Jonas Vingegaard Missed a Doping Test in 2019. What Does That Mean, Exactly?
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Last week, Tour de France winner Jonas Vingegaard sort of freaked out the cycling world with the revelation that back in 2019, he missed a doping test. He told Danish news outlet Ekstra Bladet that a missed test is ‘every cyclist’s worst nightmare,’ and that it still haunts him.
So, should cycling fans start holding their collective breath that there’s more to the story? Given how past heroes of cycling have fallen time and time again, it’s certainly concerning—but it appears there’s a bit more nuance to the story, and it’s probably not time to completely panic about Vingegaard.
Given that Vingegaard’s teammate Michael Hessman was suspended earlier this year for a positive doping test for a diuretic drug, it’s understandable that Vingegaard would be on edge. He told Ekstra Badet that he firmly believes in anti-doping and testing protocols, and that he’s concerned about his teammate’s positive test, but doesn’t know how the diuretic could have gotten into Hessman’s body.
And the missed 2019 test? A comedy of error. “I had left my cell phone in the kitchen, and then our doorbell didn’t work,” he told Ekstra Badet. “They tried to call me, and it was clear that it was not possible to answer. Of course, it’s not cool. But they did come back two days later.”
The World Anti-Doping Organization (WADA) can and does perform random tests on professional athletes, including cyclists, and someone from a nation’s anti-doping governing body (USADA in the U.S., for example) can show up at a rider’s house anytime and require a blood and/or urine sample. Cyclists who are in the testing pool are required to list their addresses and when they’ll be in different places with WADA—this is referred to as “whereabouts.”
Missed tests aren’t uncommon due to scheduling changes and mix-ups, since these athletes obviously spend large amounts of time traveling and schedules can shift. So a missed test doesn’t necessarily indicate guilt, more often, it’s simply bad timing.
As GCN analyst Dan Lloyd points out, it’s easy to jump to conclusions and point fingers when a high-level rider misses a test. After all, we’ve been burned before. It’s hard to trust, especially when so many top riders have turned out to be not-so-clean.
But, as Lloyd says, it’s so easy to make a simple mistake when filling out your Whereabouts (or have a flight delayed, or make a split-second decision to head to warmer weather for better training).
Lloyd also points out the simple fact that a rider can miss three random tests in a 12 month period before they count as a doping violation.
Sometimes, an address is recorded incorrectly or a house is just hard to find or difficult to access. From personal experience as a team manager for a cyclocross team, one of my riders only narrowly avoiding missing a test thanks to a series of frantic phone calls and—seriously—Twitter DMs that saved the day from friends-of-friends who had been contacted by WADA’s local testers looking for our hard-to-find AirBNB.
Bear in mind, this was even trickier back in 2016 with an American cell phone in a tiny village in France, where wifi was spotty at the best of times. We were able to guide the testing crew to the house and our rider was tested (and clean!), but it was a reminder that even riders with the best of intentions can get caught out.
Even without the broken doorbell, imagine Vingegaard had simply been in the shower when they showed up. (Please don’t imagine this too vividly.) He may not have heard the doorbell even if it wasn’t broken, and wouldn’t have his phone on hand. It could easily be more than an hour before he realized they’d come and gone. Or what if he’d been out riding in an area with no cell coverage when they came by?
True, it’s harder and harder to be off-the-grid at any given moment. But at the same time, surely we can give riders a bit of leeway when it comes to random knocks on the door. After all, when was the last time you answered a call from an unknown number, or ran to the door when the bell rang, rather than assuming it was just a UPS dropoff?
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