Bernard Kohl of Austria and riding for T-Mobile after winning the king of the mountains jersey in the prologue of the AMGEN Tour of California 2006 in San Francisco, California. (Doug Pensinger/Getty Images )
"I had a phone call from Bernhard Kohl and he admitted he was notified with the news of a positive test. The substance is EPO CERA," his Gerolsteiner team manager Hans-Michael Holczer told Reuters.
Kohl is the second Gerolsteiner rider to fail a dope test on the 2008 Tour de France after German Stefan Schumacher, who won the two time trials in the race, also tested positive for CERA (Continuous Erythropoiesis Receptor Activator).
"(This) is a shock for all sports enthusiasts, because Austria has lost an idol in one stroke," Austrian Sports Secretary Reinhold Lopatka told national news agency APA.
"It also shows that the anti-doping system is working better than ever and the fight against doping can succeed," he added after Kohl had become the first Austrian to win the Tour de France polka dot jersey for the best climber.
The positive tests of Kohl, Schumacher and Italy's Leonardo Piepoli this month are the result of the French Anti-Doping Agency (AFLD) retroactively testing blood samples for the new type of erythropoietin (EPO).
The AFLD's Chatenay-Malabry laboratory has developed a more effective blood test to find CERA, which had been difficult to detect through urine samples.
Another World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) approved lab in Lausanne has implemented another test for CERA and blood samples from the Tour are also tested in Switzerland.
AFLD head Pierre Bordry said the Lausanne lab was also being used to analyse blood samples from the Tour that were taken on July 3, 4 and 15.
German blow
The news of Kohl's positive test is another blow for cycling in Germany, whose state TV left last year's Tour after it was announced that German Patrick Sinkewitz had tested positive for testosterone."I think it is time for me to leave cycling," Holczer, who had built his Gerolsteiner team on a strong anti-doping stance, told Reuters.
Gerolsteiner, a mineral water distribution company based in Germany, had already said they were leaving the sport at the end of the season, with Kohl having struck a deal with Belgian team Silence-Lotto.
During the Tour, Italian Riccardo Ricco, Spaniards Moises Duenas Nevado, Manuel Beltran, Kazakh Dmitri Fofonov and France's Jimmy Casper failed tests, although the latter was cleared by the French federation last month.
