Covid-19 tests completed as Tour de France holds its breath

LA ROCHELLE, France: Egan Bernal, Primoz Roglic and the rest of the peloton has undergone a second wave of Covid-19 swab tests with the samples sent to Paris for analysis, the Tour de France testing centre confirmed on Monday’s rest day.

Any team returning two or more positive PCR tests, be they riders, managers, doctors, masseurs or mechanics, risks being excluded from the remainder of the race.

The original idea was to ban teams where two riders tested positive but two days ahead of the Grand Depart on August 29, as much of France went on red alert with the pandemic numbers rising, the French government requested that it also include support staff.

“The final team has now been tested and these tests have now been sent to a laboratory in Paris for analysis,” a member of staff at the centre said. “The results will first be communicated to the team doctors, who must then pass those results on to the International Cycling Union.

“They in turn will inform the Tour organisers,” the official said. The results will be announced officially on Tuesday morning ahead of stage 10, although teams may leak those results ahead of time.

Each team on this year’s trimmed down Tour was restricted to 30 members, but some arrived with as few as 25. Four members of the Lotto-Soudal team were sent home after two mechanics returned positive tests — the other two were their room-mates.

The PCR test involves a famously queasy moment with a Q-tip inserted in each nostril and then twisted. “It’s uncomfortable, but necessary,” Astana’s Colombian captain Miguel Angel Lopez, known as one of the peloton’s toughest guys, told reporters with a smile.

“We couldn’t have run all these races without all the precautions that have been put in place to protect us,” said the 26-year-old who was nicknamed ‘’Superman’’ in his homeland after fighting off three roadside thugs who foolishly tried to steal his bike when he was a teenager.