Halfway through the last Vuelta, beneath the display of the Jumbo’s mechanical banana, a dull background noise filled the peloton, and a little hidden desire. Do you know about the papers? Have you received the papers? Aren’t you going to publish any of the papers?
The papers that everyone knew, that a few wanted to see published, that the Vuelta feared and that others wanted to silence consisted of several pages that contained the transcription of dozens of conversations and WhatsApp audios from the summary of the Civil Guard’s Operation Ilex against doping. Recorded in the last quarter of 2021 and the first quarter of 2022, they reflect the contacts of several runners from the Caja Rural team with the doctor Marcos Maynar, from the University of Extremadura.
Operation Ilex, directed by a Cáceres court, is what has led to the suspension for alleged doping of Superman López, who was fired from Astana and returned to a Colombian team, and to the investigation for an alleged doping crime of Vicente Belda , former director of Kelme already involved, in 2006, in Operation Puerto, and his son, also Vicente, who worked as López’s masseuse on the Kazakh team.
The papers were received at the beginning of September, with the Vuelta already underway, either in bulky envelopes by ordinary mail sent from a post office in Vitoria, or via email converted into PDF, by those responsible for the 22 teams that ran the Vuelta, and reached the offices of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the International Cycling Union (UCI), the Spanish cycling federation, the Spanish anti-doping agency, the Vuelta a España and the editorial offices of some newspapers and radio stations (not to EL PAÍS).
“This is the massive dissemination of a partial and decontextualized report anonymously with the aim of damaging the reputation of this team, the Caja Rural-Seguros RGA,” they explain from the Navarrese team, which has filed a complaint in Madrid with the Civil Guard. “in case the facts could constitute a crime” of revealing secrets. “By not knowing the person or persons responsible for the events, the complaint is not directed against a specific person, and this is expressly reflected.” The team, however, has indications, although not conclusive evidence, of who the person responsible may be.
Previously, according to sources from the Civil Guard, which was already investigating the shipment, the Cáceres court of Operation Ilex had opened a separate case for this revelation, which, according to the first police reports, coinciding with those held by Caja Rural, would come from a leader of a team unhappy for not participating in the Vuelta. In Spain, apart from Movistar, which belongs to the WorldTeam category and has a fixed right to participate in the major events, there are four teams in the second division, the ProTeam, which can only participate by invitation to the race. They don’t all fit. In 2022 Unipublic, the organizer of the Vuelta, invited three of them – Kern Pharma, Euskaltel Euskadi and Burgos BH – and left Caja Rural out. In 2023 he only invited two, Caja Rural and Burgos. Everyone considers participation in the Vuelta a primary objective.
In the investigation of Operation Ilex, the Civil Guard confirmed that dozens of athletes, especially cyclists, had contacts with Maynar about the consumption of certain substances and training advice, but the papers that flooded the Vuelta referred only to the conversations that they had with the sulphurous doctor kept some corridors of the Caja Rural. Through them, and from the words of both Maynar and the runners, the Civil Guard investigators concluded that the contact between both parties had been established by Juan Manuel Hernández, manager and sports manager of the team.
“The conversations are not proof that a doping crime was committed, nor can the runners be sanctioned because although he is investigated and has been involved in other doping cases for years, Maynar is not suspended for doping in Spain, although the “He was in Portugal for 10 years, between 2009 and 2019, and he can help whoever he wants,” say sources in the investigation who regret the little help provided by the teams and athletes, the most affected, respectful of the law of silence, when they asks for collaboration to delve deeper into Maynar’s plot. “What they do is not a crime, but they do it behind the backs of the rest of the team and against the UCI regulations, which require that athletes can only be treated by coaches and doctors who appear on the team’s official roster.”
Everyone in the cycling world focused on the Vuelta, the impatient and the anxious, those who wanted the matter not to be talked about at all and some rival team that was not very fond of Caja Rural and encouraged journalists to tell everything, finally followed the ostrich tactic Everyone stuck their heads in the sand and waited for the unusual storm to pass. Neither the Spanish federation nor the UCI nor the anti-doping agency have delved into the investigation and Caja Rural announces that it will make the necessary decisions internally.
Only, and in the background, Unipublic, the organizing company of the Vuelta, reacted, speaking with those responsible for Caja Rural asking them that it was their responsibility to ensure that the matter did not affect the race. The day after the conversation, the best rider on the team, the Venezuelan champion Orluis Aular, a magnificent sprinter (second in the Oliva stage), withdrew from the Vuelta citing “an indisposition.” Aular was the only rider in the Navarrese team’s Vuelta lineup whose name appeared on the papers talking to Maynar. The only victim with a name and surname of the paper trick, a “totally innocent” athlete, according to investigators, participated three weeks later in the Tour of Croatia. He won a stage and won the final overall.
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