British Cycling is checking bikes for hidden motors at the road national championships, which have started in Stockton-on-Tees today.
The governing body says it is using the same scanning equipment used by the UCI that in January detected a concealed motor in a bike prepared for Belgian under-23 rider Femke Van Den Driessche at the cyclo-cross world championships.
The global governing body held a training day hosted by British Cycling in Manchester to demonstrate how the app and tablet-based scanning works.
Jonny Clay, British Cycling’s cyclesport and membership director, commented: “British Cycling is one of the first national federations to respond to this form of cheating and we are taking our responsibility very seriously.
“The National Road Race Championships was the ideal first event to undertake testing of the new technology.
“While technical fraud is extremely rare, we need to ensure that we are taking action in the fight against all forms of cheating and the new scanning method is a real step forward, especially given that it can be done so quickly.
“We will soon roll out the testing across other disciplines,” he added.
The time trials are taking place today, while the road races will be held on Sunday. More information can be found on the Stockton Cycling Festival website.
4 thoughts on “Mechanical doping: British Cycling tests for hidden motors at national championships”
How long before this trickles
How long before this trickles down to amateur races? Fortunately, my cycling club is currently polling its members on whether to leave British Cycling, and if it does we’ll be free from this sort of stifling crypto-bureaucracy. Plus we’ll be able to reject people joining as second claim members, which is important because some of us think that some of them might be triathletes. Of course, we won’t be able to compete in a lot of local races, and we’ve spent the last six months doing nothing but debating it so we haven’t organised any of our own, and we’re all as fat as Bernard Manning, but you can’t put a price on sovereignty.
handlebarcam wrote:
Thank you you made me smile for the first time today
You might as well stay,
You might as well stay, network and ride the lard off until your group can agree on the rota a year ahead.
Wonder CTC or Cycling U.K. is doing anything similar? They seem to have a few rides too.
I’m not a race-ist, and some
I’m not a race-ist, and some of my best friends are triathletes, but…
British Cycling is just for the elite, join Cycling UK’s campaign and we can make cycling in Britain great again – everyone will wear tweeds, have a steel framed bike manufactured in a shed in Coventry with a Brooks saddle. Oh wait, http://eroicabritannia.co.uk/