The gendarmes do not bother with the general classification.
While the cohort of cycling followers wondered about the performance of the Jumbo-Visma team of Slovenian Primoz Roglic or his compatriot and future winner of the Tour de France Tadej Pogacar (UAE-Emirates), investigators from the Office Central for the fight against attacks on the environment and public health (OCLAESP) focused on training much less prominent: Arkéa-Samsic, and its leader Nairo Quintana, 17th in Paris.
Whose entourage is at the heart of the matter.
Explanations.
What are we accusing him of?
The 30-year-old Colombian was heard by investigators in a free hearing on Monday afternoon, as was his brother Dayer, who runs alongside him in the Breton team.
At the start of the morning, two men from his close guard and members of the Arkéa-Samsic staff on this Grande Boucle, the Spanish physiotherapist Mikel Otero and the Colombian doctor Fredy Gonzales Torres, were placed in police custody.
All these confrontations with the police fall within the framework of the preliminary investigation opened for suspicions of doping on the same day.
It is based on the heads of “administration and prescription to an athlete without medical justification of prohibited substances or methods” but also of “transport of prohibited substances”.
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The magistrates of the public health pole of the Marseille prosecutor's office rely on a search carried out on Wednesday in the hotel in Méribel (Savoie).
The OCLAESP gendarmes got their hands on "many medicinal products" in the room of the two runners.
They also found in the establishment more than 100 ml of physiological serum, with injection equipment.
“A method that can be qualified as doping”, they summarize.
What can these products be used for?
The analysis of the drugs found in the delegation of the Arkéa-Samsic team still had to be done on Monday.
But investigators are particularly interested in physiological saline.
If they claim to have found more than 100 ml, it is not yet clear what the precise volume entered is.
Which is important.
"In infusion, physiological serum can be used to dilute the blood concentration in the body," describes the biologist and doping specialist, Gérard Dine.
By the same means, you also reduce the level of waste that the blood will eliminate in the kidneys and therefore, potentially, the markers of a possible doping product.
"
"Now, we are talking about men who have 5 to 6 liters of blood in their body," continues the doctor.
For your infusion to have a significant impact and to be able to hide a product, you need at least half a liter, or even a liter of physiological serum.
"
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“Since 2005, everything that is used for an infusion technique is part of the list of prohibited products, slips into Ouest-France Jean-Pierre de Mondenard, sports doctor.
Physiological serum is therefore prohibited.
Its detention accredits a doping method.
Its mere possession is reprehensible.
"
Where do the two men in custody come from?
Small step back.
At the beginning of September 2019, Arkéa-Samsic formalized his big coup in the transfer window with the arrival of Nairo Quintana, then at the Movistar: winner of the Giro in 2014 and the Vuelta in 2016, three times on the podium of the Tour de France, the Colombian is a strong rookie for a ProTeam roster, the second division in the world.
Dayer Quintana, on the right, arrived at Arkéa with his brother. / Icon Sport / Jean Michel Bancet
To attract him, the French team allows him to come with his close guard.
Hire his little brother, Dayer, with very modest results?
Allowed.
Take in the team his compatriot and friend Winner Anacona?
It's a yes.
Allow him to come with his physiotherapist from Spanish training, Mikel Otero.
Okay too.
"It is not unusual in this kind of negotiations," explains a regular in these cases.
If you feel like he's not missing much to get him signed and he's telling you that he knows people who might be looking for work, you go.
"
Before the Tour de France, another member of the Quintana clan was added to the team.
To replace his doctor, victim of health problems, Arkéa-Samsic called on Fredy Gonzales Torres, the Colombian practitioner.
“Even if your leader recommends it, is it really a good idea to put on your most important race of the season someone you don't know in such a sensitive area?
“Asks a former sports director.
In a press release, the manager of the French training Emmanuel Hubert dissociates himself from the two detained, speaking of “close entourage, not an employee of the team” and considers that the investigation “does not target the team, nor his staff directly.
However, Mikel Otero is listed among the members of the management on the official website of the French training.
At the end of May, the Spaniard even gave a little interview to this site.
What could be the consequences?
In the state none.
But Emmanuel Hubert has already warned that "if it turns out that at the end of the current investigation, elements come to confirm the veracity of doping practices, the team will immediately dissociate itself from such acts and take without delay the measures which are necessary to put an end to the links which could unite them with unacceptable methods and always opposed ”.
Contacted by Le Parisien, the banking and insurance group Arkéa, one of the two major sponsors of the team, evokes its "amazement" at the announcement of the opening of the investigation.
"Without predicting the follow-up to be given to this investigation, and respecting the presumption of innocence, Arkéa will be particularly attentive to the development of the situation, and will take, if necessary, all the necessary decisions," he continues. .
As it stands, the riders like the two indicted members remain in the team.
The Movement for a Credible Cycling (MPCC), of which Arkéa-Samsic is a member, will demand the provisional suspension of those concerned only in the event of the opening of an official UCI procedure or of an indictment, says its president Roger Legeay.
There remains the criminal aspect of the investigation.
The penalty incurred for the acts of which the two relatives of Nairo Quintana are suspected is five years' imprisonment and a fine of 75,000 euros.
