A thinning peloton snakes up Alpe d'Huez last Thursday led by Team Sky. Sunday Times journalist David Walsh and fellow Irishman Dr Alan Farrell, who works as Team Sky's doctor, have painted a picture of abuse directed at the team on the climb. And both have said some Irish fans were among those involved.
Riders and officials from Team Sky were abused on Alpe d’Huez during last Thursday’s stage of the Tour de France and Irish fans were involved in some of the abuse, a report in The Sunday Times has alleged.
Writing a feature piece in Sunday’s edition of the respected broadsheet British newspaper, journalist David Walsh quoted Team Sky’s Irish doctor Alan Farrell saying when he drove up the climb in one of the team’s cars he felt under siege, as did the occupants in the team’s other vehicles.
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Walsh reports that eggs were smashed against the team’s cars, that beer was thrown at them and when the vehicles slowed down enough on some points enabling some fans by the roadside to rock the cars from side to side, that’s what happened.
“The abuse was worst at those parts of the climb populated by Irish and Dutch fans,” wrote Walsh, before adding that one large sign on Irish corner read “Froome dope”.
That sign was a reference to the doping allegations levelled against Sky leader and race winner Chris Froome because of the strength of his performances.
The sign is the only reference in the piece to Irish corner. Stickybottle understands the sign had not been placed there by any Irish fans.
Walsh reports that Sky’s Irish doctor Farrell met some Irish fans the morning after the Alpe d’Huez stage and that he, Farrell, told them he was “disappointed” at the way Froome and the team had been treated.
Walsh suggested Farrell was very upset as he relayed the story, saying there were tears in his eyes as he spoke.
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Walsh also reported that a number of members of an Irish cycling club sought out and found team principal Dave Brailsford and apologised, apparently for the behaviour of some of the Irish fans on the climb.
He added that a Dutch journalist he spoke to had reported feeling ashamed at the behaviour of Dutch fans on the same ascent.
Walsh has been “embedded” with Team Sky on a number of training camps and races this year including the Tour de France and has given them a clean bill of health in his reports in relation to doping.
He alleges that all the way up the climb last Thursday fans screamed at Sky riders and many mimicked the action of injecting into their arms.
Walsh quotes Froome in the piece saying that at one point fans ran alongside him with a giant syringe filled with an unknown substance and squirted it at him at such close range and with such accuracy that some of the liquid went into Froome’s mouth.
There is no reference in the story suggesting the nationality of those fans with the giant syringe or those who mimicked injecting.
It should also be stressed that there is no suggestion whatsoever of any orchestrated protest or abuse by Irish fans on the mountain.
What Walsh describes is alleged to have taken place over long sections of the climb between base and peak. The allegations centre on what could be described as individual fans – some alleged to be Irish - at different points along the climb. However, Walsh suggests that activity was most intense among some groups of Irish and Dutch fans.
Froome told Walsh the ascent of Alpe d’Huez reminded him of one episode in his childhood in Kenya when he was with his mother in a car as they drove into a protest in a dangerous township and the protestors rocked their car with the young Froome worried what was going to happen next.
If you were on the climb, please let us know what you saw, or indeed did not see.
