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news
Nicole Cooke at 2010 GB road nats (copyright britishcycling.org.uk)Nicole Cooke to give evidence to MPs tomorrow in doping investigation
Former world and Olympic champion Nicole Cooke will give evidence tomorrow to a House of Commons committee that is examining doping in sport. Given the strong views she has expressed on drugs cheats in the past, it's unlikely she will pull any punches.
The 33-year-old, who retired from professional cycling four years ago this month, will appear by videolink at 11am tomorrow before the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, which is chaired by Folkestone & Hythe MP, Damian Collins.
Her appearance comes a month after British Cycling president Bob Howden and fellow board member Dr George Gilbert, former coach Shane Sutton and Team Sky principal Sir Dave Brailsford were grilled by the committee.
Cooke is believed to have given evidence to the independent review of British Cycling ordered by UK Sport in the wake of allegations of discrimination and bullying made against former Great Britain Cycling Team technical director Sutton
Writing in the Guardian last year, she said that elite cycling is “sexist by design,” and she has equally forthright views on doping.
Announcing her retirement in January 2013, she said: "I do despair that the sport will ever clean itself up when rewards of stealing are greater than riding clean. If that remains the case, the temptation for those with no morals will always be too great.
> Nicole Cooke retires and goes out with guns blazing against dopers
"I have been robbed by drugs cheats, but am fortunate, I am here with more in my basket than the 12-year-old dreamed of.
"But for many people out there who do ride clean; people with morals, many of these people have had to leave the sport with nothing after a lifetime of hard work - some going through horrific financial turmoil."
Ten times a British national champion, the highlight of Cooke’s career came in 2008, when she won the road world championship in Varese, Italy, a month after winning gold in the road race at the Beijing Olympics.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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11 comments
i ve stood on a regional podium as girls series winner and waited as the boy got his trophy and the BC rep looked awkward and handed me and 2nd place girl £2 each.
My dad compained to the local BC people and it turned out exactly the same thing had happened the year before, the same thing happened the following year, they had a prize but could nt find it.
when they did, the girl did have her presentation, just months after she should have.
i race in womens races now and its better, some regions are brilliant but on the whole a long way behind CTT.
Why doesnt BC promote a junior girls series? they do for the junior men.
So i find her (and jess Varnish) view on BC completely beliveable.
Meanwhile football isnt even mentioned....
Nicole Cooke mentioned Rio Ferdinand in her submission.
Did you log on to the wrong website?
Ouch - Nicole Cooke's 10 page submission
1.0 Summary
I wish to present to you evidence for two problems that you may wish to consider.
The first one relates to the governance of a sport that receives annually significant financial support from the public purse and the fact that such funds are not distributed equitably and in a decent manner for the benefit of the whole of the target population. I summarise that as a sport run by men, for men. I have attempted to achieve redress on a number of occasions but have encountered a governance structure at the National Federation – British Cycling - that is not responsible to anyone other than itself for its own actions. It has an Executive Board, but this exerts minimal control of its executive officers and is filled with a majority who approve of the mal-distribution of public funds. The oversight that should be in place via UK Sport is, at best, token.
The second relates to how measures and schemes put in place to fight the abuse of performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) are inadequate and ineffective in planning, management and execution – the so called “war on PEDs”. I summarise that as the wrong people fighting the wrong war, in the wrong way, with the wrong tools.
so is she going to give evidence, or is she going to give her opinion as usual?
I hope its the former, but suspect the latter
Given that these Select Committee Inquiries are basically kangaroo courts it probably makes very little difference which!
I like her outspoken opinions anyway, she can be quite refreshing.
I like Nicole Cooke.
We need to do what they have done in other countries - treat doping as fraud and bring criminal prosecutions against the fraudsters.
We do need tougher sanctions - has to be blanket, international agreement though.
One aspect I disagree with her quotes above on is that the rewards for cheating will *always* be worth cheating for, for people willing to cheat. That's a battle that will never be won, so not worth fighting.
So the risk of being caught and the punishment once caught needs to be a deterrent.
It's worth revisiting what's meant to be the scope of this inquiry from their own website:
Scope of the inquiry
In August the Sunday Times published a series of articles commenting on a database of test results from athletes taken between 2001 and 2012, which its experts argued showed abnormal results for a number of endurance runners.
The Committee explores the allegations (which have been strenuously rebutted by the International Association of Athletics Federations) that the IAAF failed to follow up test results from some prominent athletes which raised suspicions that blood doping had occurred.
i look forward to a thorough discussion with Nicole on the IAAF's failings... No actually let's just bang on about the cyclists again.
*grabs popcorn*