“I have soiled my sport. » This Wednesday, during her trial in Montargis for possession and importation of doping products, former French cyclist Marion Sicot, tested positive for EPO in 2019 and suspended for four years, admitted to doping from 2016 to 2019. “I regret cheating, lying,” she said. The prosecutor requested a one-year suspended prison sentence and a fine of 5,000 euros.
Sometimes moved to tears, with a bike tattooed on her right arm, the sportswoman said she had “not been able to say no in this quest for performance”. “I wasn’t doing well, I went to the facility,” she added. Until now, Marion Sicot had only publicly spoken about an EPO injection, after a positive test in June 2019 following the French Road Championships. Facts that she initially rejected in their entirety, before recognizing them in March 2020.
“Bicycling was my whole life”
This control initially earned the athlete a two-year suspension, a sentence increased to four years by the Council of State after a procedure lasting almost three years. At the helm, the ex-cyclist this time recognized all the doping facts revealed by the investigations carried out following his control, in particular different doping protocols with erythropoietin, but also with clenbuterol, between 2016 and 2019. “I wanted to reveal part of what I had done, that I had cheated, without taking full responsibility,” she explained.
Marion Sicot had also previously motivated this injection by the hope of performing well and regaining the trust of her manager, the Belgian Marc Bracke, of the Doltcini-Van Eyck team, from whom she hoped to break away by obtaining a good result. The latter, against whom she had filed a complaint for sexual harassment in August 2022, which was dismissed, committed suicide in October 2022. “At that time, I was not well. I was in my bubble and cycling was my whole life. I saw that my level was declining and, mentally, I was no longer there,” she also confided.
“Relieved”, she wants to turn the page
The former cyclist, now licensed at the Châteauroux triathlon club (Indre) and self-employed in sports coaching, has repeatedly insisted that doping is “an integral part of this sport”. But for her, “there was no professional benefit”. She described her fear of disappearing from sport and her three years of professional cycling, a level “which cost her money” due to her low pay, without doping allowing her to compete with the best in her sport.
At the end of the hearing, Marion Sicot said she was “relieved”. “I will be able to turn the page and continue this new life,” she continued. One of his friends, a former semi-pro cyclist, also called to appear, admitted to importing, administering and possessing doping products. A third defendant, a doctor suspected of having illegally issued prescriptions for the purpose of prescribing EPO, denied the facts.
Sentences of 18 months suspended imprisonment, accompanied by a fine of 10,000 euros, and 18 months suspended imprisonment accompanied by a fine of 20,000 euros, with a ban on exercising the activity of doctor for two years, were respectively requested against the two other defendants. Judgment is scheduled for January 22, 2025.
