Former professional cyclist Jan Ullrich spoke for the first time about doping in Team Telekom. “I learned pretty quickly that doping was widespread. I was told: You’re good, you’re hugely talented, you train with a lot of effort, you have all the skills it takes. But if you want to keep up here, you have to take part,” the 49-year-old told Stern.
Ullrich joined the then model German racing team in 1995 and two years later became the only German to win the Tour de France. Ullrich, about whose life a documentary will be released on Amazon Prime next week, does not explicitly admit to his own doping. “Without helping, the widespread perception at the time was that it would be like going to a shooting armed with only a knife,” said the Rostock native.
At the time, it all felt completely normal: “In general, the prevailing attitude was: If you don’t do that – how are you going to survive in a race? Then you ride in the peloton and you know that you’re probably one of those who have nothing in it, and that’s why “You have zero chance either.”
Ullrich was suspended by his team in 2006 for links to Spanish doping doctor Eufemiano Fuentes and was banned for two years by the Cas International Court of Arbitration for Sport in 2012. The fact that he did not talk about doping in 2006 or a year later, when a number of other Telekom drivers admitted to doping, was primarily for legal reasons. In 2006 he “didn’t want to be a traitor,” and in 2007 criminal proceedings were underway against Ullrich. “My lawyers advised me to remain silent. Advice that I followed, but the consequences of which I suffered for a long time.”
At the same time, he also spoke about the difficult time after the doping scandal, his alcohol addiction and the escapades in Mallorca. “I wasn’t far from death,” said Ullrich. He had a serious crash in 2018 and, among other things, caused negative headlines with his drug use. Three years previously he had moved to Mallorca with his wife Sara and their three children.
“At some point someone brought cocaine with them” and that “turns you from human to monster in a very short space of time,” says Ullrich
It was “first and foremost an escape from the dreary German winter weather,” said Ullrich: “In the end, the crash followed – it couldn’t get that deep, any deeper.” Ullrich was plagued by loneliness when his family abandoned him. He started drinking. “Wine turned into whiskey. First one bottle a day, later up to two. It was a total stupor,” said the 49-year-old. From then on, his finca developed into a “party place”, “at some point someone brought cocaine with them” and that “turns you from human to monster in a very short time,” says Ullrich.
When his wife Sara threatened that he would no longer be allowed to see his children, Ullrich gave in. That was “the only reason” to “seek medical treatment,” he said: “I knew: I had to do something if I even wanted to see her again.” During all this time he lived a “life of extremes”: “I was in heaven and I was in hell. Now I’m back on earth, on the way to the middle.”
