When the Festina affair
made the Tour fall apart

At the wheel was the team’s soigneur, Willy Voet. The car contained a large supply of products, including EPO, growth hormone, testosterone and amphetamines.

Three days later, the Tour de France began in Dublin as though nothing had happened.

That was how the 1998 edition began: one race on the road and another story waiting with the police and the courts. Once the two met, the Tour did not stop all at once. It fell apart piece by piece.

The Tour continued while the case grew

Festina was not a minor team at the edge of the peloton. Richard Virenque was a favourite with the French public and had won the mountains classification five times. Alex Zülle had won the Vuelta a España twice. The team came to the Tour with sporting ambitions and a name most spectators knew.

On 15 July, after stage four to Cholet, team manager Bruno Roussel and doctor Eric Rijckaert were arrested. Police searched the team’s hotel and vehicles. On 17 July, Roussel admitted that the team operated an organised system for supplying doping products, under medical supervision according to his account.

Shortly before 11 p.m., race director Jean-Marie Leblanc announced Festina’s expulsion. The team was therefore removed nine days after the discovery in Voet’s car.

The following morning, the riders nevertheless appeared at the time trial. After a meeting, they left the Tour. Virenque cried in front of the cameras and continued to maintain publicly that he had not doped. It was not until the Festina trial in October 2000 that he admitted using doping products.

The rest day became a police day

On the rest day, 23 July, the nine Festina riders selected for the Tour and three staff members were questioned in Lyon. That same day, police searched the TVM team’s hotel in Pamiers.

The TVM investigation was a separate case. A vehicle connected with the team had already been stopped near Reims with EPO in March. The Festina discovery had not exposed TVM, but the summer investigation caused the older case to flare up again.

The Tour did not fall apart because of one shared supply. Several investigations, searches and interrogations converged in the middle of the race.

On the day after the rest day, the peloton initially refused to ride stage 12 from Tarascon-sur-Ariège. Several Festina riders had now admitted using EPO, but the protest was not simply a defence of Festina. The riders protested against police methods, the treatment by the press and the sense that the entire peloton had been placed under suspicion. After a delay, the stage was ridden.