{"id":171947,"date":"2025-10-01T04:01:04","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T04:01:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/171947\/"},"modified":"2025-10-01T04:01:04","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T04:01:04","slug":"risks-of-suicide-are-considerable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/171947\/","title":{"rendered":"Risks of suicide are considerable"},"content":{"rendered":"

Doping<\/a> has been a background issue in cycling<\/a> for some time now. Major cases are a thing of the past, although riders are still caught using banned substances occasionally. Suspension is the appropriate punishment, but the consequences of that suspension can be a lot worse than the punishment itself.That was the experience of Marion Sicot<\/a>. The French cyclist was caught using EPO in 2019. She was suspended for this and even had to serve a suspended prison sentence. \u201cI was locked in my bubble, cycling was my whole life,\u201d she said earlier<\/a>. \u201cI wanted to try to keep up with the best. I told myself that maybe the others were doing it, so I tried it too.\u201d<\/p>\n

The doping case was made even more difficult because she was involved in an abuse case at the time. Her former sports director, Marc Bracke, was allegedly the culprit. \u201cHe forced me to send him photos of myself in my underwear every Monday, under the pretext that he had to monitor my weight.\u201d After the Belgian was banned from cycling, he committed suicide in 2022.<\/p>\n

That is precisely what Sicot, now 33, wants to draw attention to. During and after her suspension, she struggled with suicidal thoughts. \u201cIt was like a bomb had dropped on me, and I had to deal with it alone. I only existed as Marion the cyclist. From one day to the next, I had nothing left. I couldn’t imagine living without cycling. Without my loved ones, I wouldn’t be here anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo!<\/p>\n

\"marion\"\/“The risk of suicide is considerable”The Frenchwoman recounts her story in L’\u00c9quipe<\/a>, where fifteen French athletes share their experiences with the unforeseen consequences of a doping suspension: \u201cWhen you’re suspended, everything is taken away from you, all your functions,\u201d says soccer player Paul Pogba, who returned from a doping ban this summer. \u201cHonestly, it was as if I was no longer a soccer player.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because coming back from a suspension is extremely difficult, even if you have served your sentence, you will probably never get the same opportunities again, and you will never be seen in the same light again: you are effectively suspended for life, it is concluded. \u201cOne day, a suspended athlete will commit suicide, as I almost did,\u201d said Sicot, who has not returned to the peloton.<\/p>\n

The French newspaper’s investigation calls for urgent attention to be paid to the mental health of athletes, particularly those who have been caught using banned substances. \u201cThere is an urgent need to consider this problem as a physical and mental health issue,\u201d says sports psychologist Mattia Piffaretti. \u201cThe risks of suicide are considerable.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Doping has been a background issue in cycling for some time now. Major cases are a thing of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":171948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-171947","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=171947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/171948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=171947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=171947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=171947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}