BEVERLY HILLS, March 12, (THEWILL) – Former British Cycling and Team Sky doctor Richard Freeman had been found guilty of ordering testosterone “knowing or believing it was to be administered to an athlete to improve their athletic performance”. This came from a Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service ruling on the case on Friday.
Testosterone is a banned drug under the laws of the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) and, together with anabolic androgenic steroids (AASs), have been widely used to enhance sport performance throughout the last 50 years.
The sports physician, known for his work with British Cycling and Team Sky, was charged with ordering 30 sachets of banned substance Testogel for an athlete in 2011 and admitted to destroying a laptop with “a screwdriver or blunt instrument” before giving it to forensic experts conducting a doping investigation into the charges bright against him.
Freeman previously admitted to 18 of the 22 charges against him but said he was pressured into ordering the banned substance by former head coach Shane Sutton. Sutton, who is an Australian-born former professional racing cyclist turned cycling coach, whose last position was as Technical Director for British Cycling, has strenuously denied that accusation.
WADA has striven to clean sports of enhancing substances for years now. It has not had it easy. German Democratic Republic used a notoriously comprehensive programme of steroid doping across all major Olympic sports throughout the 1970s and 1980s, and in more recent years, a somewhat similar state-sponsored doping regime has been shown to have operated in Russian sport.
This led to an initial four-year ban slammed on Russia by the WADA, which was halved by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) with the warning that the reduction of the ban should not be seen “as any validation” of Russia’s conduct.
The Medical Practitioners Tribunal will sit again next week to determine what sanctions Dr Freeman will face and whether he will be deemed unfit to continue to practise medicine. It will further jeopardise Freeman’s reputation that he is also facing two UK Anti-Doping charges relating to the testosterone order.
Several of the charges related to an interview the medic gave to UKAD in 2017 where he subsequently admitted he had lied.
About the Author
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
