![Femke van den driessche-1454767232](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/41/Femke_van_den_driessche-1454767232.jpg)
Motor doping, or mechanical doping, in
competitive cycling terminology, is a method of cheating by using a hidden
motor
An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy.
Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power g ...
to help propel a
racing bicycle
A racing bicycle, also known as a road bike is a bicycle designed for competitive road cycling, a sport governed by and according to the rules of the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI).
Racing bicycles are designed for maximum performance w ...
. The term is an analogy to chemical
doping in sport, cheating by using
performance-enhancing drugs
Performance-enhancing substances, also known as performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs), are substances that are used to improve any form of activity performance in humans. A well-known example of cheating in sports involves doping in sport, where bann ...
. As a form of "
technological fraud" it is banned by the , the international governing body of cycling.
History
One of the first allegations of mechanical doping goes back to the
2010 Tour of Flanders
The 2010 Tour of Flanders cycle race was the 94th edition of this Classic cycle races, monument classic and took place on 4 April. The course was 262.3 km long, starting in Bruges and finishing in Ninove. The race was won by Fabian Cancellara ...
when
Fabian Cancellara
Fabian Cancellara (born 18 March 1981), nicknamed "Spartacus", is a Swiss cycling executive, businessman and former professional road racing cyclist who last rode for UCI ProTeam . He was born in Wohlen bei Bern, Switzerland. Cancellara began ...
attacked
Tom Boonen
Tom Boonen (; born 15 October 1980) is a Belgian former road bicycle racer, who competed as a professional between 2002 and 2017 for the and teams and a professional racing driver who currently competes in Belcar, having previously competed in ...
on a steep part of
Kapelmuur whilst unusually seated, leading to allegations that there was an electric motor hidden in Cancellara's bike. Four years later the issue was raised again when
Ryder Hesjedal
Eric Ryder Hesjedal (; born December 9, 1980) is a Canadian retired professional racing cyclist who competed in both mountain biking and road racing between 1998 and 2016. Hesjedal won a silver medal at the 1998 Junior, 2001 Under-23, and Elite ...
was the subject of allegations of mechanical doping during the
2014 Vuelta a España
The 2014 Vuelta a España took place between 23 August and 14 September 2014 and was the 69th edition of the race. It featured eight mountain stages, five hill stages, five flat stages, and three time trials (one team and two individual), two of ...
: Hesjedal crashed on stage seven of the race, and video footage of the crash showed his bicycle's rear wheel continuing to spin after it had fallen onto the road, leading to a number of media outlets including the website of French sports newspaper ''
L'Equipe'' questioning whether the bike contained a motor, although it was suggested by ''
Cycling Weekly
''Cycling Weekly'' is a British cycling magazine. It is published by Future and is devoted to the sport and pastime of cycling. It used to be affectionately referred to by British club cyclists as "The Comic". '' that the bicycle's movement could have simply been due to it sliding on a downward gradient. Public pressure on the UCI led to the race
commissaires examining the bikes of Hesjedal's team the following morning: no motors were found. The following spring, checks for bike motors were carried out at
Paris–Nice,
Milan–San Remo, and the
Giro d'Italia.
In January 2016 – almost six years after initial allegations of a pro cyclist doping mechanically – the first confirmed use of "mechanical doping" in the sport was discovered at the
2016 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships
The 2016 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships was the World Championship for cyclo-cross for the season 2015–16. It was held in Heusden-Zolder in Belgium on Saturday 30th and Sunday 31 January 2016. The championships featured five events, in add ...
when one of the bikes of Belgian cyclist
Femke Van den Driessche
Femke Van den Driessche (born 27 August 1996) is a Belgian former cyclo-cross cyclist, mountainbiker and road racing cyclist. As a junior, she became national cyclo-cross champion in 2011 and mountain bike champion in 2013. In 2015, Van den Dri ...
was found to have a secret motor inside.
Some sources claim that motorized doping has occurred before in professional cycling, but that it has gone undetected or unproven. It is seen as part of a larger effort by athletes in many sports to gain mechanical advantage in competition. In May 2010 former rider
Davide Cassani
Davide Cassani (born 1 January 1961) is a former road cyclist and cycling commentator on Italian television from Italy. Now he works as manager for Italy national cycling team.
He was born in Faenza. In 1982 he made his professional debut with ...
demonstrated a motorised bicycle on the Italian public broadcaster
RAI
RAI – Radiotelevisione italiana (; commercially styled as Rai since 2000; known until 1954 as Radio Audizioni Italiane) is the national public broadcasting company of Italy, owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. RAI operates many ter ...
, claiming that similar bikes had been used by some professional cyclists since 2004. The discovery of a motor resulted in a substantial uptick in the level of scrutiny focused on bikes. The UCI has indicated it intends to expend
€
The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists ...
40,000 to 50,000 to purchase scanning equipment. According to Peter van de Abele of the UCI, it also has an app and tablet with which to scan bikes in seconds.
One blogger described it as the worst scandal in cycling since the doping scandal that engulfed
Lance Armstrong
Lance Edward Armstrong ('' né'' Gunderson; born September 18, 1971) is an American former professional road racing cyclist. Regarded as a sports icon for winning the Tour de France seven consecutive times from 1999 to 2005 after recovering fr ...
in 2012.
UCI regulations
The federation's technological fraud article 12.1.013 fully states:
"Technological fraud is an infringement to article 1.3.010. Technological fraud is materialised by:
"The presence, within or on the margins of a cycling competition, of a bicycle that does not comply with the provisions of article 1.3.010. The use by a rider, within or on the margins of a cycling competition, of a bicycle that does not comply with the provisions of article 1.3.010. All teams must ensure that all their bicycles are in compliance with the provisions of article 1.3.010. Any presence of a bicycle that does not comply with the provisions of article 1.3.010, within or on the margins of a cycling competition, constitutes a technological fraud by the team and the rider. All riders must ensure that any bicycle that they use is in compliance with the provisions of article 1.3.010. Any use by a rider of a bicycle that does not comply with the provisions of article 1.3.010, within or on the margins of a cycling competition, constitutes a technological fraud by the team and the rider.
Any technological fraud shall be sanctioned as follows:
# Rider: disqualification, suspension of a minimum of six months and a fine of between CHF 20,000 and CHF 200,000.
# Team: disqualification, suspension of a minimum of six months and a fine of between CHF 100,000 and CHF 1,000,000."
In pertinent part, the technical regulation plainly states:
"The bicycle shall be propelled solely, through a chainset, by the legs (inferior muscular chain) moving in a circular movement, without electric or other assistance."
Sanctioned athletes
Inspections
The UCI says that it has a new device which will reveal the existence of electrical circuitry, armatures, batteries, etc., which are where they are not supposed to be. For the
2016 Tour de France
The 2016 Tour de France was the 103rd edition of the Tour de France, one of cycling's Grand Tours. The -long race consisted of 21 stages, starting on 2 July in Mont Saint-Michel, Normandy, and concluding on 24 July with the Champs-Élysées st ...
, thermal cameras were used to detect hidden motors.
The UCI carried out a total of 10,000 bicycle checks for hidden motors and magnets in 2016, whilst at the
2017 Tour Down Under 132 tests were carried out.
In March 2018, the UCI announced that X-ray cameras would be used in future on
Grand Tour
The Grand Tour was the principally 17th- to early 19th-century custom of a traditional trip through Europe, with Italy as a key destination, undertaken by upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank (typically accompanied by a tut ...
stages and
classic cycle races, to detect the use of hidden motors.
See also
*
List of doping cases in cycling
The following is an incomplete list of doping cases and recurring accusations of doping in professional cycling, where doping means "use of physiological substances or abnormal method to obtain an artificial increase of performance." It is neither ...
*
Technology doping
Technology doping is the practice of gaining a competitive advantage using sports equipment. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) considers prohibiting technologies if they are "performance-enhancing" or "being against the spirit of the sport". I ...
References
{{Cycling , state=collapsed
Bicycle parts
Cheating in sports
History of cycling
Sports controversies
Sports law