Racing Through the Dark: The Fall and Rise of David Millar

by David Millar

  Puerto was the biggest scandal to hit cycling since Festina. It put to shame any claims of the sport cleaning itself up. A Spanish police investigation into Eufemiano Fuentes, a prominent sports doctor based near Madrid, had revealed a doping ring that reached far beyond the borders of Spain. Although there were over a hundred clients listed in Fuentes’s files and he admitted that other sports were involved, only cyclists were ever investigated or sanctioned.

  One of the four arrested in the initial police operation was Manolo Saiz, at the time the most famous team boss in cycling and the president of the Professional Cycling Teams Association. When Saiz was arrested he was scheduled to be meeting Fuentes and was carrying €50,000 in cash. His arrest signalled his downfall and that of his team, the all-powerful Spanish Liberty Seguros team.

  The pivotal evidence in the investigation was the cache of codenamed blood bags found in Fuentes’s offices. Puerto revealed that the increased efficiency of the latest EPO test had sent the doctors back to basics. Blood transfusions, once considered outdated, had come back into vogue.

  Blood would be extracted during a training phase, allowing the body to replenish itself naturally (or with help from EPO micro-dosing while at altitude). It would then be reintroduced just before a big objective or during a stage race. Blood transfusions markedly boosted performance, especially in Grand Tours.

  Being away from the sport for almost two years had allowed me to distance myself from the harsh realities. I had tried my best to defend cycling, convinced that during my enforced absence there had been a change in attitude.

  At first, Operación Puerto shocked me. Then it worried me, especially when I began to notice that some of the cyclists implicated had connections to Luigi Cecchini. I had realised, given my history and the media cynicism towards cycling, how my contact with him would be seen.

  I was sure Cecchini wasn’t mixed up in any doping practices himself, yet it appeared some of his clients might have had their doping requirements taken care of in Spain by Fuentes. I was in a tight spot. A couple of weeks before the Tour started I thanked him for all his help and stopped working with him.

  It was a rude awakening. I had to be very careful about who I worked with. I couldn’t claim to be naive any longer. I might have changed, but that did not mean the sport had. Generally, I am not a cynic, but it was clear that it was maybe a safer policy than any other when dealing with professional cycling. I would have to strike a balance between my belief in the future of professional cycling and my cynical understanding of the harsh realities.

  The 2006 Tour, bookended by two huge scandals, was another blighted edition of the old race. As Puerto took its toll on the peloton, I became the go-to guy, the repentant ex-doper willing to actually discuss what nobody else wanted to.

  The role fitted me well, perhaps because in some ways it was what I had prepared for. Within hours of being back on the world stage, I was in the limelight and convinced that I was helping by giving a balanced and educated opinion on what was going on. I was assuming the responsibility I knew I would be burdened with on my return to the sport. It didn’t frustrate me – I knew it was my place.

  On the eve of the prologue, I dropped off a letter to Jean-Marie Leblanc’s hotel thanking him for supporting me and promising him that I wouldn’t let him down. I had also enclosed blood test results from the previous six months. The doctor in Hayfield had taken samples monthly so that I could demonstrate to whoever asked that my blood values were normal and that I was not doping. I knew that it was up to me to prove my innocence from now on.

  In theory, I had a chance of winning the Strasbourg prologue. Training had gone amazingly well but it had been impossible to replicate the intense demands of ‘real’ racing. We’d attempted to replicate race situations by using motor-pacing. This was the only option we had but we were convinced that it would do the job. It didn’t.

  Cecchini had been able to compare my training data with those of practising professionals, current and old. My numbers were through the roof and I was beating records held by some of the most successful cyclists. This gave us a false impression: instead of being one of the strongest racing cyclists in the world, I had become the best-trained cyclist in the world. There is a massive difference between the two. I was in fantastic condition to train, not to race.

  Even so, I was enjoying every moment, finding it simply wonderful to be back at the race I loved, despite everything else that was going on. I just wanted to soak it all up, appreciate where I was and to remember where I’d come from. It wasn’t the mindset of somebody who was going to rip the course to pieces.

  I knew within a kilometre of the prologue starting that I didn’t have the form for it. I simply didn’t have the top-end power to explode my way through 7 kilometres. I finished fourteenth, while Brad Wiggins, riding his first Tour, placed fifteenth. It wasn’t an auspicious start but I didn’t really care. I was back doing what I loved.

  As for the reaction from my fellow pros, they were welcoming, understanding that I’d admitted to my mistakes and taken my punishment. They knew I was a talented cyclist who had made mistakes, that I had taken it on the chin and that I was trying to come back in a positive manner and without any bitterness. So many others embroiled in a doping scandal have chosen to deny, deny and deny, before eventually reaching an endgame that forces them to admit their guilt.

  Over that first week of the Tour, I discovered a love for different aspects of racing that I hadn’t had in the years building up to my ban. I wanted to be everywhere, doing everything, involved all the time. During the Cofidis years, I would have avoided the chaotic front of the bunch during those final dangerous kilometres, but now I was up there, getting stuck in, trying to help our team sprinter. I found it exhilarating, and every day when I crossed the line I had a big grin on my face.

  Those rose-tinted glasses were lost on the roadside somewhere in the Pyrenees. As soon as we hit the mountains I was reminded of just how horribly hard the Tour de France could be. Not even my biggest, hardest training sessions had come close to stretching me as far as that first day in the mountains. Even though I’d done a five-day reconnaissance mission in the very same mountains with John Herety, an English ex-pro cyclist, in May, the Pyrenees were excruciating. I finished just in front of the gruppetto that first day and in a similar position on every other day in the mountains. It hurt so much: I had completely forgotten how much suffering was involved.

  By the end of the Tour, I was on my knees. I got in a couple of breakaways and one succeeded in making it to the finish, but I had no chance of being a contender for the win. I’d been the instigator of the break and the first to attack in the finale, having decided that if I was going to fail, then at least I’d fail with panache.

  Yet standing on the start line on the final day of the Tour, I couldn’t help but feel empty. I had not been a player over the whole three weeks; instead, it felt like I’d been chasing my tail the whole time.

  I’d never considered myself to be that ambitious or driven before, yet I stood there waiting for us to roll out through the start line knowing that taking part wasn’t enough. I wanted to be a racer, not just a finisher. I also knew that nothing I said or claimed about my sport or myself mattered if I didn’t show myself to be a winner once again; a clean winner.

  Later that afternoon, Floyd Landis stood on the Champs Elysées podium wearing the yellow jersey after one of the most incredible comebacks in Tour de France history. But it was bullshit. Floyd tested positive for testosterone and then spent the next four years denying it, fundraising for a ‘fairness’ campaign, before finally admitting to doping in 2010.

  As I write this, over four years later, Landis has announced his retirement from cycling. When I heard about his positive control, I tried to contact him more than once to tell him to admit to whatever it was he had done, that it was the only thing to do for himself and for his sport. He never responded. He has yet to explain his positive doping control in the Tour and remains
adamant that cycling will always be riddled with doping.

  As he retired, Floyd said: ‘I’m relatively sure this sport cannot be fixed, that’s not my job, that’s not my fight.’

  I don’t agree. I think it is the obligation of every athlete who admits to doping to try and repair their sport, whether they think it’s futile or not. Athletes must understand that admitting to their mistakes is not the end of the road – in many ways it can be the beginning of something much better.

  I was exhausted when I got back to Hayfield. In fact, I’d never been so tired after a Grand Tour. I moved slothfully between sofa and bed for five days before being flown out to Hamburg for a one-day race. But my ambition to race and to win clean had been replenished.

  Unlike Floyd, the Tour hadn’t broken me – it had fixed me.

  23

  TIME TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS

  The epiphany I’d experienced on the start line of the Tour’s final stage had left its mark on me. I was 29 but I still had plenty of ambition – if anything I was more driven than I’d ever been, having realised how much I loved racing and also that my career wouldn’t go on for ever.

  It was becoming clear that if I wanted to be truly professional I had to live somewhere near fellow professionals in a suitable climate with the perfect roads and terrain. From my experience, there are only two places in Europe that tick all these boxes: Tuscany and Catalunya.

  Before I headed off to the Vuelta a España, a race I loved, Nicole and I spent some time in Girona, about an hour’s drive north of Barcelona. Neither of us had ever been there before, but I had heard good things about it from other riders.

  We’d tried Tuscany – Nicole had come out to visit me when I was training at Max’s house – but it didn’t feel right, so after speaking to fellow pro and Girona stalwart Christian Vande Velde during the Tour de France, we homed in on the Catalan city.

  Christian and his wife Leah welcomed us with open arms and we stayed with them for a few days before I headed off to Malaga for the Vuelta. Girona was perfect; the weather was fabulous, the roads quiet and varied, and there were half a dozen English-speaking professionals living there, ensuring that there would always be training partners. This was key because my attitude had changed – I no longer wanted to isolate myself from my profession.

  Although we were only there for a few days, we decided to make Girona our new home. Nicole was absolutely fearless in her commitment to living abroad, which made the decision to move to Spain all the easier.

  I arrived at the 2006 Vuelta relaxed and fresh – the opposite of my state at the start of the Tour. But I was already starting to feel a little isolated from the team. During the last week of the Tour, when I had been exhausted but had maintained my stance against injected récup, I think they genuinely thought I was simply stupid, a fanatic regarding my cause. They had no real understanding of my reasoning or beliefs.

  In my races with them I had taken to working as hard as I could. I hadn’t regained the confidence to race for myself, so it was easier to win respect by being a super-domestique. It helped me fit in and be accepted, something which, despite the ethical divide, was important to me.

  When our young sprinter Francisco Ventoso won a stage in the Vuelta, he surprisingly dedicated it to me. I had become his lead-out man, something I had never even tried while at Cofidis. In another stage, a couple of days later, I put myself on the line to help another teammate. He didn’t win and I realised that I was sacrificing myself too much, just to try and fit in. It was time to rediscover my old self-belief, even if it meant risking failure.

  There was an individual time trial stage looming and I was convinced I could win it. My form was picking up and my physical condition was light years away from where it had been at the end of the Tour. I could feel myself becoming one of the strongest and fastest in the peloton once again.

  I may have lost my edge in the road stages but a time trial was far simpler. I just had to get from point A to point B faster than everybody else. But there was an obstacle – Swiss rider Fabian Cancellara. In my absence from the sport, he’d developed into a monster of a rider and the undisputed king against the clock.

  The time trial was in Cuenca, one of the classic Vuelta finishes. There’s a cobbled climb up through the old town before it levels off, loops out through a valley, and then descends back into the new town.

  We’d ridden this finale in the previous day’s road stage and Fabian and I were clearly on the same wavelength because, with no commitments to the overall standings, we both sat up at the bottom of the cobbled climb and relaxed a little, in order to save our strength for the next day.

  But there was one big difference. Fabian was chatting, joking about and not really paying much attention. Meanwhile, I stayed at the back of the group, studying the road, memorising as much of it as I could and gauging how long I would be able to remain on the time trial bars. Watching Fabian laughing and chatting as we rode over the course made it all the easier for me to focus – I knew I was gaining an advantage.

  In the Saunier Duval team, nobody got up before nine on a time trial stage – they considered it a virtual rest day. Despite that, at seven the next morning I was out on my time trial bike, riding the course. My weary mechanic, David Fernandez, who looked at me as if I was madder than ever, had to get out of bed and open the team truck to give me my bike.

  As I studied the course once more, I knew what I had to do, and that was to limit my deficit as much as I could to the top of the cobbled climb, then take time along the plateau section before attacking the descent to the finish.

  I threw myself into the descent in my time-trialling position. It was possible, but it was going to be a big risk and scary as hell. I told Matxin and David, who would be in the following car during the race itself, that I would be taking a lot of risks in the final kilometres but that I knew what I was doing. If I crashed, then so be it.

  Later that day, towards the end of a hot afternoon, I came over the top of the climb 11 seconds behind Cancellara. But I didn’t panic. Keeping to my plan, I chipped away just over a second on every kilometre to the finish line and narrowly beat him. My victory margin was less than a second but I only came close to crashing once. I think that was the last time anybody ever went faster than Fabian downhill.

  It was the moment I’d been waiting for, certainly since my ban and perhaps since the butterfly récup needle had first dropped into my vein all those years before. I had proven my point.

  In the post-race press conference, I said what I now believed in and had proven through winning, and I said it because I knew I owed it to my younger self. It was what he had always needed to hear.

  ‘I want everybody to understand something, even my fellow professional cyclists and the fans who love cycling: I am doing this on nothing, only on bread and water. I do not believe in any injections of any sort for recuperation. We can perform at the highest level in cycling without medical help.

  ‘Today was a purely physical test. I won, and I am 100 per cent clean. Some people may not believe me, but if you know me, you will believe me after what I have been through. I love my sport and I want everyone to know that you can win the biggest races on bread and water.’

  Because I’d beaten Cancellara in the Vuelta time trial, great things were expected of me in the World Championships later that autumn, my first appearance in Team GB colours since winning the world title in Canada.

  I flopped completely in the time trial, suffering from exhaustion and a very badly timed puncture. But I redeemed myself in the road race, ending up in the defining move of the last lap. It was the first time a Team GB jersey had been seen in the finale of the professional men’s Worlds for a long time.

  A couple of weeks later, I entered the National Track Championships. I won the 4-kilometre individual pursuit, and – as I didn’t defend my title – have since kept a 100 per cent undefeated track racing record. But then beginner’s luck probably played a bigger part in that win than was ac
knowledged at the time.

  Bit by bit, I was being accepted back into the fold. That autumn, I was invited to the Tour de France presentation, in Paris, unveiling the details of the 2007 race, scheduled to start in London. The presentation is a grand affair, held in the Palais des Congrès, just off the périphérique, and always followed by champagne and canapés.

  As I mingled with the crowds in the foyer of the auditorium, I saw ‘JV – former pro Jonathan Vaughters. Jonathan had dropped out of the world of pro cycling a few years earlier, reappearing every now and then writing for magazines. He was now managing a small start-up cycling team in the States.

  I was surprised to see him. Jonathan had endured a hard time as a pro and eventually decided that enough was enough, returning to his Colorado home and turning his back on professional cycling. I didn’t know his full story, but it had always been clear that he was an outsider, separated from others in cycling by his intelligence as much as anything. I’d never known him well enough to notice that he was something of an outsider in all walks of life, and that the older he got the more eccentric he became.

  An intellectual athlete is considered to be an oxymoron, or at least a rare bird in the menagerie that is professional sport. But there are intelligent athletes – it’s just that they sometimes lack higher education, because they have devoted so much of their youth to reaching the top in sport. The most successful athletes have an intelligence that is more like that of a very successful businessman. They are able to manage, motivate and inspire in equal measure.

  They may be out of their depth in many situations but in their world they are extremely well educated and accomplished. Jonathan has more of an education-based intellect, making him very different from most in the sporting sphere, and this sets him apart.

  He has a scientific brain but is also a loner – in fact he’s almost antisocial – and that is not the sort of personality that makes the pack-like existence of professional sport very easy.