Top Italian cyclist Franco Pellizotti banned from Giro; irregular blood levels suggest doping

Top Italian rider Franco Pellizotti gets Giro ban

ROME — Top Italian cyclist Franco Pellizotti was banned from the Giro d’Italia on Monday because his irregular blood levels suggested he resorted to doping.

Pellizotti, the best climber at last year’s Tour de France, was expected to be a strong contender in the Giro, which starts Saturday in Amsterdam.

He failed the International Cycling Union’s biological passport program and was one of three riders identified by cycling’s governing body Monday as having suspicious blood profiles.

Pellizotti is the biggest name to be identified in a second wave of cases based solely on evidence from the pioneering program to catch drug cheats. The program started in 2008 in a partnership between the cycling body and World Anti-Doping Agency.

“Now Franco will have to justify these irregularities in his passport and he won’t be able to participate in the Giro,” Italian cycling federation president Renato Di Rocco said without providing more details.

The other riders are Slovenia’s Tadej Valjavec and Spain’s Jesus Rosendo. Each rider’s national federation must now investigate to determine if he used performance-enhancing drugs.

Pellizotti scheduled a news conference for Tuesday in Milan with his Liquigas team physician, his lawyer and a biochemistry professor.

The Gazzetta dello Sport reported earlier that the 32-year-old rider’s case related to a drug test just before the 2009 Tour de France. Pellizotti finished third in the Giro, behind Denis Menchov of Russia and fellow Italian Danilo Di Luca.

In February, Di Luca was hit with a two-year ban after testing positive for the advanced blood-booster CERA following two Giro stages last year.

The 33-year-old Valjavec rides for the Ag2r-La Mondiale team and 28-year-old Rosendo races for the second-tier Andalucia-Cajasur squad.

Last June, the cycling body named five riders whose blood profiles suggested doping. They were Spaniards Igor Astarloa — the world road race champion in 2003 — Ruben Lobato and Ricardo Serrano, and Italians Pietro Caucchioli and Francesco De Bonis.

Many more cases have been brought against riders who tested positive for banned drugs after being targeted based on their biological passport readings.

More than 850 riders across cycling’s disciplines have given a series of blood and urine samples allowing WADA laboratories to create individual body chemistry profiles. Researchers can then detect the effects of doping rather than test for each banned drug.

Suspicious profiles are presented to a panel of nine independent experts from around the world. They advise if evidence is strong enough to pursue a case.