Central Manchester litigation and costs solicitors

This year’s Tour de France is at its halfway point at the time of writing and 2011 is shaping up to be a vintage year.  Christian Prudhomme’s route has kept the racing fierce and the fans on the edge of their seats.  The race is almost as intense from a sports lawyer’s perspective. 

A cloud hangs over Alberto Contador’s head following his positive test for clenbuterol at last year’s Tour.  The hearing of the UCI’s appeal to the CAS was due to be heard in early June, but has now been adjourned to early August and Contador is free to race in the meantime.  If the UCI appeal is upheld then Contador faces a 2 year ban and the loss of his results since his positive test, including last year’s TdF title, his 2011 Giro d’Italia win and his result in the 2011 TdF (which, if his knee holds out, could well be another win).

The TdF has thrown up its first doping positive with the announcement yesterday of Alexandr Kolobnev’s positive test for the diuretic and masking agent hydrochlorothiazide.  Doping is a criminal offence in France, so beyond facing disciplinary proceedings by his national federation, the boys en bleu have started a criminal investigation.  Kolobnev’s name has already cropped up earlier this year in the Padova investigation in Italy.   

Crashes are simply an inevitable feature of cycle racing and it is exceptionally difficult for an injured rider to establish a legal liability for injuries sustained in competition.  Perhaps the best know rider against rider claim was Claude Criquielion’s (ultimately unsuccessful) legal action against Steve Bauer for damages of $1.5M following the tangle in the sprint for the 1988 World Championship Road Race that took them both out of contention and gifted the win to the then little-known Maurzio Fondriest. 

Most of the incidents at this year’s TdF are no exception and from a legal perspective would be seen as part of the rough and tumble of professional road racing.  Hypothetically, two incidents do however stand out as potentially actionable (although legal action is rare in the absence of career-ending injury).  The first is the incident on the stage to Cap when a race photographer’s motorbike knocked Nicki Sorensen from his bike.  The motorbike is said to have dragged Sorensen’s bicycle for a kilometre before the motorbike rider realised what had happened. 

The second – and more serious – incident involved a French TV car that knocked Juan Antonio Flecha and Johnny Hoogerland off their bikes in a truly horrifying incident in the run in to the finish on the stage to Sant-Flour (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWT8yeHGA0U).  Hoogerland was left with deep lacerations, requiring 30 stitches.  If you are squeamish, do not open this link! (http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/sport-front-page/2011/07/12/tour-de-france-2011-johnny-hoogerland-back-on-his-bike-in-tour-de-carnage-115875-23266605/).  Demonstrating considerable fortitude, Hoogerland finished the stage and continues to hold the climber’s jersey.  Chapeau!

In a rather curious move, the government is looking to introduce a new offence of causing death by dangerous cycling, despite there appearing to be little, if indeed, any statistical support for the need for such a new offence to be created.     

The last official road death statistics (compiled in 2009) recorded no deaths to pedestrians as a result of collisions with cyclists.  Between 1998 and 2007 there were never more than 5 pedestrian deaths per year as a result of collision with cyclists, although it is important to emphasise that the official statistics simply deal with the number of deaths resulting from collisions with cyclists and not the number of deaths where the cyclist was at fault.  In how many of these cases was the pedestrian at fault?  Were they prosecuted?  The statistics demonstrate that deaths to pedestrians as a result of collisions with cyclists are very rare indeed.  There also seems a dearth of evidence that there is actually a problem with the criminal law as it stands (s.35 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861) that needs addressing.

With three of the five races in the series now decided, David Williams of Fibrax Wrexham RC has sealed overall victory in the men’s category with wins in each of the events so far.  The fight for the rest of the podium continues.  Rob MacDonald has consolidated his lead in the veteran’s category, as too Suzanne MacDonald the ladies category.  Rob and Suzanne could secure their series titles if they can better their rivals and win their respective categories at this weekend’s classic Fibrax Wrexham RC mountain time trial, which takes in the Horseshoe Pass and Nant-y-Garth pass in North Wales.