Florent Debruyne - MPCC - Mouvement Pour un Cyclisme Crédible

MPCC fully supports ITA's project for 2023

On June 9 in Lyon, during the Critérium du Dauphiné, our Board of Directors held its second meeting of the year. The main topic was about ITA stepping up the fight against doping.

First of all, the Board of Directors was pleased to note that all the members of the movement fully complied with the internal regulation they committed to, on the basis of their voluntary adhesion, since the previous meeting.

MPCC President Roger Legeay also underlined that there are now more than 1000 stakeholders into MPCC (1034).

On top of all its individual memberships, MPCC also gathers:

• 36 professional men's teams, including 9 WorldTeams
• 13 professional women's teams, including 5 WorldTeams

Above all, this Board of Directors Meeting gave the opportunity to discuss the recent proposals submitted by ITA. The International Testing Agency is an independant foundation (subjected to the Swiss law) that has been mandated by the UCI to lead cycling's fight against doping, back in January 2021.

At the end of last year, ITA adhered to MPCC. Thus, the two entities took the opportunity to affirm their mutual support, driven by the shared willingness to follow up fight against doping's developments.

Both ITA and MPCC agree that testing is not the only focus to have to protect clean athletes. Efforts also have to be made through investigations and intelligence sharing. Following this goal, ITA made recommandations that could potentially be implemented in 2023:

• Allocating structural, operational and technological reinforcements to Intelligence and Investigation unity
• Increasing the use of information provided by confidential sources, through the REVEAL platform
• Making better use of data analysis: whereabouts, biological passports, analytics, athletes' performances, medication use
• Performing a greater number of out-of-competition tests and sample analysis, with WADA's accredited laboratories
• Focusing efforts on the elite level
• Increasing the amount of samples conserved on a long-time period, to make reanalysis possible
• Increasing the amount of sample reanalysis, making the most of the extended conservation period

ITA needs greater financial resources than what is currently available to achieve the implementation of this project. Even if professional cycling teams have already been making important financial contributions to the fight against doping, the total amount has barely evolved in the 10 last years.

This is the reason why MPCC wants to raise awareness among all professional cycling teams in order to offer full support to this ambitious project. The goal is to provide an effective response to the general suspicion cycling suffers from, allowing the sport to improve its credibility.

by Florent Debruyne

China Glory Continental Cycling Team joins MPCC!

Created in 2022, the team runned by Maarten Tjallingii is now a member of MPCC.

Part of the Continental UCI division, the team is made up of 6 Chinese riders and 6 foiregn riders. Among them, the Americain Sean Bennett, who rode in the WorldTour divisions during three years.

Amaël Moinard, member of the team's management staff, states: "The genesis of this project is to allow the best Chinese riders to participate in the next Olympic Games in Paris in 2024 and to compete on the European continent. Supported by the Chinese governmental and sporting authorities, this team's ambition is to grow in the coming years around riders from the international peloton and our detection programme set up by the Chinese Cycling Association. Our desire to build this project around clearly established ethical rules within our organisation naturally leads us to join the Mouvement Pour un Cycliste Crédible."

by Florent Debruyne

2022 Giro d'Italia under the microscope

The Giro d'Italia 2022 crowned a rider from a MPCC member team, Jai Hindley (Bora-Hansgrohe). However, this should not obscure the fact that on May 6th, two riders who were suspended during their careers started the race in Budapest, riding for teams that are not members of our movement.

For the first time in five years and Team Sunweb's final victory in the 2017 edition, a MPCC member team won the Giro d'Italia. Jai Hindley, who already finished second in 2020, won the 2022 edition wearing the colours of Bora-Hansgrohe, an MPCC member team since October 2012. The Australian is himself an individual member of our movement.

Five riders in the final top 10 are members of MPCC teams. And twelve of the 21 stages were won by a rider from one of the twelve MPCC member teams at the start of this race. Our movement congratulates them on their performance, as they show that committing to a stricter set of rules than those of the authorities, on a voluntary basis, does not prevent one from achieving the greatest results. All of this contributes to increasing the credibility of our sport.

However, it should be noted that once again, at the start of a Grand Tour, there were several riders who had been suspended during their career. In Budapest there were two such riders, all riding for teams that are not members of the MPCC. This is an opportunity to recall one of the points of the rules that the member teams of our movement pledge to respect: not signing up riders who have been involved in doping cases and who have been sanctioned for more than six months in the two years following the suspension.

Furthermore, one of the teams invited by RCS Sport for this Giro d'Italia 2022 was not a member of the MPCC, and has not applied for membership to date. In the past, our movement has been concerned by some of the precedents set by this organisation. It should be noted that the Tour de France and La Vuelta have both granted all of their invitations to MPCC member teams for their 2022 editions.

by Florent Debruyne