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Sir Dave Brailsford gives evidence to the Culture, Media and Spot Select Committee (Parliamentlive.tv).jpgTeam Sky boss Dave Brailsford tried to kill Bradley Wiggins Dauphiné package story claims journalist who broke it
The journalist who broke the story about a package delivered to Team Sky at the 2011 Critérium du Dauphiné that contained medicine destined for Sir Bradley Wiggins says that team principal Sir Dave Brailsford tried to get him to kill the report.
The Daily Mail’s chief sports reporter, Matt Lawton, also claims Brailsford raised the possibility of him instead being offered another story relating to a rival team winning races with the help of Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs).
Meanwhile, David Walsh, the Sunday Times chief sports reporter who helped bring down Lance Armstrong, has said on Twitter that the answers given to MPs by Brailsford and others yesterday (full video here) smacked of a “massive cover-up.”
He said Lawton’s latest allegations against Brailsford were “not so much a game changer as a game ender” for the Team Sky boss.
Lawton had already broken another of the biggest cycling stories of 2016 – former world champion Lizzie Armitstead’s missed drugs tests – when he met Brailsford in late September as he prepared to reveal details of the package delivered to Team Sky in 2011.
> UK Anti-Doping investigating Wiggins and Sky
In the preceding weeks, hackers who had accessed the World Anti-Doping Agency database had published details of TUEs issued to Wiggins ahead of the 2011 and 2012 editions of the Tour de France – he won the latter – and the 2013 Giro d’Italia.
The journalist says in an article published yesterday evening that at his meeting with Brailsford, the Team Sky principal asked him: “If you didn't write the story, is there anything else that could be done?”
He said that Brailsford was worried that the story could mean “the end of Team Sky,” which when it launched in 2010 insisted it would race clean but which has come under intense scrutiny in recent months especially following the revelations about TUEs and the Dauphiné package.
Lawton said: “First came the offer of an alternative, more positive story. Then possibly a story about a rival team winning races with Therapeutic Use Exemptions – something he did not reveal in the end.”
He made the claim at the end of a day in which Brailsford, Shane Sutton, British Cycling President Bob Howden and Dr George Gilbert, who sits on the governing body’s board and chairs its Ethics Commission, in front of a Parliamentary Committee to be quizzed about doping.
> Brailsford reveals the medicine contained in package for Wiggins at 2011 Dauphiné
After Howden and Gilbert had repeatedly claimed to MPs that they were gagged by UK Anti-Doping from talking about the package while insisting they knew nothing of the contents, Sutton confirmed it did contain medicine, with Brailsford later saying it was a decongestant called Fluimucil.
Walsh, who has been embedded with Team Sky, something that has seen him come under intense criticism from his former Sunday Times colleague Paul Kimmage, said on Twitter: “My impression from listening to Dave Brailsford and Shane Sutton at Select Committee today is that we're being subjected to massive cover-up.”
He added that if the package did indeed contain Fluimucil, why had it taken almost three months for that to emerge given that Lawton quizzed Brailsford about it in September.
“Two months ago I said in Sunday Times only way for Team Sky to move forward was without Dave Brailsford,” Walsh went on. “I believe that now more than ever.”
Those tweets were posted before Walsh saw Lawton’s latest claims against Brailsford, which he described as “not so much a game changer as a game ender.”
Questions are already being raised as to whether the episode may result in Sky, whose longstanding sponsorship of British Cycling finishes at the end of the month, pulling the plug on its financial backing of the WorldTour team.
Meanwhile, British Cycling, which earlier this month learnt that its funding for the next Olympic cycle would be cut by £4 million, has reportedly been warned by UK Sport that it could lose its funding altogether depending on the results of an investigation into its governance.
> British Cycling funding could be withdrawn due to governance issues
That probe was ordered in April following the allegations of bullying and discrimination against Sutton and other staff made by riders including track sprinter Jess Varnish and Paralympic gold medallist Darren Kenny.
In a year that saw Team Sky win its fourth Tour de France in five years, and Team GB dominate the track events for a third Olympic Games in a row, the ongoing controversies – including the UKAD investigation – must raise serious doubts about whether those successes can be repeated in future.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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38 comments
That's fair. Haven't had chance yet to watch the full hearing. Bit fatal really to start talking about something one actually knows very little about. I just felt comments here previously were dismissive of reality. Were you talking about this on CT yesterday? Seems very similar. I read it after posting here. Got the same opinion as the Aussies talking there.
I just don't get if it was such a simple thing the entire time then why the fuss? Obsfuscation seems to be Brailsfords modus operandi and he can't escape the tactic even when it isn't beneficial, if you believe him.
Meh.
Tom Simpson is still revered by many.
Footballers cheat game in, game out, in full sight of millions and nobody gives a flying.
City dealers smacked off their heads but making millions. Probably.
Plus ça change.
Move on. Nothing to see here.
Happy Christmas.
Awful lot of rose tinted glasses being worn in this thread.
I might remind people about the distain many had for Americans constantly denying LA had done anything wrong.
I never in my life ever expected to see cycling and the catholic herald in the same topic!
next we'll have to check the spectator and the tablet, no mention in there either...
Sky's ''we're so so so clean'' and Wiggan's ''no needles'' talk has set themselves up for this. They've got a public who sat through years of US Postal/Armstrong denying drug use and how many tests they've passed, only to be found to be massive cheats. If Sky had just said that ''marginal gains'' includes everything that we can legally do to win the race, then the story would have had less traction.
I only hope the investigations continue and get wider, and WADA/UCI get a better picture of where the rules could be improved in the future.
I'm not an apologist for Team Sky, nor am I a particularly big fan of Wiggins, but as regards promoting the Dauphiné package conspiracy, I suggest those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
We seem to have forgotten Alain Baxter. Baxter won an Olympic bronze medal in the Salt lake City Olympics in 2002, and subsequently failed a drugs test. Turns out Baxter had used a Vicks Inhaler, which he had bought in US. The US version contained levomethamphetamine which is not present in the UK formulation, and although not recognised as a performance enhancer, is a banned substance. Although you can do torture this story until it tells you what you want to hear, one take home lesson from this is painfully clear.
In the (unlikely) event that I had any responsibility for Team Sky's medication, one thing you can be sure of is that any medication used would come from a single, known and specified source, which in this instance would look to be around Manchester.
What if they had bobbed in to a local French pharmacy to buy some Fluimucil (which is a formulation of acetylcysteine, not a drug in itself) which, oh, by the by had a trace ingredient of a banned substance not present in the usual formulation from UK (see Baxter for details).
"So Sir Dave, if you were going to let Bradders use a legal drug, why didn't you use your tried and trusted supplier which you knew was free of anything untoward. You could have flown it out for a few pounds ..........." etc etc.
I would not repeat history, just learn from it.
Not saying that Sir Dave has not cocked up the handling of the media, but using a permitted medication - sorry conspiracy theorists, what I would have done.
could be Dario Frigo's missus hanging around the Cheadle Hume area in a 1990's bmw
This explanation and following justification seems to have gained traction online yet it's a supposition almost equally without evidence as the theory that the parcel contained a banned substance.
Dave Brailsford and Shane Sutton gave testimony that the Jiffy bag contained Fluimucil, yet did not provide the documentary evidence that surely exists. Brailsford said the evidence "should be there" however he made sure to say he was only told what the package contained, not that he knew.
This was after two hours in front of a parliamentary select commitee.
Three months after the question of this unknown package arose.
Why did this take three months? Why even did it take two hours? Why didn't they provide the documents from UKAD? Why has Fluimucil never been mentioned before? The least Team SKY are guilty of is obsfuscation and lack of record keeping and at the very least, this is very strange.
I don't really think this is a smoking gun. I don't doubt, much, that full evidence will come out that the package was indeed Fluimucil. I hope so anyway, but I'm neutral until it does so. We should be MORE skeptical and MORE pressing of the truth exactly because it is a British team compared to foreign teams not less. If Sky was from another country the comments on this story would not be as vociferous. I suspect therewas/is the exact same reaction from the Russian public. The Daily Mail is a terrible publication but it would be a huge error to assume that every story it publishes is false. That's as ridiculous as some of their copy. If Matt Lawton and Dave Brailsford didn't have a two and a half hour meeting about trying to hide the story there would be legal papers served by now.
It's so obvious that I'm loathed to say it's ironic you use the aphorism 'Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it' about a doping conspiracy that turned out to be innocent. Fuck! This is cycling! That seven times winner? An 80 year history of drugs? There is no benefit of the doubt in cycling - that's exactly why Sky had a no needle policy and promised absolute transparency!
It's not good enough and Brailsford has lost his credibility.
You have missed a few points.
The first is that Shane Sutton said he didn't know what was in the package.
The second point hasn't really been covered by the press, but was very obvious if you watched the testimony.
BC's Howden & Gilbert made it very clear that UKAD had told them not to run their own investigation, and as recently as Friday had instructed them not to discuss the package with the committee. However, on Sunday, UKAD sent the committee's chairman an email saying that it was fine for witnesses to discuss the package. BC took the view that they needed to hear from UKAD before discussing it, and even if they were willing to discuss it, they didn't know anything because UKAD had prohibited them from finding anything out. They agreed to do some digging and report back to the committee at a later date.
Against this backdrop, not one single witness entered the committee room prepared to discuss the contents of the package because UKAD told them not to. Brailsford accepted the email from UKAD and so told them what he knew. Because he was unprepared to answer questions, he didn't come in with the paper trail that would have proved it.
To my mind, UKAD have also handled this situation very badly. To send out such conflicting communications to witnesses and committee members was only ever going to result in confusion and the witnesses looking wrong-footed.
Gosh people on here are rather attached to their own Team Sky aren't they?
The DM has accused Team sky of illegal drug smuggling.
Why was the most important witness not interrogated,
the person who told the DM about the package?
interrogated? - you do know the daily heil is a joke name right? they might aspire to act like the gestapo, but interrogation is pushing it a bit
A fundamental principle of journalism (even for the DM) is that you don't reveal your sources, so I wouldn't expect the leaker to be identified. Someone must have informed Lawton, and it would have to be someone within Sky, or someone working at the BC end who was aware of the delivery. I'm guessing that either someone knows something dodgy is going on and blew the whistle, or someone knew about the delivery, didn't know what was in the (legitimate) package, but thought they could make a few quid selling the story to the DM. Those are my best guesses, but of course I have no idea what is really going on.
I think it is entirely reasonable to suggest that Sky would fly out medicine from a known source (I don't think anyone has forgotten the well publicised Alain Baxter case). I think it is understandable that Brailsford didn't want to discuss internal team business with a journo in the heat of the moment and dissembled. I'm a bit surprised he continued to dig a hole, and didn't shut the whole thing down ASAP by just saying it was a delivery of a legit medicine. I don't think he would have been in front of a parliamentary committee if he had provided a timely explanation.
The simple fact is that nobody in this discussion has proof that Sky are breaking the rules. You can say "of course they are doping", but so what? That's just opinion, however you dress it up. I think it is good that people are scrutinising them closely, and are prepared to question their behaviour, and if something is going on, I hope the authorities and the press keep digging. Until we get more facts, that's about it, though.
Gosh this echo chamber is purpose built, the comments are just bouncing around, reaffirming each other.
There is an obvious problem with the whole story about the pharmaceutical delivery. But I guess no one who has commented here wants to hear it.
This IS a non-story but only because 'conspiracy' theorists have already provided the narrative. Sky are no cleaner than any other successful pro-team. The claim to be a clean team is a smokescreen which what people want to hear. But once you accept that pro-sport is a murky dark world you can move on. But holding these folk out as pure clean heroes is naive in extremis.
That doesn't mean you can't enjoy sport, nor that you can't appreciate the drama and skill, but placing your faith in deeply flawed, but very focused people is a fallacy. We are all human.
Sadly I think this is probably true. Although I do think cycling is perhaps cleaner than it was, or at least better at making itself appear to be.
Not sure what news you are reading, but the Grayling story seems to have been extensively reported across all the media sources I'm aware of.
Don't know about that. I've diligently searched the pages of the Isle of Wight County Press and the Catholic Herald and can't find a peep about it. It's obviously a scandalous cover-up so somebody must be guilty of something, somewhere. Stands to reason man.
The BBC covered the Andrew Mitchell plebgate story 24/7 for months, but I have not seen or heard a single report of the Grayling incident on the BBC, and I haven't seen it featured anywhere else apart from the Guardian and the cycling press.
But they are all featuring this non-news story at length, while ignoring a minister responsible for road safety knocking off a cyclist, failing to exchange details, hiding his parliamentary pass and not reporting the incident to the police.
Why do you think there is such a huge difference in coverage of the two stories?
I just did a Google search for BBC and Grayling. Top two stories are about the cycling incident.
The DM ran a story about how Grayling could face criminal charges for knocking the cyclist down. I don't see the relevance of Plebgate, apart from the fact it involved a bicycle?
The IoW/Catholic Herald conspiracy is interesting, however. I wonder what they are trying to hide...
This is deliberate distraction news. While all the media are reporting this non-story, they aren't reporting Chris Grayling, the minister in charge of road safety, knocking off a cyclist, not exchanging details, hiding his parliamentary pass and not reporting the incident to the police.
Which is the most important and newsworthy?
I have no time for the lazy internet conspiracy theorists who just repeatedly shout "they must be doping" without bringing any evidence to the table, and I despise the DM as an institution, BUT Lawton seems to be one of the few people who is doing the journalisic leg work to find out if Sky are actually doing anything wrong.
I'd be interested to know what triggered the current investigation. I can't see how Lawton could have known about the package in the first place, without inside information, which might suggest someone within Sky has tipped him off. I still don't think there is a smoking gun here, but I think Sky's handling of the situation has set them up for more digging.
The problem is, having done the legwork, Lawton has discovered nothing. He's intent on making the news, because the news he's reporting is utterly unexceptional.
If memory serves, a team must use pharmacetical products from their own team supplies; i.e. they can't march into a local Pharmacist and go buy the medication they need. For one they will have their own supplies with a proven record of where it was bought, by who, when and from a reputible supplier. Going into a French pharmacist you can probably buy Flumaci(whatever) but can you guarantees it's exactly the same as your own? Probably not. Plus there's no verifcation if it's what says it is etc. I wouldn't be in the slightest bit surprised if Team Sky have all medications batch tested to make absolutly certain it's above board.
Here's the thing, if you are going to cheat, discreation surely not brought to you by plane, going through customs etc in a jiffy bag etc. Team Sky have cetainly made a huge mistake with the way they dealt with all of this that much is certain.
I would contest the 'apply for a TUE easily' - as with all these things yes it says you can do this on UKAD but the reality when you try is it is not easy...
Oooh if you think you need one then search 'here' for your medication if its on the list then...
Oh hang on if its NOT found in the search then sign this waiver that we never told you it was NOT on the list just because you did not find it ON our list!
So regardless go contact you NGB
oh and also you need to inform your GP - which is not 'easy' - have you tried to get an appointment!!!
So I think based on the process we should all deluge BC with request just to check and formally confirm the lack of need for a TUE for Ibuprofen, or paracetamol or tramadol or whatever your personal poison is!
Finally thankyou for making my point about Millar et al.
As for Team SKY being transparent - from the answers it would appear they have been pretty clear and used a very robust process for the TUEs.
Love to know if all the teams can detail every bit of logistics between the travelling entourage and their respective bases.
Sky and Brailsford repeatedly marketed the team as open and transparent. Nothing about this case, or the TUE's for that matter, have been transparent.
FatBoyW, Millar now works as a mentor for the British Cycling junior squad. He has no current professional connection with Cannondale Drapac. Also, UK amateur racers, time trialists and sportive riders (riding a BC sanctioned event) can apply for a TUE easily via the UKAD website.
"Team Sky boss Dave Brailsford tried to kill Bradley Wiggins"
Unusual headline
This makes me laugh... I am sure Brailsford is shitting his pants...
As Director, he has helped take Britich Cycling to the very top of world track cycling, then in his position of Sky has not only managed to generate a british winner of th tour de france, his team has now won the tour 4 out of the past 5 editions.
He is at the top of the tree. if Sky should walk away, I am mightly sure there will be plenty of opportunities available for him in the sport.
I'd also suggest that Sky have no intention of walking away from the team just yet. As mentioned already, for all the smoke being blown about, no one has been able to identify any fire sources (yet)... until they do, then Sky will be more than happy with their investment.
Lets be frank... so far nothing useful has been brought forward... Yep, its clear that Sky were working the TUE process back in 2012/13, but crucially they were playing within the rules.
Those rules are being retrospectively questioned and yes, on reflection they seem a bit lax. This was also the review of WADA a little while back and the TUE system was updated to close the potential loop hole utilised by Sky and many others.
Whilst we can all tut, and shout about breaching moral codes of fair play, no rules have been broken... nothing to see here.
And then we have the package.
We can all look at the actions of the time and quite rightly feel that it is all very suspect. because it is very suspect.
However, no one knows what was in the package. it could have been EPO, growth hormone, childrens heads... we simply don't know. Those that do know, are hardly going to throw themselves under the bus, so nothing an come from this. its a non-event.
Don't think for a second that I am saying Sky are clean...i do not know, what I am saying is that we, or should i say the press are going for the jugular with a foam knife. At best, this package should be the inspiration for investigative journalists to dig deeper... it is not enough evidence to hang anyone.
in my opinion....
You've heard the children's heads story too... No smoke without fire, as they say.
[/quote]
You've heard the children's heads story too... No smoke without fire, as they say.
[/quote]
You can smoke without a fire. It's called a smoke machine. The Daily Mail seems to own one...
Am I missing something here? If Wiggins had a TUE for the prescription drug for both the 2012 Dauphiné and the TDF surely it's a none story. I also seem to recall a real doping story about UK athletics prior to the Rio games? That's disappeared.
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