Spanish sports authorities furious over Le Monde's covert 'doping' link with Pau Gasol
Thursday, September 24, 2015 @ 6:56 PM
NATIONAL basketball legend Pau Gasol has had to fend off oblique but unfounded hints in the French media about doping, but managed to deflect them with equal subtlety on Instagram.
A reporter's blog in France's best-known national daily newspaper Le Monde referred to the relationship between Gasol and Spanish physiologist Dr Nicolás Terrados when discussing the factors behind the former's apparent super-human strength and powerful play.
Dr Terrado, one-time GP to the ONCE national Spanish cycling team, was fined 30,000 French francs (about €4,080) during the 1998 Tour de France when containers of corticosteroids, anabolic substances, caffeine capsules and other stimulants were found in his hotel room.
During the same competition, ONCE team leader Laurent Jalabert tested positive for doping and Swiss cyclist Alex Zülle has since admitted he and 'about another 20 or so' others consumed stimulants during their time on the team 'under the control of Dr Terrado and a doctor called José'.
Concerning Pau Gasol, the Le Monde article explains how he and his trainer Joaquín Juan approached Dr Terrados 'to study his metabolism and energy production, and to optimise them', before going on to say: “Nicolás Terrados knows all about energy,” as a lead-in to his fine in the 1998 doping scandal.
Read more at thinkSPAIN.com