Indurain: Riis does cycling no favours

By Monika Prell

After Bjarne Riis' confession that he used EPO during the Tour de France 1996, Miguel Indurain stated that he did not like the declarations of Riis, who was the one to conclude the Spaniards five-year reign. "I don't understand why he made these confessions eleven years after. But he is old enough and he will know better than anybody else why he did it," he said to Marca.

He believes that the confessions of Riis "did not do any favours for cycling. Actually, there are many people who hope that this sport comes out of this bottomless pit, and things like this take from everyone's courage."

Indurain does not want to take away from Riis' 1996 win. "I don't want to detract from what Riis did, but my impression is that he did not overwhelm me, that it was me who lost the Tour. I did all I could to be in front and at the end I did not reach this goal. Riis and many others were stronger, and if there was anything irregular or not then it is not my affair."

Indurain does not want to call Riis "Mister 60 percent" like many others do. "I am not the one who should judge his declarations because only he knows what he did and only he is responsible of what he did."