is the case with Riis Cycling (the company behind Team CSC); would he risk it all by being involved in doping? Would you, Bjarne?”

“Of course I wouldn’t.” Doping is a subject that I bring up with the team every year. I tell them what the conditions are – I have had my career, created a good life for myself, gotten myself a fantastic family; I do not need to be here. But I am here because I want to make the world’s best of most trustworthy cycling team. That is why what has now is a blow to the back of the head for me, I will admit that. But when I told my wife that what I most wanted to do was run away from all this screaming, she told me – ‘no you don’t’. And I won’t, but it will be very hard to turn this around and come back.”

“If it is so hard, why don’t you just let go of the responsibility. You – with your connections – could easily get as job as a sports director at T-Mobile or anywhere else,” the journalist asks.

“Yes, or for that matter do something completely different; I have the possibilities. But no, I am here, and I believe that cycling needs me. I have been surrounded by all kinds [of doping suspicion] in my time, and that is why there is a need for my experience. I have become more and more aware of my responsibility, and I fight for my team – and right now that is more important than at any time before.

“I can not say anything now [about how this will end]. I can’t do anything to help or hinder Basso’s situation, in that I am helpless. Now I am concentrating on my team – they need me now.”

The journalist asks whether Riis confronted his riders with the doping problem, and tried to find out if others might be “in trouble”.

“When I had sent Ivan home, I held an hour-long press conference. It was hard, but necessary – and once I had pulled myself together from that, I collected the team, explained the situation with Ivan, and said that was that – no one else was involved according to the papers – and I did not expect any more surprises. Yes, I cried while I spoke with them, I couldn’t hold back the tears.”

It seems that bad fortune continues to follow Team CSC as Bobby Julich crashed out on stage 7, breaking his wrist. More than ever, the team will have to stay faithful to its values, and prove that the work Riis and B.S. put the team through at the famous training camps each december really do make a difference.

Today though, Riis will have the opportunity to lean back, relax, and purge his thoughts as he takes a day off from the cycling circus to watch the World Cup final in Berlin.

Journalist: “Is Basso’s dog named Birillo?”

Martelli: “I do not know!”

Massimo Martelli, Basso’s lawyer, is unconcerned by whether his client is innocent or guilty, and refuses to comment the detailed allegations against his client published by the media. He is in Spain to begin the process of getting his client back on the road.

“I am very indignant about the way Ivan Basso has been treated. Not even the lowliest of workers would be treated like this. If you turn away someone, you at least have to give them a chance to defend themselves.”

“Basso is suspended on the basis of a big round zero. The decision was taken after a browse through a document that was not even translated from Spanish. The teams talk about ethical principles, but this is Burundi-ethics we are talking about. CSC should not have suspended Basso so fast without knowing the charges against him.”

Martelli is in Madrid, and finally got access to the summary of the report (39 pages) through his private connections. “The document is filled with references to stuff that is not in the summary. So there is no evidence in it,” says Martelli. He is now trying to get access to the full material.

Martelli notes that his client can not be charged criminally. In Spain, a cyclist cannot be charged criminally for doping. Doping is a crime in Italy, but Martelli is not worried by this. “The crime – if it has happened – happened outside of Italy. For that reason, Basso cannot be charged in Italy.”

Martelli’s anger is particularly directed at the French sportsminister, who is – according to his opinion – the man who made a big deal out of the Operation Puerto case, and caused the unjust treatment of the riders. “Don’t ask me why the minister was so eager to spread the report. Maybe to put focus on doping? But one could well ask the sports minister: Why does France only put focus on doping for one month every year, during the Tour the France?”

Bjarne Riis and Joost de Maeseneer has once again been forced to respond to the latest “revelations” of the press. In doing so, they also added more details.

According to Maeseneer, Basso was tested three times during the Giro d’Italia and his blood was examined according to three different parameters: haematocrit, haemogoblin, and stimulation index.

“I can not reveal Ivan’s numbers, but I can assure you they are completely within normal boundaries – which in the case of the haematocrit means between 38 and 45. Ivan was at no time outside these bounds. The same is true of all the tests we have done in the past. And please note, we do our tests without notifying Basso first.

Bjarne Riis has been analyzing Ivan Basso’s performances since November/December when they started working toward the Tour de France. And according to Riis, Basso’s performance has been simply one of slow, gradual improvement, without any strange jumps in performance.

“Even in my wildest imagination, I can’t imagine how he would have been able to manipulate with his blood,” Riis says. “If he suddenly has given half a liter of blood, it should definitely be noticeable in the test runs that we perform regularly, but just like there are no explosive increases, I have not registered any sudden decreases in performance. For that reason, I don’t see how I could have done anything different in my work with Ivan.”

Several news services have recently reported that Joost de Maeseneer considers Ivan Basso a “cheater”. This is an error.

“I have never said that”, says de Maeseneer. “I leave everything open. It’s up to Basso to prove that he is innocent in the Fuentes-case.

“I have called Basso just this morning, cause this case still has a big impact in our team. We talk about it each day, everyone in the team is unhappy. Basso is a nice kid, who we all like to work with and who we want to work very much with in the future”, says de Maeseneer.

The teamdoctor is “99% sure” that Basso has done nothing wrong, “but 100% sure you never can be…”

Speaking on Spain’s Cadena Ser radio station, Eufemiano Fuentes has struck out at “the list” of doped athletes that was released by the Spanish authorities, and which led to the exclusion of Ivan Basso and others on friday.

“I’m angry about the whole matter. Names have appeared of people that I don’t even know and there are others that haven’t come out and I’ve no idea why, but my professional oath forbids me from revealing their names,” Fuentes declared. “Treatment only for cyclists? I’m also indignant about that. I’ve worked with other sports, like athletics, tennis and football. There are a lot of names that haven’t come out, there have been only selective leaks. I don’t know why… There are still riders in the Tour de France who I have treated.”

With his statements, Fuentes spreads more uncertainty about the case, and raises serious questions about the justice of ASO and AIGCP’s decision to exclude 13 riders from the Tour.

La Gazzetta dello Sport has provided additional information about Basso’s alleged links to Eufemiano Fuentes (thanks to zarathustra on the DP Forums for helping with the translation from Italian – any errors are mine, though).

In a conversation between Fuentes and Labarta, taped on the evening of May 14 – just hours after Basso’s stage victory on the Passo Lanciano – Fuentes and Labarta apparently discuss the result of the race, and Fuentes says in a mischevous tone”A strange rider won: Basso, Ivan Basso.” Labarta replies knowingly: “A certain Ivan Basso”.

According to La Gazzetta, Labarta later seems to be complementing Fuentes as he observes that Basso and another alleged client, José Enrique Gutierrez, occupy first and second place on general classification.

Labarta: “Good, my boy, a certain Basso and a certain Guti are first and second.”
Fuentes: “My goodness”.
Labarta: “You have first and second”.

After stage 7, they also discuss the rider Birillo.

Labarta calls Fuentes to talk about the results and outlines the great performance of the “Bufalo” who finished 4th.
Labarta then gives more informations to Fuentes about the results: “Savoldelli, yes, and then after 16 seconds arrived Birillo with Simoni, at 20 seconds Zapatero, at 24 seconds Uno. All very well. I want to say that all of those riders which are interesting for you (….) are in the race and have done well.”

[Zapatero > alleged to be Scarponi, Uno > alleged to be Unai Osa.]

The result of stage 7:
1 VERBRUGGHE Rik
2 SAVOLDELLI Paolo 0:14
3 MAZZANTI Luca 0:14
4 GUTIERREZ CATALUNA José E. 0:14
5 REBELLIN Davide 0:16
6 BASSO Ivan 0:16
7 HONCHAR Serhiy 0:16
8 SIMONI Gilberto 0:16
9 LEFEVRE Laurent 0:20
10 SCARPONI Michele 0:20

Only Rebellin, Honchar arrived with Basso and Simoni 16 seconds down. Somehow (not described in La Gazzetta) the investigator excluded that Rebellin and Honchar are implicated and came to the conclusion that only Basso can be Birillo.

Birillo also appears on another handwritten note taken from Fuentes and referring to testosterone patches, blood plasma, the female hormone treatment gonadotropine, and also the code for a Swiss bank account.

As always, it should be noted that these are reports from the press, and none of this information has yet been confirmed by the authorities.

It is increasingly beginning to look as if Ivan Basso’s career may end up being held hostage by Operation Puerto.

Basso will not be allowed to prove his innocence, the public prosecutor Manuel Moix in the case of Operation Puerto made clear monday. The Spanish courts do not intend to start a criminal case against Basso, because doping is not illegal in Spain.

But in refusing to start proceedings against Basso, the Spanish authorities are also denying access to the details of the case to Basso and the other riders excluded from the Tour. As a suspect in the case, Basso is a potential witness, and his access to the material around the case has thus been denied.

The result of this is that Basso has been incriminated by Operation Puerto and thrown out of the Tour, but is not allowed to find out why and defend himself. And with a case of the magnitude of Operation Puerto, it may take months, if not years, before the case works itself through the courts.

Team CSC has asked Ivan Basso to prove his innocence, but if no case is raised against him, there is a very real possibility that it may take a very long time before that will be possible.

“It is impossible for me to say [how long the case may last]. But Ivan is suspended until we have a resolution. Such are the rules, and we will follow them. That of course also means he won’t be riding the Tour of Denmark, if the situation does not change.”

Asked what happens if Basso fails to prove his innocence, Riis is stern.

“There is no question. All our riders sign contracts that specify that any doping infringement is a breach of contract. And that is of course also true for Basso. It also states that the riders should only use the team’s doctors.”

Queried on Dr. Cecchini who was at one time Basso’s trainer, Riis reacted sharply: “Cecchini did not function as a doctor on the team. He is educated as a doctor, but that is not the same as him functioning as one with us.”

Riis acknowledges that the situation for Basso at the moment, unable to defend himself, is untenable, but notes that there is little he can do at the moment.

“I can’t start a case against Basso, but it is in our interest also to have a resolution soon. But we have to wait for the system to work, we don’t have other possibilities.”

With access to the information from Spain closed to him, Basso will have to hope that the UCI and the Italian cycling federation move quickly, and take a quick decision to either charge him for doping offences, or drop the case.

With the UCI spending time and energy quarrelling with WADA and the French sportsministry, who knows when that will be?

According to the Spanish police, Basso may have been one of Fuentes clients, under the code name of Birillo. And this Birillo is supposed to have performed a transfusion/blood manipulation on May 12, in the middle of the Giro.

Team CSC doctor, Joost de Maessener is very sceptical of this allegation, as it does not fit in with the tests that the team itself took during the Giro.

“There is nothing that happened during the Giro, that leads me to believe that Basso was doping,” Maesseneer explains in the Danish daily Jyllands Posten. “His blood was normal at the start of the race, and his Haematocrit fell a little toward the end of the race, which is normal. As far as I can see, he rode the race cleanly, although I can of course not know if he had been doing anything before the Giro [when the team doctors would not have been able to monitor Basso].”

Quick-Steps manager, Patrick Lefevre, has been quoted as supporting Bjarne Riis in the ongoing doping controversy, according to the Danish newspaper BT. Danish media have been harsh on Riis, saying that it is inconceivable that Basso could be doping without Riis knowing about it. Not so, according to Lefevre.

“I have had a similar case myself,” Lefevre says. “Johann Museuw was not just my rider, but also my friend for many, many years. We were always together. And it hit me like a bomb when it was revealed that he was involved with doping. I had no suspicion.

“Riis is not mentioned in the report [from Operation Puerto], and we believe in him,” Lefevre says.

Everyone on Team CSC are of course hard hit by the ongoing doping investigation implicating Basso. One thing that the team is not doing, however, is hiding away. In fact, every Team CSC rider at the Tour has apparently been given standing orders that he must reply openly to questions on the ongoing doping case against Ivan Basso.

So far, all that has resulted in, are statements of support for Basso. Comments so far indicate that Ivan Basso assured his team mates of his innocence in the case in a meeting after the suspension, and at least publically, all the riders have stated they believe him.

In an interview friday, Kurt Asle Arvesen, who is a close friend of Ivan Basso since their amateur days, said that he was highly surprised by the suspension, and will believe Basso innocent until proven otherwise. In the same interview, Kurt also expressed his anger and shock at the idea that so many riders in the peloton would be doping. “I feel cheated,” he says. “I ride and compete with these people. If this is so widespread as seems to be the case, then it is a terribly frustrating situation for those of us who ride cleanly.”

« Previous PageNext Page »