UCI president Lappartient confirms what Visma | Lease a Bike was told after overnight doping test

The late-night doping tests involving Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard—and, eventually, many more riders—may well have been the defining off-bike story of the 2026 Tour de France. They triggered a debate on an unprecedented scale, with fresh twists continuing to emerge. Now that the storm has begun to settle, UCI president David Lappartient has set out his view of the controversy.

Vingegaard dropped what initially seemed like a small bombshell before the start of Stage 15, although it would soon produce an enormous reaction. The Dane revealed that he had been woken at 2 a.m. to undergo a test. Pogačar was woken at 5 a.m. that same night. Riders, analysts and team directors were angered by the disruption, and questions were quickly raised over whether such testing was permitted.

The answer appeared to be yes, although permission from a French judge was required. Such authorisation should only be granted when there are “serious and consistent suspicions” that anti-doping rules have been—or are about to be—broken. Visma | Lease a Bike later said it had been told that Vingegaard’s test was not based on specific suspicions concerning the Danish rider.

Enter Lappartient, the head of cycling’s international governing body. He expressed his support for the International Testing Agency, which carried out the overnight controls during the Tour. “It has to remain very exceptional. We will not support something that is done every night to all the riders. It really has to remain exceptional,” he told Daniel Benson.

Lappartient nevertheless underlined his support for targeted testing. “However, we support the ITA if they have to carry out specific tests. Why? Because we know that with micro-dosing EPO, it can no longer be detected six or seven hours later. For riders, the fear that the ITA could turn up is just as significant as the fear that the police could come.”

The UCI president knows only too well why that fear and distrust exist. “In cycling, there is always suspicion, probably because of our past, but I know everything that has been done to fight doping. Night-time testing is a tool in that fight, but it is not a tool that should be used every day.”

Lappartient again stressed that the measure should only be used in exceptional circumstances. “The aim is not to wake a rider in the middle of the night. The ITA has to say: look, we have this control available. It sends a message: we are here, and we will never give up the fight against doping.”

“So it is not about suspicions directed at one particular rider, but a general message to the whole peloton,” the UCI president concluded, confirming what Visma | Lease a Bike had previously been told by the ITA.