Jan Ullrich speaks unfiltered about doping: “I could have ratted everyone out”

Jan Ullrich He was one of the best cyclists of his generation. Winner of the Tour de France in 1997 and the Vuelta a España in 1999, the German achieved 32 victories in his professional career. A career that was marred by doping and that ended in 2007, after Operation Puerto.

A year earlier, he was sidelined by his team, T-Mobile, on the eve of the start of the Tour. It was the beginning of the end. In 2012, the CAS found the former cyclist guilty of an anti-doping rule violation and annulled his results since May 1, 2005, including the Tour podium that same year.

For years he denied the accusations and turned his life into a hell marked by alcohol and drugs: “He drank whiskey as if it were water and consumed cocaine,” the German confessed, which he acknowledged in the documentary Jan Ullrich – Der Gejagte that “it was the love for my children that helped me get ahead.”

With the passage of time, Ullrich He has spoken more openly about doping, making it clear that it was a common practice in cycling at that time. “I could have ratted out everyone who was part of cycling at that time, but I didn’t because I loved my sport too much,” he explained in the program. Inas Nacht.

“We adapted to what others were already doing and told ourselves that this was not doping. If everyone does it, then it all comes down to talent and skill,” he added. The Sydney 2000 Olympic champion admitted that “it was a horrible time” and that “doping cost me ten years,” although he wanted to close his reflection with a positive message: “A clean sport emerged from that time.”