Greg LeMond has been on a whole motodoping tour online recently to stay relevant. He clearly does not understand modern cycling and he has a ton of people he wants to put down for the sake of his own reputation.
There is not reason to believe him more than a crazy uncle.
> Fabian Cancellera was widely suspected of mechanical doping
I don't think the opinions of these fringe conspiracy theorists were ever widely held. Not in the cycling world, not among people with an understanding of physics, and not among the general public.
I am definitely a layperson when it comes to organized sports, but from my POV it seems like competitive cycling attracts WAY more fraud/cheating/doping/etc. than many other kinds of sports. At least I have heard about it a lot more. I wonder why that is.
Because it's such a tough sport. The Tour de France was originally intended to be so tough that only one person might finish it. In other words it was set up to be extremely hard for most normal athletes to compete without some kind of artificial assistance.
So there was a history of drug taking from the start. But after the scandals of 20 years ago it became one of the most tested sports in the world. So now, in my opinion, drugs are not used much compared to other relatively untested sports (maybe some microdosing). Instead sports science has taken over. Pogacar, the current TdF champion works with a someone who is a contributor in mitochondria research. Something that has made a big difference in the last few years is the amount of carbohydrates the riders take in during a stage etc. etc.
It's the most tested sport by far. Mostly because a couple of huge scandals - Festina and Armstrong. It's an endurance sport which is a natural target for doping because of the huge gains that can be made and it's also probably the most popular endurance sport too. That said, it's a problem in other sports but they just don't test as much or publicise it as much. It's become a real problem in Rugby, https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/50785122 and in Football where they hardly test anyone
https://warrenmenezes.substack.com/p/doping-and-english-foot...
One way of thinking about it is how much a sport is skill-based versus fitness-based. Team sports and racquet sports tend to rely more on skill. Cycling and track and field rely more on fitness. A good soccer player isn't going to become a great just by getting a bit fitter, but the advantage given by doping is exactly what it means to be a better cyclist.
This doesn't explain why cycling seems to attract more doping than running. I don't even know if it's true that it does. But there might be something there given the institutional problems cycling has had with doping. Back in the day, it was entire teams doping, with the team staff and doctors in on it, and it's not like they all left when the sport tried to clean up. Either way, the reputation has stuck around.
At that level of competition, just keep xraying bikes so it can't become an issue? Drug testing is privacy invasive, having your bike xrayed isn't if you're not cheating.
A proper ebike won't stand a chance against the modern queen stage of the tour de france, even if ridden by a professional with appropriate gears otherwise, because the battery would run out half way on the first HC and it would just be a very heavy bike for the rest of the stage.
Same with a tiny motor - you gain tiny amount of force but you'll have to carry a full bidon with you on all the climbs, not to mention that the delicate mechanism can break easily.
The bikes have a weight regulation that was set in the 90s, 6.8kg.
Ultra light bikes can be as light weight as 2.7kg. That gives 4kg to hide a battery and motor and still hit weight. A really good lithium battery offers 350 Wh/kg. 1kWh can grant 100 miles of range by itself.
While I don't believe they're being used to cheat in professional cycling, a motor would _definitely_ provide a massive advantage in a cycling race of any kind.
A motor easily provides enough power to overcome its weight, and they wouldn't need assistance for the entire race, just an edge at key moments.
Its real and I find it technologically fascinating as they were using the frame and wheel as motor.
In January 2016 – almost six years after initial allegations of a pro cyclist
doping mechanically – the first confirmed use of "mechanical doping" in the
sport was discovered at the 2016 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships when one
of the bikes of Belgian cyclist Femke Van den Driessche was found to have a
secret motor inside. One blogger described it as the worst scandal in cycling
since the doping scandal that engulfed Lance Armstrong in 2012.
You wouldn't necessarily use mechanical doping to win the general classification, or even a particular stage.
More likely, you'd use it on select stages for very specific reasons... for example, a rider could use it to avoid the time cut on an ITT stage (effectively getting extra rest vs their competitors). Similarly, a pure sprinter could use it to stay in contention on a punchy "sprint" stage (like a stage that MvdP might be a favorite instead of a pure sprinter).
Edit - I don't think anybody is doing this at the top levels of pro cycling. Maybe in regional racing (masters, etc).
> would just be a very heavy bike for the rest of the stage
Bikes in the Tour de France have a minimum weight of 6.8kg imposed by the UCI. So if you manage to build a normal bike that weights 5kg, you still have 1.8kg of weight available to try to add some more hidden power "without adding more weight to the bike" (small battery+engine, small compressed air tank, whatever).
Funnily enough, you're correct in your belief, even if by accident and in defiance of your own preconception. Mechanical doping is the topic your speaking about! :)
Here's some of the more obvious examples out there:
A hybrid car trivially improves total energy input needed, since it replaces braking by generating heat by braking by storing energy later to be reused.
The same should he true here, right? The added energy needed to carry the weight of the motor would be easily overcome by the gains from regenerative braking?
but cycling races are won by being able to put out a critical extra 50 watts for a few minutes at a key point in the race. I don't think anyone is trying to motor the whole way up a climb, but I can imagine how you could have a useful motor if you're just trying to run for ten minutes total? at that point it's analagous to the <250g drones that are out there.
It's too obvious to put the motor in the bike. What they should do is embed electromagnets under the road surface to help accelerate certain bikes and decelerate others.
Kidding aside, this is one of those fields where I don't know how to use Occam's Razor.
Given the fact: "in a sport that is mostly about physical capacity, some racers now routinely achieve better performances than racers that where dopped, but excaped controls, 20 years ago".
What is the explanation that requires the less priors:
* some teams have perfected training regimen, equipment quality, etc... in order to make the same performance today, but without doping (something that never happened)
* some teams have found another way to escape controls (something that happened in the past)
So of course, "Past does not predict the future", it's unfair to accuse without proofs, etc... And maybe the performances have improved dramatically in other sports (surely the number of goals scored in football is increasing exponentially, etc... ?)
I have to give Pogacar credit for one thing: he knew that things were getting really suspicious, and he had the sportmanship to let other people win a couple of stages.
I really wonder how long it will take for the case to be settled !
I don't know if this is a big factor, but, kids for the last 10 years have had access to really good training techniques for free via youtube. Every kid has the opportunity to use the same training techniques as the professionals.
By the time they get serious and have access to professional coaches, they've had maybe 5 years of good quality training.
As well as bikes have improved a lot. Clothes have improved a bit. But the biggest factor of all are the drugs. I mean I don't know. I'm just cynical.
I think it's a level playing field, though. I think it was a level playing field during the armstrong era.
Maybe armstrong had better drugs, better doctors, but it's not like the other riders were clean.
I am familiar with the UFC as a follower: there are many current and former competitors confessed every training camp out there hires experts who know to administer performance enhancing drugs into their athletes in a way they can not be caught when tested.
There is this french website[0] which (among other things) analyses TdF performances over the years.
They compute power metrics based on climbing times in the mountain stages. The trend these last few years is quite worrying, reaching and going above peak doping-era performances [1].
The website is maintained by a former pro-level coach of the festina era.
Where do they fit a motor, battery, controls, and transmission on a 4kg bike? I can’t find any online to buy and I would expect it’s a poorly kept secret.
Yeah, it's so common that literally nobody in high-level road cycling has ever been found doing it. "Motor doping" is the chupacabra: universally feared, never seen.
The math doesn't even begin to pass the smell test, with regards to how much energy you'd get out of some tiny battery vs. the amount you'd spend dragging the dead battery around France all day.
The lengths people will go to to cheat in sports is super interesting - sometimes more interesting than the sport itself! There should be a global all-sport annual prize for red-teaming (against the cheaters).
But something I've noticed across several sports is amateurs really can't grasp how elite some human beings can be biologically due to accidents in evolution
So any significantly elite performance is indistinguishable from tech/drug doping
It's all in the mitochondria and someday they might be able to test at birth (or even before)
And now they are developing mitochondria transplants so just imagine TdF or the Olympics in a few decades
Bikers and their teams are known for removing as much weight as possible from their bikes. Would love to see the math for weight/power/time ratio for a motor like this. Would it be worth it considering you'd have to expend additional watts lugging it around all stage? My guess is probably not. Especially on a mountain stage which is where the tour is really won or lost.
There is a minimum weight requirement for bikes. I remember reading somewhere that they actually add ballast to some of them because they can be made so light.
Theoretically, the motor would be most useful on the climbs of the mountain stages. On the flats a couple of hundred grams don't matter, especially when most of the leaders are hanging back in the group anyway.
That said, bikes can already be made under UCI weight minimums of 6.8kg. Yet from what I've seen, most tour bikes are in the 7-7.5kg range.
The difference between the top 0.0000001% of humanity and second place is very, very small. Fractions of a watt. Adding just 10W would be game changing, and modern lipos and brushless motors add far, far more power than their weight penalty subtracts.
If anyone is a fan of podcasts and this subject, there is a really good podcast series called 'Ghost in the Machine' which does a deep dive into motor doping, how it could be occurring, the current state of technology to enable it and also looking into Femke van den Driessche's case which is mentioned in the article.
[+] [-] bookofjoe|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] jamesblonde|7 months ago|reply
Since then, however, they x-ray bikes for motors. More importantly, riders aren't switching bikes they way they used to.
Greg LeMond claimed Chris Froome used on in the TDF.
References:
https://www.bennionkearny.com/the-hidden-motor-mechanical-do...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgbvuJCvfxg
[+] [-] tokai|7 months ago|reply
There is not reason to believe him more than a crazy uncle.
[+] [-] sidibe|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] Luc|7 months ago|reply
I don't think the opinions of these fringe conspiracy theorists were ever widely held. Not in the cycling world, not among people with an understanding of physics, and not among the general public.
[+] [-] ekianjo|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway81523|8 months ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_doping
Article created in 2016.
[+] [-] ajsnigrutin|7 months ago|reply
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-lead/wp/2015/07/23...
[+] [-] cactusplant7374|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] gwelson|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] discreteevent|7 months ago|reply
So there was a history of drug taking from the start. But after the scandals of 20 years ago it became one of the most tested sports in the world. So now, in my opinion, drugs are not used much compared to other relatively untested sports (maybe some microdosing). Instead sports science has taken over. Pogacar, the current TdF champion works with a someone who is a contributor in mitochondria research. Something that has made a big difference in the last few years is the amount of carbohydrates the riders take in during a stage etc. etc.
[+] [-] sumo89|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] h11h|7 months ago|reply
This doesn't explain why cycling seems to attract more doping than running. I don't even know if it's true that it does. But there might be something there given the institutional problems cycling has had with doping. Back in the day, it was entire teams doping, with the team staff and doctors in on it, and it's not like they all left when the sport tried to clean up. Either way, the reputation has stuck around.
[+] [-] lillecarl|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] Aperocky|7 months ago|reply
A proper ebike won't stand a chance against the modern queen stage of the tour de france, even if ridden by a professional with appropriate gears otherwise, because the battery would run out half way on the first HC and it would just be a very heavy bike for the rest of the stage.
Same with a tiny motor - you gain tiny amount of force but you'll have to carry a full bidon with you on all the climbs, not to mention that the delicate mechanism can break easily.
I'd rather believe they're doping.
[+] [-] cogman10|7 months ago|reply
Ultra light bikes can be as light weight as 2.7kg. That gives 4kg to hide a battery and motor and still hit weight. A really good lithium battery offers 350 Wh/kg. 1kWh can grant 100 miles of range by itself.
[+] [-] mb7733|7 months ago|reply
A motor easily provides enough power to overcome its weight, and they wouldn't need assistance for the entire race, just an edge at key moments.
[+] [-] adolph|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] alistairSH|7 months ago|reply
More likely, you'd use it on select stages for very specific reasons... for example, a rider could use it to avoid the time cut on an ITT stage (effectively getting extra rest vs their competitors). Similarly, a pure sprinter could use it to stay in contention on a punchy "sprint" stage (like a stage that MvdP might be a favorite instead of a pure sprinter).
Edit - I don't think anybody is doing this at the top levels of pro cycling. Maybe in regional racing (masters, etc).
[+] [-] polivier|7 months ago|reply
Bikes in the Tour de France have a minimum weight of 6.8kg imposed by the UCI. So if you manage to build a normal bike that weights 5kg, you still have 1.8kg of weight available to try to add some more hidden power "without adding more weight to the bike" (small battery+engine, small compressed air tank, whatever).
[+] [-] registeredcorn|7 months ago|reply
Funnily enough, you're correct in your belief, even if by accident and in defiance of your own preconception. Mechanical doping is the topic your speaking about! :)
Here's some of the more obvious examples out there:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSfLbALqUgM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZerARsCqAE
https://youtu.be/1CnyvcAFTlA?t=36
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fbg4BjZna4Y
This video covers a bit of the history of mechanical doping. https://youtu.be/JMZbU6on43k?t=610
[+] [-] jakewins|7 months ago|reply
The same should he true here, right? The added energy needed to carry the weight of the motor would be easily overcome by the gains from regenerative braking?
[+] [-] ortusdux|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] matthewowen|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] aeternum|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] SamPatt|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] cwmoore|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] phtrivier|7 months ago|reply
Kidding aside, this is one of those fields where I don't know how to use Occam's Razor.
Given the fact: "in a sport that is mostly about physical capacity, some racers now routinely achieve better performances than racers that where dopped, but excaped controls, 20 years ago".
What is the explanation that requires the less priors:
* some teams have perfected training regimen, equipment quality, etc... in order to make the same performance today, but without doping (something that never happened)
* some teams have found another way to escape controls (something that happened in the past)
So of course, "Past does not predict the future", it's unfair to accuse without proofs, etc... And maybe the performances have improved dramatically in other sports (surely the number of goals scored in football is increasing exponentially, etc... ?)
I have to give Pogacar credit for one thing: he knew that things were getting really suspicious, and he had the sportmanship to let other people win a couple of stages.
I really wonder how long it will take for the case to be settled !
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVB7OX0Oa-Q
[+] [-] crashbunny|7 months ago|reply
By the time they get serious and have access to professional coaches, they've had maybe 5 years of good quality training.
As well as bikes have improved a lot. Clothes have improved a bit. But the biggest factor of all are the drugs. I mean I don't know. I'm just cynical.
I think it's a level playing field, though. I think it was a level playing field during the armstrong era.
Maybe armstrong had better drugs, better doctors, but it's not like the other riders were clean.
[+] [-] jnpnj|7 months ago|reply
this is something I never expected to see on HN.
[+] [-] jonplackett|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] begueradj|7 months ago|reply
There is always a way to cheat.
[+] [-] Neil44|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] navaed01|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] timost|7 months ago|reply
They compute power metrics based on climbing times in the mountain stages. The trend these last few years is quite worrying, reaching and going above peak doping-era performances [1].
The website is maintained by a former pro-level coach of the festina era.
[0] https://www.cyclisme-dopage.com/
[1] https://www.cyclisme-dopage.com/actualite/2025-07-26-cyclism...
[+] [-] ngriffiths|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] scoreandmore|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] blakesterz|7 months ago|reply
https://telegrafi.com/en/keshtu-funksionon-motori-vogel-per-...
The video of him reaching behind his seat is interesting I guess.
[+] [-] aaronrobinson|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] jeffbee|7 months ago|reply
The math doesn't even begin to pass the smell test, with regards to how much energy you'd get out of some tiny battery vs. the amount you'd spend dragging the dead battery around France all day.
[+] [-] amelius|7 months ago|reply
The least they can do is give all contestants the same equipment.
[+] [-] jl6|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] ck2|7 months ago|reply
But something I've noticed across several sports is amateurs really can't grasp how elite some human beings can be biologically due to accidents in evolution
So any significantly elite performance is indistinguishable from tech/drug doping
It's all in the mitochondria and someday they might be able to test at birth (or even before)
And now they are developing mitochondria transplants so just imagine TdF or the Olympics in a few decades
[+] [-] floodfx|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] silverquiet|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] ahi|7 months ago|reply
That said, bikes can already be made under UCI weight minimums of 6.8kg. Yet from what I've seen, most tour bikes are in the 7-7.5kg range.
[+] [-] LeifCarrotson|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] jmcdowell|7 months ago|reply
[+] [-] jfghi|8 months ago|reply