Drug Testing
While we all are dismayed at what drug-cheating has done to cycling and other sports, vigilance can go too far. Steve sends along this note:
Corrie, here’s an overly aggressive stance on drug testing. I would have thought that an impossible position to reach, but bureaucrats found a way!
I wish all those wanting to police others could use sound judgement and good sense. –Steve
This is Belgian cyclist Kevin van Impe. His wife gave birth prematurely this year, and their son died hours after he was born.
Last week van Impe was at a crematorium, making arrangements for his son’s funeral, when a drug tester representing cycling’s governing body showed up. Van Impe asked whether the tester would be kind enough to give him some space during his grieving process, but the tester would have none of it, telling him it was provide a urine sample immediately or be banned from the sport for two years:
“He wouldn’t even come back later in the day. It was either do it right on the spot or it would be taken as if I had refused,” van Impe said.