“They searched my car, my phone and I’m sure they also searched my house to find evidence that did not exist.” These words are those of Vincenzo Nibali (40 years old), one of the greatest runners in the last decade. He notably won the Tour de France in 2014, the Giro in 2013 and 2016 and the Vuelta in 2010.
The Italian was never tested positive during his career. He assured it in a long interview granted on Saturday to the Corriere Della Serra. “I have never boosted myself in my life, and I never even thought of doing it. I have been checked a million times, they can test test pieces in a hundred years. ”
However, a doping scandal splashed the Astana training, with which he was under contract from 2013 to 2016, in 2015. “I won, I was Italian and the boss of my team, Alexandre Vinokourov, had an ambiguous past, he summed up. I was followed. Cyclists were easy targets. “
The “Messina shark” is however not fooled. He knows full well that some of his opponents were not clean. “It was something cultural,” he admitted. I was beaten by dopeds. “
He quotes as an example the Liège-Bastogne-Liège race in 2012, where he finished second behind Maxim Iglinskiy. Kazakh was suspended in 2014 after being checked positive at EPO. Or the Vuelta 2010, which he won for 41 small seconds in front of the Spaniard Ezequiel Mosquera, finally downgraded and suspended for doping.
