By Susan Westemeyer
Jan Ullrich may have settled the Bonn, Germany, investigation that he defrauded his employers by the use of doping, but he is not out of the woods with all his legal problems. He still has to face an investigation by Swiss Olympic – or does he?
"It looks like we will send the dossier to the disciplinary committee of Swiss Olympic in early summer (June or July) for them to act on," Bernhard Welten, head of the Swiss Olympic anti-doping committee told Cyclingnews. He noted that if Ullrich is convicted, this would be his second offense and he would therefore be subject to a lifetime ban. The German rider, who lives in Switzerland, has retired from racing, but such a ban would prevent him from becoming a trainer, for example.
Ullrich was suspended for six months in 2002 for the so-called "party pill affair." He tested positive for amphetamines during rehabilitation after knee surgery. He claimed to have taken a couple of pills from an unnamed person while at a disco the night before the out-of-competition drug test. At the time, amphetamines were on the forbidden list, but the rules were changed in 2004.
However, Roland Richner, the technical director of Swiss Cycling, the national cycling federation, indicated that nothing may happen. "We can't and won't undertake anything," he told the German web site tagesspiegel.de.
