By DPA,
Paris: The French Anti-Doping Agency (AFLD) will re-analyse a number of samples taken from more than a dozen riders during the 2008 Tour de France, the daily L’Equipe reported Sunday on its website.
AFLD head Pierre Bordry sent a letter to the cyclists concerned just hours before this year’s Tour de France began. According to L’Equipe, the measure concerns the samples of about 15 riders, all of whom finished in the top 20 of last year’s Tour.
The new analyses are to be carried out after the summer, L’Equipe reported.
The procedure will target the third-generation doping substance CERA, a form of EPO, which was found to have been used by four riders in last year’s race, Italians Riccardo Ricco and Leonardo Piepoli, Germany’s Stefan Schumacher and Austrian Bernhard Kohl, who finished third in the race.
According to the report, the analyses were not carried out last year because of financial problems.
As of Sunday, the last day of the race, no rider in the 2009 Tour de France has tested positive for a banned substance.