Of the many thousands of vehicles at the Tour de France, the anti-doping truck is the most secretive, blocked off by high black fencing with a security guard permanently stationed outside. On the race’s first time trial, however, I’m waved through various checkpoints and allowed into the operations centre that is tasked with maintaining the integrity of cycling’s biggest event. Led up the steps of the long white truck, I’m shown into the first of two unremarkable, plain portable offices, featuring a desk, lots of anti-doping posters, and a bathroom with mirrors on all four sides.

On average, eight riders per stage are required to give a urine sample at the Tour (at the cost of just under €1,000 per test), including the stage winner and the yellow jersey, and they must follow a strict protocol: after a chaperone notifies them of their obligation to provide a sample and they’ve signed a disclaimer form, they then roll their bibshorts down to their knees and their jersey up to their chest, and urinate into a small plastic pot called the testing vessel, with a doping control officer (DCO) watching at all times to ensure that no third-party liquid is used instead. The urine is then poured into A and B vessels, and stored in a coolbox between 2°C and 8°C before being sent for analysis.

The 2024 Tour has passed off without any doping violations, and the sport appears to be light years away from the EPO and blood doping days of the 1990s and 2000s. But violations do still occur; EF Education-EasyPost terminated the contract of Andrea Piccolo just before the Tour after he was accused of importing human growth hormone into Italy. It was a timely reminder that the fight to ensure a clean Tour de France is a never-ending one.

This article was published in Cycling Weekly in July 2025. You can read the full article here.