New Spanish Doping Ring Uncovered
Operacion Grial - Spanish investigators have uncovered a new doping ring in Spain, centered around the former Kelme team doctor, Walter Viru.

By Lee Rodgers

Last Tuesday the Spanish Civil Guard (police) raided several locations across Spain that led to the arrest of 11 people, including 3 cyclists. The police raids took place in Barcelona, Valencia, Murcia and Grenada. The arrested include two pharmacists who were already suspected of distributing banned substances, and several doctors. The ring is reported by the Spanish police to have distributed EPO, CERA and human growth hormone.

The investigation, named Operacion Grial by the authorities, is reminiscent of the infamous Operacion Puerto, the doping scandal of 2006 that uncovered the doping ring run by Dr Fuentes, a former collaborator of Walter Viru and also once a doctor with the Kelme squad.

"Investigations were initiated in early August 2009 when the Civil Guard became aware of the existence of a group of people, mostly residents in Valencia, which were dedicated to supplying doping products to people of different sports and categories," read the statement.

It continued: "During the investigations it was discovered that among the network of members was a physician with sports and dietary consultation in Valencia, whose role would be to prepare training plans, nutrition and supplementation aimed at improving the performance of athletes, including substances in these plans prohibited in sport."

On Thursday the 26th of November, a 12th person was arrested for alleged involvement in the ring - Raul Castano, an amateur cyclist who rides for the Valencia-based team Terra I Mar. Castano is the 5th cyclist to be involved in the case, along with Pedro Vera, a professional rider with Contentpolis, José Ortega from Club Pub Tribus and female bike rider Cristina Navarro. Paracyclist Javier Ochoa was also questioned by police. Castano himself denied that he had been arrested, though the Spanish media reported that he was indeed taken in by police for questioning last week.

Amazingly, former Spanish professional Jesus Manzano (ex-Kelme) has said that he actually warned the Spanish anti-doping authorities about Viru and his role in helping cyclists to beat the doping controls.

Speaking to French newspaper L`Equipe in 2007, Manzano said: “I want to give you an example, something I've never spoken about except to the police up until now. It concerns one of the four Spanish Laboratories accredited by the UCI. This laboratory, which is in charge of sending the UCI vampires [doctors] to take the samples during the Vuelta and other races is the same lab that's in charge of the doctors’ visits to the cyclists. They follow the cyclists and give them the stamp of approval on their licenses.

“The owner of this clinic, a renowned haematologist, called Walter Viru, who is one of the doctors for Kelme, warned the team doctors the day before the UCI vampires were coming to take the samples from the cyclists. And he did the same thing with Del Moral, the doctor for the US Postal team and then Discovery, [who is] a good friend of his.”

If Monzano is to be believed, that means that at least one of the actual clinics that the UCI has working for them in the fight against doping is in fact helping the cyclists to cheat the doping controls.

Though this latest Spanish investigation has so far only uncovered doping by relatively unknown riders, it highlights the extent and depth of doping in Spain. It also reveals, quite obviously, that the lesson of Operacion Puerto has not been learnt. The Spanish authorities were roundly criticized for what many saw as attempts to cover-up the extent of banned substance use by professional cyclists and other sportsmen after Puerto. One can only hope that the same mistake will not be made yet again.

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