DRS said: "Martin Platter was on a motorbike last Wednesday on the route to Chur à Arosa. He saw a driver of a car from the Lampre team put a bag in the rubbish bin. The journalist stopped and searched the bag. He found several bottles of medicines which had been opened, some new and used syringes and an official envelope from the Tour de Suisse with the hotel address of the team Lampre indicated."
Platter took some photos of his find and took the drugs for analysis to a sport's medicine laboratory run by Dr. Walter Frey in Zurich. According to DRS, the tests showed that 4 of the 13 substances found were on the official banned list of drugs - Urbason, Rubrocortin, Synachten Depot and ACTH.
Lampre team director, Maurizio Piovani, was contacted by DRS but refused to make any comment. Camenzind had said that he had 3 drug tests during the Tour de Suisse.
This is the second team within a week that has once again been implicated in doping. Earlier in the week, Festina was caught on the Belgian-French border by customs officers with the some banned substances. The team moved quickly and sacked the driver of the car, soigneur Rick Keyaerts. The team said: "Kayaerts transported the products without the authorisation of the team. Festina moved quickly because it had infringed the rules of the team."
In the final stages of the Giro d'Italia, the UCI tested the top 15 on GC. Two days before the end they caught Marco Pantani out with a hematocrit level of 52.
On Thursday, the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI) said that they believed that any doping charges against Pantani should not be proceeded with. They issued a statement which in part said: "There is no evidence to point to breaches of the rules." It was stated that the investigator in this matter would report to the Anti-doping panel of CONI to recommend that the Pantani be exonerated. investigators said on Thursday that doping charges against Italian cyclist Marco Pantani should be dropped.
It is still not too late for the team to start this year. But he said: "While it may be late, I found it important that we will probably be able to work together in the future."
What about TVM? Verbruggen replied: "I put forward some suggestions about TVM and we have to await the reaction of Leblanc. I think it is important that he has already said that the team can start next year. This will be very important in determining the likelihood of a new major sponsor coming into the sport. It is crucial that there is no lasting rancour over this."
Next week, Cees Priem will announce the names of the new team sponsors for 2000.