by David Millar
As soon as I walked through the door, I sensed it in the air. I wasn’t the star any more – I was the pariah. I became very self-conscious – signing in was embarrassing. Writing ‘David Millar’ and then seeing it there, next to all the other athletes, reminded me that my name was now synonymous with doping. I was out of place.
Despite my unease, the test went well. Even after a year off, I was stronger than many top cyclists after only a month off. The power and fitness would return the more I trained but, most importantly, my pedalling action remained nearly perfectly balanced.
My right and left legs followed almost precisely the same power curves, so at the very least the test showed that I was born to ride a bike. But there were repercussions from my visit.
The next day, Dave got a call reminding him that I was banned from all official facilities – that as a banned British athlete I was banned from everything. He listened but then made it clear that he was going to be standing by me and allowing me to use his facilities at the velodrome, even though I was banned from all others. As Performance Director of British Cycling, he had the power to do this. But what was amazing was that he had the strength of character to resist the pressure that was put on him. It meant so much to me.
Dave and I sat down to talk it all through. He told me that he had spoken to his team at the velodrome, asking them how they felt about helping me, and that they’d all offered to support me. This saved me. Many would have been happy to see me eradicated from the history of the sport and banned for life. But if I had been ostracised, as certain people wanted, then I think I would have destroyed myself completely. I didn’t have the strength to try and come back on my own.
If it hadn’t been for Dave B and British Cycling, I would have ended up a very different man, living a very different life. They knew that what had happened to me was about more than simply my own mistakes – they knew it wasn’t black and white. They judged me as a person rather than simply judging my crime. They were strong enough to try and learn from my experience and then to help reconstruct me.
I owe them a massive debt.
I’d realised that I’d be a fool not to go back into cycling. I wanted to try and right the wrongs, to set the record straight – to prove myself without any doubts. To do that, I needed to get back on the road.
It was also the only profession I knew. I was talented and passionate about it, I had the skills and experience - and it paid well, compared to anything else that I might possibly do. This hit home when I went to the Borders bookshop in Stockport to try and get a job.
I barely knew how to fill in the application form. I couldn’t remember my GCSE and A-level results, let alone the addresses of my schools. The interview was fine, but what did that matter if I’d been stumped by an application form? I couldn’t believe I’d ever even thought that I could do anything apart from professional cycling.
But I also knew that I had to make my comeback mean something, that it had to have some worth beyond my own experience. I knew I could train hard and in time recover my fitness, but I was a doper, a cheat – why did I deserve to come back? I’d thrown away so much, hurt so many people, and taken myself to the very edge. I had to show that it wasn’t all for nothing. I had to demonstrate that something had been learned.
One of the points I had made clear to every authority, journalist, friend and family member I’d spoken to was that what had happened to me was preventable.
I had never wanted to dope. I hadn’t ridden my bike around Hong Kong and High Wycombe, dreaming of the Tour de France, and thinking, ‘I’ll do whatever I have to do to win – doping will just be part and parcel of that.’
I’d spent years resisting doping because I was totally against it. It disgusted me. I knew it was wrong, I knew it was cheating – yet eventually I succumbed.
Yes, I was vulnerable and I was weak and I took the decision to dope myself - but there was nobody offering proactive support to me when I wanted to stay clean. That was due in part to the omertà – the law of silence.
The non-dopers were too scared to say they were doing it clean and they would even go as far as defending the guys who doped, in order not to rock the boat. That’s how binding the omertà was – and sometimes still is.
There was never a voice saying, ‘One day you’ll be better than all of them, so be patient and be proud.’ Instead, clean riders were just looked upon as simple-minded and stubborn.
As I thought more about my comeback, I thought about what I would have wanted to hear. What advice would I have needed to prevent me from throwing in the towel on staying clean? In truth, I knew the answer to this - simply because I’d wanted to hear somebody say it for so many years.
If nothing else, when I came back to racing I could be the older guy, the hitter – the fallen champion who was proactive towards anti-doping and wasn’t scared to stand on a soapbox and talk about doing it clean. That was my prerogative now, my obligation. My arrest, admission and ban meant that the omertà no longer applied to me.
I wanted to help younger riders, to prevent them from going through everything I’d gone through. I recognised that this would mean taking on new responsibilities.
Every interview I gave would have to confront doping, and I accepted that was going to be integral to my return to cycling. I no longer had the right to avoid the subject. I was in a very rare position to make a difference, to tell people what I’d been through and also to explain that the world of sport wasn’t as black and white as some would like to think. It gave everything I did a raison d’être. I believed I could make a difference.
I had a year until the 2006 Tour de France. The first thing I needed to do was to speak to Jean-Marie Leblanc, director of the Tour. Jean-Marie had watched me win the prologue at the Tour de l’Avenir in 1997 and also followed me when I’d won the first stage of the Tour in 2000.I felt like I’d particularly let him down. I needed to apologise to him, face to face.
I also wanted to ask him if he’d allow me back into the Tour de France. I called the offices of the Tour in Paris and left my name and number. Thirty minutes later, he called me back.
‘Daveed? C’est Jean-Marie Leblanc.’ He sounded jovial, which I definitely wasn’t expecting.
‘Jean-Marie, thank you for calling me back.’ I spoke my most formal French, trying to be as polite as possible.
‘David, it’s good to hear from you,’ he said. ‘Where are you?’
I was surprised by how friendly he was.
‘I’m near Manchester, that’s where I live now,’ I told him, as I stood in Mike and Pat’s garden.
‘That’s different to Biarritz – non?! Well, you would not believe where I am . . . PLOUDANIEL!’ he exclaimed excitedly.
‘Sounds familiar – but where is it?’ I had absolutely no idea where it was.
‘Daveeed – it’s where you won the Tour de l’Avenir prologue in ’97.’
‘Of course it is!’ I did remember now.
The small talk carried on for quite a while. His manner was so relaxed and friendly that it put me completely at ease.
Eventually, I found the courage to ask him.
‘Jean-Marie, I was wondering if it would be possible to meet with you. I’d like to explain everything that happened.’
He was receptive to the idea, and said that I should come to Paris a few days after the Tour ended on 27 July.
Jean-Marie’s positive response enthused me. I didn’t even know who the World Champion was, who’d won Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders or Paris-Roubaix, but as the Tour gathered pace, I began to get sucked back into it all again. I didn’t have satellite TV, so instead relied on the internet and occasional dashes to Nick Craig’s house to watch Eurosport as my way of keeping up with events. Now I was following the Tour as a fan – not a jaded, embittered professional – and I loved it.
Towards the end of that July, I stayed with my sister in London. Sunday was a beautiful summer’s day, perfect for lunch by the Thames, so we headed over to
Putney. We found a riverside restaurant with seating on the water.
As we walked through the restaurant to our table, France gave me a nudge. ‘Oooh, you’re in luck today,’ she said. ‘Look – a table full of blondes!’
‘Very funny,’ I said dismissively Romance hadn’t been on my agenda for quite a while.
‘Hang on – you are in luck – I know one of them.’ She sounded genuinely shocked.
‘Who?’ I said. ‘Which one?’
‘Nicole.’ I had no idea who Nicole was.
‘That trip with the Major?’ France said. ‘Mallorca at New Year? Remember Desirée? You met her there – well, Nicole’s her daughter.’ But the moment had gone and I still hadn’t been able to spot Nicole. We sat down and ordered lunch.
In hindsight, Nicole was very brave because later on she came over and said hello. Knowing how shy she can be, that’s actually quite remarkable. But thank God she did because it changed my life. I was smitten immediately. She was lovely and there was something quite magical about her.
We chatted and then, by coincidence, we ended up in the same pub after lunch. We all sat down together and Nicole and I hit it off. She knew nothing about cycling, or my life, which made it all the better. The next night, more bravely, she had dinner with the Millar siblings at France’s club.
I then disappeared back up north. There was no contact for over a week, until I finally cracked and called her. That was it – we became an item.
My life had turned a corner. The future was opening up for me. Good things seemed possible. I had followed the 2005 Tour de France avidly, falling in love with it all over again. I didn’t care about what went on behind the scenes or feel resentment about not being there. I relished the fact that it existed, and with that came the final and most radical awakening: I was lucky.
I rediscovered my childhood dreams watching the 2005 Tour. I had fulfilled that dream once, but I’d let it slip through my fingers. Now I’d been given a second chance. This time I’d do it properly and I’d treasure every moment.
The Amaury Sports Organisation – ASO – owns a host of French sporting events, as well as the Tour de France. ASO also owns L’Equipe, the renowned sports newspaper that published my statement to Judge Pallain. The Paris offices of L’Equipe and ASO sit side by side on the same site at Issy-les-Moulineaux, on the banks of the Seine.
I did my best to be invisible as I sat in reception at ASO, waiting to see Jean-Marie Leblanc. I really did not want to be spotted by any journalists from L’Equipe. I hid behind a newspaper, trying my best to get past the second sentence of the article I was reading, but incapable of focusing beyond what I was going to say to Jean-Marie.
Finally his secretary emerged and took me through to his office. Jean-Marie was on the phone but he looked up and smiled as I sat down. The room was filled with an overpowering – an overwhelming – stench of cheese.
I studied the room. It was a big office, with views over the river. There were all sorts of bits and bobs scattered around the shelves, and boxes stacked up, yet nothing stood out apart from a photo of the Pope. He was sitting with another man in what looked to be a prison cell.
Jean-Marie put the phone down and we shook hands. He was immediately warm and friendly. The boxes, he explained, were the accumulated booty of three weeks on Tour, of being the guest of honour in town after town around France.
Similarly, he said, the cheese had been a gift and he’d left it in the fridge but underestimated its aroma. He opened the fridge door. Cheeses, charcuterie and bottles of champagne were crammed into it. Well, what else would you expect of the director of the Tour de France?
Then we sat down again. I was far from the first rider to let him down – he had been director of the Tour during perhaps its darkest hour, when the Festina affair had almost brought it to a standstill. But I didn’t waste any time and immediately apologised to him for having cheated at his race.
He accepted my apology, but also wanted me to explain how and why. So we sat there for about half an hour, while he asked me questions and I gave him answers.
Then I told him I wanted to come back and make a difference, to race clean and with pride. I told him I’d like to make the following year’s Tour de France my first race back, but that I didn’t want to make his life difficult.
‘You will have served your time,’ he said. ‘That is punishment enough.’
As I listened to his voice, a weight lifted from my shoulders.
‘Mais alors, Daveed,’ he said, ‘you cannot ride the Tour if you do not have a team . . .’
This was a valid point.
‘At the moment I’m trying to rebuild my life,’ I said. ‘Once I feel like I am in the right direction, I will start talking to teams. In all honesty, I haven’t really thought about that bit yet.’
Jean-Marie listened.
‘Well, look – maybe I can help you,’ he said. ‘There are not many teams that are suited to your new attitude, so we will have to think carefully. Let me call up Roger now and speak to him first, see what he thinks.’
‘Roger’ was Roger Legeay, his close friend and boss of Credit Agricole, one of the biggest and oldest of the French teams. Jean-Marie called him and they chatted for 5 minutes.
Although nothing concrete came out of the conversation, Jean-Marie said he would do his best to help me. I knew how influential he was. His support was more, much more, than I had ever expected.
Then he stood up.
‘Now, let’s go for lunch!’
As we left the room, he pointed to the photograph of the Pope.
‘You see this photo, David?’ he asked. ‘This is the Pope forgiving the man who shot him. I like to have it here. It’s a good reminder of how we should live our lives . . . showing forgiveness.’
Jean-Marie’s chauffeur-driven car took us to a restaurant attached to a small sports stadium. He was clearly a regular. All the staff welcomed us with a ‘Bonjour, Monsieur Leblanc, Monsieur Millar.’
There were photos of many sportsmen and women on the walls. I paused and studied some of them as we walked to our table. Then I saw a big photo of me in a kilt with my bike, and below it one of my actual bikes on show. I was humbled. I didn’t know whether Jean-Marie had chosen that restaurant specially – in hindsight he must have done – but it was the first time that I had felt proud of being a professional cyclist for a very long time.
We had a wonderful lunch. Jean-Marie ordered a bottle of champagne and we had a wide-ranging conversation. Then, as we were leaving, the staff wished him happy birthday.
He had given so much to me, on his birthday of all days, and demonstrated his generosity of spirit. As we said our goodbyes, he reiterated his support. It was another step forward. In those few hours, he had made me see so many good things about professional cycling that I’d been blind to before.
My financial circumstances however were dire. I was ruined. I had debts totalling over £800,000 and no prospect of any income for probably another year. The only asset I had was my house in Biarritz, which was up for sale. But, not surprisingly, it was proving difficult to find a buyer for an unfinished, state-of-the-art, bachelor pad.
I was going to have to take it on the chin and lose an awful lot of money on it. It was clear that I’d be very lucky to clear half the debt through the sale of it.
The majority of the money owed was to the French tax authorities. They had taxed everything I’d earned during the previous four years at 50 cents per euro – and then added a 40 per cent penalty on top of that. The remaining debts were legal and accountancy bills. It was an unfathomable amount of money really.
The French were non-negotiable. Forfeiting the debt through bankruptcy was an option – I’d be protected under UK law, but not French law, and this was no use as I wanted to return to France. I was in debt to the French Republic until I paid back every cent.
There was also something about declaring bankruptcy that I didn’t like. Aside from the stigma, it didn’t feel right – i
t didn’t offer any closure. I decided that I would pay back my debts. I agreed with all my creditors to pay them back in full through an Individual Voluntary Agreement (IVA). This was formalised when I submitted the IVA to the Stockport courthouse on 12 August 2005.
I submitted my monthly living expenses to an insolvency lawyer. Once this was accepted I received an allowance while the rest of my income went towards repayment of the debts. At the time, I only had enough for my month-to-month living. But I finally paid off the debts in April 2009. It was one of my proudest achievements.
The financial limitations taught me to curb the out-of-control spending that was part of my lifestyle. I had no concept of managing money; it came in, it went out. I learned how valuable it really is, and I also learned that it wasn’t my God-given right as a professional sportsman to avoid tax.
Beyond that, I had one goal: to be on the start line of the 2006 Tour de France. I had a little over ten months to turn my body back into that of a professional cyclist. I knew I could do that – the difficult bit would be finding a team.
I didn’t know where to start when it came to finding a team. I hadn’t been ‘on the market’ since 1996 when I was an amateur looking for that first pro contract. I had given a couple of interviews in which I talked about my plans for a comeback and after that I heard that a small Spanish team, Saunier Duval – a team I would have never even considered in my pre-ban days – were interested in me.
They had probably the smallest budget and one of the more eclectic rosters in the peloton. They were an opportunistic team – they had to be with such a small budget – and it was clear in their eyes that I was an opportunity: a big-name rider going cheap.
Former pro Max Sciandri had contacted me to ask how I was getting on and what my plans were. Max is about as Italian as they come – except that he’s English. He was born in Derby and his mother is English, and in truth that’s where his Englishness begins and ends. He grew up in Tuscany until his early teens, and then his family emigrated to California, when his father went into the restaurant business.