Did Indurain(crash), LeMond(gunshot). Armstrong(cancer), have medical exemptions for pharmaceuticals?

Question

Dear NEFanforlife

I believe that would be an exemption.

Answer 1

Any pharmaceuticals that contain any performance enhancing drug cannot be used.

Case in point: Allesandro Pataki, an Italian sprinter, is now out of racing for using asthma medicine. He does have asthma.

Answer 2

No. There was even a question of steroid use for Armstrong once. Turned out to be over the counter skin rash cream that the race doctor gave him. Perfectly legit but he was given grief for it anyways.

Answer 3

At the risk of upsetting a lot of the other posters, professional cyclists are given medical exemptions for all sorts of things. And yes it is my understanding that Lance did have medical exemptions for some medications. But it was all legit, and above board. Not to say that he didn't use drugs for which he didn't have exemptions, but that's a different question.

As for Petacchi, he did indeed have an exemption for asthma medication, but he was suspended for exceeding his allowed dosage.

But not everyone gets an exemption, even when it seems obvious that they should be allowed one. The case of Johnathon Vaughters (Director of team Garmin/Chipotle) comes to mind. He was stung in the face by a bee during the tour a few years ago, and was denied permission to use an antihistamine to bring down the swelling. He had to drop out of the tour because he couldn't see out of one eye.

Although medical exemptions are not handed out lightly, they can be given where appropriate.

EDIT: I don't know about Miguel Indurain, but I raced with LeMond before his hunting accident, and can confidently say that he didn't use any drugs that I was aware of, but I wouldn't be surprised if he had an exemption for some kind of prescription drugs afterwards.

Answer 4

Yes, you can get exemptions, but they are limited as to what type of medication and the amount. Not knowing the current limits and having a current list of what is banned I can reply to Joe S' statement, I dealt with getting an asthma medication exemption for my son when he was trying to get on the Sydney team back in 2000, he received an exemption for his medication. (tons of red tape.)