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Nicole Cooke 'sceptical' about Sir Dave Brailsford claims and says British Cycling is sexist
Nicole Cooke, the former world and Olympic champion, claimed British Cycling was hopelessly and inherently sexist – “run by men, for men” – and said that she had “no faith” in the UK Anti-Doping agency authority.
Cooke, who was speaking to the Culture Media and Sport select committee as part of its inquiry, argued that doping should be criminalised, and added that she was “sceptical” of Sir Bradley Wiggins’ medical need for the corticosteroid Kenacort before the biggest targets of his seasons in 2011, 2012 and 2013.
She described the “chronological coincidence” of Wiggins’s applications for therapeutic use exemptions at those particular moments in his career as “disturbing”.
And she poured scorn on Team Sky’s claims to be the “cleanest” team in cycling when their team principal, Sir Dave Brailsford, could not say what drugs were being administered to his star rider.
British Cycling, Team Sky and UKAD were three of Cooke’s biggest targets – British Cycling and UKAD responded with statements defending themselves, while Team Sky decline to respond – but, in truth, no one was spared Cooke’s wrath. It was never going to be a comfortable ride given her oft-stated views on both sexism and doping,
Cycling’s world governing body, the UCI, the World Anti-Doping Agency, and UK Sport – who failed to keep British Cycling and Team Sky “in check” when they began to “prioritise their own personal projects” – were all given damning assessments.
Damian Collins MP, the chairman of the CMS select committee, described Cooke’s evidence as “truly shocking”, “totally unacceptable” and “disturbing”.
Collins had already told The Telegraph that he might call UKAD to give evidence in an effort to understand why its investigation into the jiffy bag taken out to Team Sky at the 2011 Critérium du Dauphiné had hit an impasse, and to discuss whether it had the appropriate resources and authority to be effective.
He repeated that on Tuesday, saying he was hopeful he would be able to make an announcement shortly “as to how we intend to close our inquiry in doping in sport”.
Collins said: “We’d like to do that in association with UKAD closing their investigation so that gives us the ability to talk to UKAD and potentially other witnesses they have called openly about the investigation into the Jiffy Bag. We certainly hope to call witnesses over the next few weeks.”
In particular, Collins said, he was concerned by Cooke’s allegations of discrimination within British Cycling, which “posed questions of UK Sport because they are supposed to be the dispassionate funders of elite sport”.
And he added that Cooke’s evidence regarding UKAD – Cooke said she twice gave evidence to the body and on neither occasion did it lead anywhere – was equally concerning, prompting questions as to whether doping should be criminalised.
“Her evidence clearly suggests that UKAD did not have the resources or the powers to investigation allegations that are brought to their attention,” he said. “The reason for having criminal sanctions for doping is so you can use the crime agencies to help investigate allegations of doping that UKAD simply don’t have that power [to do].”
Cooke, who was giving evidence via video-link from Paris where she is working, had provided a detailed written statement to the committee, which was released publicly as her hearing began.
In it she spoke of cycling being a sport “run by men, for men”, with British Cycling as bad as anyone. “British Cycling has got used to not being accountable to anyone,” Cooke told MPs. “You just have to listen to how they talk about things. It goes from Team Sky being set up to have the first British winner of the Tour de France. Of course they really did not mean any British rider because I had already won the Tour twice. They meant a British rider who counts in their eyes and that meant a man.
“This was an exclusively male programme; it was not open to women and would not support women, but resources paid from the public purse to support that tiny fraction of a programme that was available to women were stripped out of the women’s programme to augment the men’s programme by flying out ‘unknown’ Jiffy Bags or riding mopeds whenever needed.”
UCI WorldTour 2017: Team-by-team guide to the season
British Cycling issued a statement saying it was “absolutely committed to resolving the historic gender imbalance in our sport” and pointing to recent progress. “Since 2013, we have established a women’s under-23 academy, a women’s road team training base in Belgium and we are close to a 50:50 male/female ratio in terms of riders on the world-class programme. British Cycling is also proud of the record of our elite women – at London 2012, the first Games to feature parity for the genders in cycling, and Rio 2016 they won a combined 28 medals.”
UKAD, meanwhile, said it welcomed the debate about its effectiveness “as it highlights the challenges we face regarding jurisdiction and resourcing”.
“But there should be no doubt about the determination of this organisation to protect clean sport,” it added.
