Manolo Saiz arrested

thebluetrain said:

Wasnt someone on here talking about great he was the other day?

eurosport.comsport sto890934.shtmlOpen ↗

Wow, that could be disastrous for Vino and the TDF this year. Also could put Roberto Heras' doping incident in new light as well, but it is early news yet.

Also arrested was doctor Eufemiano Fuentes, former team doctor of Kelme. He's being suspected of doping his riders and giving them blood transfusions to evade positive tests

davidbod said:

Wow, that could be disastrous for Vino and the TDF this year. Also could put Roberto Heras' doping incident in new light as well, but it is early news yet.

I was thinking the same thing, I hope Vino doesnt get caught up in this. Way to early though.

Wow. All I can say is wow. Very, very bad for Vino...though early to see how far it will go. However, if this helps puts more pressure on dopers and teams that sanction doping in the sport, then in the end it is a good thing.

thebluetrain said:

Wasnt someone on here talking about great he was the other day?

eurosport.comsport sto890934.shtmlOpen ↗

That someone was me - and yes Saiz has a great palmares.

tcklyde said:

Wow. All I can say is wow. Very, very bad for Vino...though early to see how far it will go. However, if this helps puts more pressure on dopers and teams that sanction doping in the sport, then in the end it is a good thing.

Charges haven't be made as yet.
But it does look very bad.

But as a fan of cycling, I welcome all steps taken to curtail doping in cycling.

Cyclingnews reporting:

"The Spanish civil guard has arrested Liberty Seguros manager Manolo Saiz and four others on doping charges. Besides Saiz, the former doctor of Kelme, Eufemiano Fuentes Rodríguez; José Luis Merino, the responsible at an analytical laboratory in Madrid; Alberto León, a professional mountain bike racer; and José Ignacio Labarta, the assistant sports director of Comunidad Valenciana, were all arrested."

Another wow. Apparently they are also investigating the use of autologous blood doping -- using your own blood to dope yourself. I do not believe the test for this has been introduced yet, although as I understand it, they have been working on one.

tcklyde said:

Cyclingnews reporting:

"The Spanish civil guard has arrested Liberty Seguros manager Manolo Saiz and four others on doping charges. Besides Saiz, the former doctor of Kelme, Eufemiano Fuentes Rodríguez; José Luis Merino, the responsible at an analytical laboratory in Madrid; Alberto León, a professional mountain bike racer; and José Ignacio Labarta, the assistant sports director of Comunidad Valenciana, were all arrested."

Another wow. Apparently they are also investigating the use of autologous blood doping -- using your own blood to dope yourself. I do not believe the test for this has been introduced yet, although as I understand it, they have been working on one.

I'm sure Manzano's mentioned it.

Interesting to remember that Saiz was Bruyneel's DS at ONCE...

micron said:

Interesting to remember that Saiz was Bruyneel's DS at ONCE...

OK, why the need to pull Bruyneel into this? That was over a decade ago, pleez.

More likely? Saiz was director of ONCE when the whole team left the TdF in 1998, and he was re-instated if memory serves only the same way Virenque was the following year, on a technicality. He and the whole team were under suspicion and left rather than deal with the investigation. His lead rider? Jalabert and Olano, also known by the Mr 65% nickname.

This is not cool people for a DS to be arrested.
Heras, Beloki etc etc and the former Kelme doctor.
Well let the chips fall where they may.
But I'd be very curious as to the sources of info and evidence.

Come to think of it, some of his riders have been unusually good as of late!

micron said:

Interesting to remember that Saiz was Bruyneel's DS at ONCE...

Troll.

hombredesubaru said:

OK, why the need to pull Bruyneel into this? That was over a decade ago, pleez.

More likely? Saiz was director of ONCE when the whole team left the TdF in 1998, and he was re-instated if memory serves only the same way Virenque was the following year, on a technicality. He and the whole team were under suspicion and left rather than deal with the investigation. His lead rider? Jalabert and Olano, also known by the Mr 65% nickname.

This is not cool people for a DS to be arrested.
Heras, Beloki etc etc and the former Kelme doctor.
Well let the chips fall where they may.
But I'd be very curious as to the sources of info and evidence.

Come to think of it, some of his riders have been unusually good as of late!

Your imagination's running away with you Baru/Bobke.
Olano Mr 65%? Never heard that one, ever.
More wishful thinking I would sugegst on your part.

Yep, you did manage to get the Saiz bit right about the TDF in 1998.
The ONCE team went home in protest at the treatment afforded by the French police.
And who appeared in the photo that I took of the ONCE training out in Bray, just before the start of the 1998 TDF? Johan Bruyneel.
So when you cast aspersions on ONCE in 1998, you implicate your own boy.

And no, you got the other bit about ONCE in 1998 wrong - ONCE didn't get reinstated to the TDF.

Sporza has updated there article:

There are 3 other persons arrested. Ignacio Labarta (team director of Valencia), Jose Luis Merino (a doctor from Madrid) and Alberto Leon (a spanish mountainbiker).

The five guys (saiz and fuentes are the other two) are in jail in the building of the anti-drugs squad of the police in Madrid.

The investigators are also checking the connection between doctor Fuentes and the danish team CSC, which is being very impressive in the giro with Basso.

MJtje said:

Sporza has updated there article:

There are 3 other persons arrested. Ignacio Labarta (team director of Valencia), Jose Luis Merino (a doctor from Madrid) and Alberto Leon (a spanish mountainbiker).

The five guys (saiz and fuentes are the other two) are in jail in the building of the anti-drugs squad of the police in Madrid.

The investigators are also checking the connection between doctor Fuentes and the danish team CSC, which is being very impressive in the giro with Basso.

Interesting.

thebluetrain said:

Interesting.

kein Scheiss 😄.

thebluetrain said:

Interesting.

from CNN:

The manager of Spanish cycling team Liberty, Manolo Saiz, has been arrested on doping charges.

Saiz and four others -- including Valence team sporting director Ignacio Laberta and Eufemiano Fuentes, a former doctor to the Kelme and ONCE teams, are being held as part of an investigation into cycling by Spanish police.

The police are also looking at alleged links between Fuentes -- who is now practising as a gynaecologist -- and Tour of Italy leader Ivan Basso, who rides for the CSC team.

Liberty spokesman Jacinto Vidarte was not immediately available for comment, nor were the police.

The team's star cyclist, Roberto Heras, was suspended for two years in February and stripped of his victory in the 2005 Tour of Spain after failing a doping test carried out after the penultimate stage of the race.

limerickman said:

Charges haven't be made as yet.
But it does look very bad.

But as a fan of cycling, I welcome all steps taken to curtail doping in cycling.

A sad day for cycling. If there is substance to these charges it will taint some of the riders that rode for Saiz, even if they are innocent. Plus it will put doping back on the front pages again. And if it is true that the doctor also arrested in this case was working with Basso in the near past it makes a person start to question Basso's Giro strenght. People will question this and Basso may be dope free. It throws a cloud over the innocent as well as guilty. There are no winners in a case like this.

Reports are that the Spanish Federation is denying involvement. If it takes the police to clean this sport up, so be it.

Saiz and Bruyneel, Fuentes and CSC, Fuentes at Kelme & Phonak - the webs are more and more tangled, aren't they?