Possible doping ban may ruin team Italy’s plans
Paolo Bettini’s chances of winning his first World Championships as Italy’s head coach may be jeopardised if he selects Alessandro Petacchi as captain. The Italian Olympic Committee (CONI) is investigating him for doping and may issue him a life-time doping ban.
“You know more about it than I do,” Petacchi told Ciclismoweb.net. “I have not heard anything more from anyone. Too much time is passing, but I want to keep calm because my conscience is clean.”
Italy’s Petacchi won the sprinters green jersey at the Tour de France despite a doping storm brewing at home. In April, police searched properties owned by Petacchi and his wife, and the home of Lampre team-mate Lorenzo Bernucci. Their search found banned pharmaceuticals at the home of Bernucci, who confessed in a hearing August 24. After Bernucci’s confession, Petacchi met for 2.5 hours with CONI prosecutor, Tammaro Maiello.
Benedetto Roberti, a public prosecutor in Italy’s northeast city of Padova, led the investigation and ordered the searches in April. He also ordered the search of Yaroslav Popovych’s home on November 11 to aid US investigators in the Lance Armstrong investigation.
Roberti claims that Petacchi used synthetic blood Perfluorocarbon (PFC) and human serum albumin in 2009. Both Petacchi and Bernucci remained silent in an initial hearing by Italy’s Anti-Narcotics Group (NAS) July 28, only three days after Petacchi won the green jersey in Paris.
The CONI is following through with Roberti’s investigation. After it heard Petacchi and Bernucci, it summonsed Lampre’s Sports Director Fabrizio Bontempi, Masseur Paolo Chiesa and Doctor Carlo Guardascione, Bernucci’s mother and brother, and Petacchi’s wife Anna Chiara. Petacchi continued to race and won a stage of the Vuelta a España on September 3.
Bettini believes that the World Championships in Copenhagen on September 25 suits Petacchi and wants to have him as Italy’s leader.
“In Italy,” Bettini told La Gazzetta dello Sport, “there is only one rider who after 250 kilometres knows how to win a finish like this: Alessandro Petacchi.”
Bettini’s comments “made me happy,” said Petacchi. “I have already been taking to some cyclists that know the area and I get the idea that the 2011 Worlds suits my characteristics.”
Petacchi plans to race all three Grand Tours ahead of the Worlds. However, his career as a professional cyclist will end if CONI recommends a suspension. The 36-year-old risks receiving a four-year to life-time ban since he already served a suspension in 2008 for excessive use of asthma medication, Salbutamol.
CONI is likely to recommend its decision to the Italian anti-doping tribunal (TNA) before March.