Le Tour de Truth -Verbruggen fights to rescue his reputation
he world of international sports
administration has thrown up some characters over the years, but few
have come with as much baggage as Hein Verbruggen, quite literally, as
he is carrying a leather holdall stuffed with binders and folders when
we meet.
The former president of the International Cycling Union (UCI) has come to a TV production company's office in Geneva to give his first interview to the BBC since we reported allegations the UCI had taken money to get keirin into the Olympic velodrome.
The 72-year-old Dutchman has got an explanation for that in his bag, but that is not why we are meeting.
We are here to find out who is telling the truth: Lance Armstrong, the teller of perhaps the biggest lie ever told in professional sport, or Verbruggen, a man described by a contact of mine that morning as knowing "where all the bodies are buried".
It is almost a year since Armstrong told Oprah Winfrey at least some of the truth about what fuelled his seven Tour de France victories between 1999 and 2005.
Since then the fallen idol has largely been playing footsie with those seeking a bit more truth before they consider reducing his lifetime ban from most organised sport.
Last month, the Texan decided to float a bit more of his story,
telling a British newspaper
he tested positive for corticosteroids at the 1999 Tour, but asked
Verbruggen "to come up with something" that would get him, and cycling,
off the hook.
According to Armstrong,
Verbruggen agreed,
telling him to backdate a sick note and blame it on an ointment for saddle sores.
Verbruggen remembers it differently. He says there was no positive test, just an "adverse analytical finding" of which only a quarter progress to full-blown positive status.
He adds that it was the French anti-doping agency, not the UCI, that did the test, and it was the French who decided not to pursue it.
Just to emphasise the point, Verbruggen showed me emails from Armstrong and the rider's team boss at the time, Johan Bruyneel, from 2011 and 2012 that clearly state there was no positive test at the 1999 Tour, or anywhere else for that matter.
Verbruggen does admit he might have had a conversation with "somebody" about Armstrong's test at the time, but categorically denies telling the rider how to bury a positive.
The partially-remembered phone call does ring my alarm bells, but not quite as loudly as Armstrong does with his evolving narrative.
So three hours after the start of our interview, as Verbruggen bids me a cheery "bon voyage" at the airport, I am confused: have we perhaps got Hein wrong?
Before I try to answer that, let me go back to the beginning.
Our interview took place in a nondescript street squeezed between Geneva's lake and station. It was, by coincidence, around the corner from the UCI's old headquarters, a few rooms above another nondescript street.
