Festina fans protest expulsion

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Posted: Sunday July 19, 1998 05:19 PM

Signs like "Give us back Festina" showed displeasure with the decision to expell the team for doping allegations (AP)

MONTAUBAN, France (CNN/SI) -- Fans of the expelled Festina team lined the route of the eighth stage of the Tour de France from Brive to Montauban in protest on Sunday. The team was kicked out of the tour in the midst of a drug scandal involving EPO a performance-enhancing substance.

The fans waved banners and screamed "Free the Festina" as the other competitors rode past them on the 190.5 kilometer stage.

Many spectators said the Festina riders had been unfairly singled out.

"Why the Festina and not the others?" said a banner.

All nine Festina riders withdrew from the race on Saturday after their director, Bruno Roussel, confessed to making doping substances available to his team.

A Festina masseur was arrested last week at the Franco-Belgian border on a charge of smuggling doping substances.

The Festina riders have left their luxury hotel in the Correze countryside and returned home. Police said they could be called as witnesses in the case.

On Saturday, Dutch TVM team director Cees Priem said doping substances had been found in a TVM team car in March. An investigation has been launched.

On Sunday, health minister Bernard Kouchner told French radio doping had always existed in cycling.

"Everybody knows that, from strychnine to cocaine, from digitalin to arsenic, since cycling started there has been doping and since the show became more profitable, there is more doping to allow performances which once again look unbelievable," said Kouchner, whose father was a doctor on the Tour more than 30 years ago.

"Festina riders have the right to work," said a poster carried by spectators wearing the polka dot jersey which had become the trademark of team leader Richard Virenque, four times king of the mountains in the Tour.

Virenque said on Saturday the team had the legal right to continue as they were only witnesses in the case but decided to pull out "in the interests of cycling and the Tour."

"What is a Tour without Festina?" demanded a banner hanging near the route.

"The riders are victims, organizers are to blame," said another.

The impact of the scandal on the race was all the more devastating as Festina were the number one team in the world. They dominated the Tour standings last season and had three favorites at the start in Virenque and Swiss Alex Zuelle and Laurent Dufaux.

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Reuters contributed to this report.