Bradley Wiggins seems gravely serious and under pressure during his TV interview with the BBC back in September when speaking about his contentious, though sanctioned and legal, TUEs. A very short time later the story of the 'jiffy bag' delivered to Team Sky for him in 2011 emerged in the Daily Mail.
British Cycling has been unable to provide evidence to support the claim by Team Sky’s Dave Brailsford that a ‘jiffy bag’ delivered to the team in France in 2011 contained an over-the-counter decongestant product.
The governing body has said because the matter is still under investigation by UK Anti Doping it cannot confirm what was in the bag.
- Video: Brailsford, Sutton and British Cycling; the full hearing
- Brailsford tells MPs ‘jiffy bag’ contained medicine to clear mucus
- Listen In: David Walsh gets grilling live on air about defending Team Sky
- Medical Opinion: How Fluimucil would have aided Wiggins, Team Sky
- Froome turns the screw as bad blood with Wiggins resurfaces
- Coach who took “medical package” to Team Sky hits out at media
- Wiggins reputation on brink of ruin, but Team Sky asked for this
- Video of Bradley Wiggins BBC interview in full with Andrew Marr
British Cycling’s president Bob Howden has written to the parliamentary committee in the UK examining British cycling and said the federation “understands” the bag contained Fluimucil.
Advertisement
However, with the documents currently “locked down” by the UK Anti Doping inquiry British Cycling was unable to access the records.
And now the credit card details of the British Cycling coach, Simon Cope, who took the package – said to contain the medicine Fluimucil – to Team Sky at the Critérium du Dauphiné in 2011 have emerged and raise more questions for the team to answer.
When appearing before the Culture, Media and Sport Parliamentary Committee earlier this month, Brailsford said Cope was travelling from the UK to the Dauphine for logistic reasons anyway.
Cope was simply asked to bring the €8 bottle of medicine to Dr Richard Freeman for Wiggins – who sealed overall victory in the race on the day – because he was making the journey to France anyway.
The team has said his trip was for unstated logistical reasons and that he collected the medicine from the British Cycling stores in Manchester and brought it to France.
The medicine is not on the banned list and is available over the counter in France. It is available in some circumstances in Britain.
Cope has previously said he did not know at the time what was in the bag. He said there was nothing unusual about staff being asked to bring items as they travelled around, adding nothing untoward had taken place.
It must also be stressed that his credit card details raise more questions for British Cycling and Team Sky, not for Cope himself.
Those questions arise for the team and national federation precisely because they have never explained fully the reason behind Cope's trip from the UK to France, rather than there being any allegation or suggestion of wrongdoing on Cope’s part.
Even though Fluimucil – used in a nebuliser to break up mucus – is not banned, the handling of the issue by all involved, especially Brailsford, has been a disaster and has undermined Team Sky and British Cycling.
Related News
And Cope's credit card details now emerging publicly adds to that scenario, says the politician leading the parliamentary committee currently examining practices in Team Sky and British Cycling.
Brailsford being put through his paces at the recent Culture, Media and Sport Parliamentary Committee hearing in London. But the MP heading the committee has told The Times that more questions have now emerged.
Cope’s credit card details have been supplied to the parliamentary committee that Brailsford and British Cycling’s former technical director Shane Sutton appeared before earlier this month.
And the details have now been reported in The Times newspaper.
Along with The Daily Mail, The Times has broken much of the detail of the recent controversies around Team Sky, including the unrelated contentious, though legal, medicines Wiggins took under TUEs in 2011, 2012 and 2013.
The details of Cope's credit card show that on June 8th, 2011, he booked a return train from Eastbourne on the south coast of England to Manchester in the north, which he marked as being ‘Dauphine’ related.
He then returned to the south of England and stayed overnight at a hotel at Gatwick airport on June 11th, before flying to Geneva the next day.
There he used a hire car to driver to La Toussuire in France where he was meeting Team Sky. And he flew back to the UK on the same day. The total cost of the day trip was £597.65.
The chairman of the parliamentary committee Damian Collins MP said British Cycling had been unable to confirm that Fluimucil was in the bag.
He expressed concern to The Times at the apparent lack of records to confirm the contents of the bag and he also said Cope’s expenses raised more questions.
“The more we discover about the package, the more questions seem to be thrown up,” he said.
He believed Cope’s expenses suggest the request for the medicine was made in the days before he travelled to France and so the product must have been needed days before Wiggins actually received it.
“If this medicine was needed urgently it would have been much quicker to buy it in France,” he said of the team.
“It also seems that British Cycling do not know categorically what was in the package. They say they understand it to be Fluimucil but do not explain why they understand that’s what it was.”
Topics
