Udo Bölts

Udo Bölts
To person
Date of birth	August 10, 1966
nation	Germany
discipline	Street
Driver type	Mountain riders, time trialists
doping
1996-1997	Taking EPO and growth hormones
Team (s)
1989–1990 ; 1991–2002 ; 2003	Team Stuttgart ; Team Telekom ; Team Gerolsteiner
Most important successes
	German road champion in 1990, 1995 and 1999 ; Clásica San Sebastián 1996 ; Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré 1997
	Last updated: August 13, 2020

Udo Bölts (born August 10, 1966 in Heltersberg ) is a former German cyclist . After the end of his active career in 2003, he was sporting director for Team Gerolsteiner until May 2007 .

Bölts was one of the most successful German road drivers . He was considered to be fighting and was often represented in breakaway groups. According to his own statement, he took doping substances in 1996 and 1997 .

career

Bölts was already successful as an amateur and a member of the national team. In 1987 he won the race around the Henningerturm . Bölts began his professional career in 1989 with Team Stuttgart , from which Team Telekom (later Team T-Mobile) emerged in 1991 .

Bölts leads Jan Ullrich in the 1997 Tour de France over the Vosges.

From 1992 to 2003, Bölts took part in the Tour de France twelve times in uninterrupted order and completed the race each time. This made him the “German record holder” until Jens Voigt started the tour for the twelfth time in 2009 and finished it for the twelfth time in 2012 when he took part for the fifteenth time. Bölts got his best placement in the world's most important cycling race in 1994 with a ninth place. In 1996 and 1997 Bölts was the helper of the respective tour winners Bjarne Riis and Jan Ullrich .

His greatest successes include three German road championship titles (1990, 1995, 1999), victory at the Clásica San Sebastián in 1996 and a success in a mountain stage of the Giro d'Italia in 1992. In particular, he was the first and only German driver to win in 1997 Overall victory at the Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré . In 1997 he reached fourth place in the road cycling world championship .

Before his last season in 2003, Udo Bölts moved to the Gerolsteiner team . From 2004 Bölts was one of the sports directors in the team and was responsible for race support, team composition, competition planning as well as contacts to organizers, other teams and drivers. During the Tour de France 2006 , Bölts worked as an expert for ZDF . Today he works in the mountain bike park Palatinate Forest .

Confession of doping

As part of the Team Telekom doping affair , Bölts admitted on May 23, 2007 that he had started taking EPO and growth hormones in 1996 in order to take part in the 1996 Tour de France. Up to and including 1997 he continued to take it. Previously, Bert Dietz and Christian Henn , formerly in the Team Telekom colleagues Bölts' that drug-taking added. As a consequence of the doping confession, Bölts resigned his post as sporting director for the Gerolsteiner team on May 24, 2007.

Jef D'hont accused u. a. in his book Memoires van een wieler-verzorger (memories of a cyclist carer) , published in April 2007, the Telekom team of organized and systematic doping with EPO in the early 1990s. Both athletes, including the Tour de France winners Bjarne Riis and Jan Ullrich , as well as doctors and officials of the team were knowingly involved. Because of D'hont's allegations, doping researcher Werner Franke filed a criminal complaint against the responsible Freiburg doctors from Team Telekom.

Quotes

When his team captain Jan Ullrich faltered in 1997 as overall leader of the 18th stage of the Tour de France in the Vosges , he cheered him on with the slogan: “Torment you, you pig!”. This phrase has since entered cycling folklore.

His long-time team boss Walter Godefroot said of Bölts when he took part in the Ironman Hawaii with almost no preparation : "Bölts is so strong, it never breaks."