Vingegaard crashes out of Tour de France after 2 a.m. doping test sparks outrage

Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard were woken by International Testing Agency officials in the early hours of Sunday ahead of Stage 15 of the Tour de France, prompting a wave of condemnation from riders who called the timing of the tests "inhumane" and demanded action from cycling's riders' union.

Sleep Interrupted Before a Decisive Stage

Vingegaard, second in the general classification, was tested at 2 a.m., while race leader Pogačar received a knock on his door at 5 a.m., according to their respective teams, UAE Team Emirates-XRG and Visma-Lease a Bike. The news emerged before the start of Stage 15 in Champagnole, a demanding route to Plateau de Solaison that would prove fateful for Vingegaard, who crashed on the run-in to the final climb and was forced to abandon the race.cyclingweekly+4

Pogačar, speaking to Eurosport after the stage, labeled the middle-of-the-night testing "inhumane" and "strange," while adding that he "totally accepts" anti-doping rules. He suggested the 2 a.m. wake-up could have contributed to Vingegaard's crash, saying it "ruined his sleep" ahead of one of the Tour's most demanding days.cyclingnews+1

Peloton Unites in Criticism

Stage 15 winner Remco Evenepoel called on the CPA, cycling's riders' union, to take action against what he described as unacceptable testing practices. When told of Vingegaard's 2 a.m. wake-up, Evenepoel initially expressed disbelief. "At 2am? That cannot be right. No, surely that is not allowed," he told Sporza.cyclingnews+2

Visma-Lease a Bike's Matteo Jorgenson said he had been advised to stay silent but chose to speak out. "This shows a complete lack of respect for the riders," Jorgenson told Het Laatste Nieuws. "We put a huge amount of effort into recovery. Then you are woken at 2am. That genuinely makes me angry". Pogačar's teammate Florian Vermeersch called the 5 a.m. test "almost inhumane and completely absurd".domestiquecycling+1

ITA Defends Its Approach

The ITA defended the tests, stating that effective anti-doping programs must, in limited and justified circumstances, be capable of occurring outside standard daytime hours. Under UCI rules, nighttime testing between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. is generally prohibited unless the anti-doping authority has "serious and specific grounds to suspect that the rider is engaging in doping". The ITA had signaled before the race that testing would occur "any time" during the three weeks, as part of what it called a refined approach involving around 600 in-competition samples.road+4

No rider has returned a positive test at the Tour de France since 2015.domestiquecycling