The international cycling union UCI is upset about the visit that former team leader Johan Bruyneel paid to the Tour de France. The Belgian has been suspended for life by the international sports tribunal CAS for violating doping rules.
Bruyneel was a guest on the Belgian television program Vive le Vélo on July 17 and visited the caravan with an official accreditation around his neck. That accreditation is required to enter certain zones.
According to the rules, Bruyneel should not have been allowed in those zones at all, the statement said. The sixty-year-old former rider and former team leader should not have received accreditation at all.
Around the turn of the century, Bruyneel was the team leader of US Postal, the formation with which Lance Armstrong was unapproachable in the Tour for years. Years later, the American’s Tour performances were removed due to doping use. Both Armstrong and Bruyneel received a lifetime suspension.
The UCI emphasizes that Bruyneel is only allowed to attend races as a spectator due to his suspension. The distribution of accreditations is a matter for the ASO, the organization behind the Tour.
‘As if I had never been away’
The UCI has since contacted the ASO to ensure that it does not happen again. It was the first time since 2011 that Bruyneel was present in the Tour caravan.
Bruyneel said that most people reacted positively to his return. “It was pleasant, although a day or two is enough. But it seemed as if I had never been away,” said Bruyneel, who rode for the Rabobank team in 1996 and 1997, in Vive le Vélo.
Bruyneel looked back on his time as team leader of Armstrong in the program. “Everyone within the environment knows what was going on during that era. Those were the unwritten rules of the game at the time. And in that game we were the best.”