Danilo Hondo told a Munich court that he and Lampre teammate Alessandro Petacchi used the services of doctor Mark Schmidt for blood doping during the 2012 season. In testimony at the Operation Adelas trial on Tuesday, Hondo said that he and Petacchi received blood transfusions in the same room.

According to the DPA news agency (opens in new tab), "If the relationship is so close that it is almost fraternal, there is no problem with doping together in one room," Hondo told the Munich District Court.

Hondo was Petacchi's lead out man at Lampre from 2010 to 2012. He told the court that he was approached by Schmidt in the winter of 2011 and paid the former Milram team doctor about €25,000 before terminating their cooperation at the end of the 2012 season.

Hondo and Petacchi are among the cyclists involved in the Adelrath blood doping investigation that became public last year when police raided the FIS Nordic Ski World Championships in Seefeld, Austria, and found evidence of a blood doping ring. A raid on a garage associated with Schmidt in Erfurt, Germany, also uncovered 40 blood bags

and a raid of the Schmidt's garage in the same town in Germany

also uncovered evidence of a blood doping ring.

Schmidt admitted doping athletes in an earlier trial in September. The trial is expected to continue through December.

Hondo confessed to blood doping in an interview with ARD last year and was immediately dismissed as Swiss national coach; Petacchi, who retired in 2015, has denied any wrongdoing but was handed a two-year ban by the UCI last year.

Hondo explained in evidence Tuesday that athletes doped by Schmidt used code names similar to those used on blood bag labels in Operacion Puerto. Hondo's own nickname was "James Bond," while another athlete used the pseudonym "Bin Laden," according to Deutschlandhunk (opens in new tab).

"Yes, you had to come up with a cover name. I was watching all the James Bond movies at the time, and I was like, 'Yes, let's make it James Bond,'" Hondo said, explaining that he paid about 25,000 euros for "three or four" blood samples and transfusions.

"The doctor comes in, and then it starts. If you play sports for a long time, you have to have transfusions for recovery and for pain. I can only imagine that. Of course, I have a bad feeling about it because I don't want to get caught."

Hondo was a professional for 15 seasons, riding for Telekom, Gerolsteiner, Tinkoff, Androni, and Lampre before finishing his career with Trek Factory Racing in 2014. 2005 Vuelta a Murcia, Carfedon He was banned for a year after testing positive for Calfedon, won two stages at the 2001 Giro d'Italia, won the German road race title in 2002, and finished second to Petacchi at the 2005 Milano-Sanremo race.

During his three years in Lampre, Hondo helped Petacchi win three Grand Tour stages and the green jersey in the 2010 Tour de France, but only three stage victories in the 2012 Bayern Lundfahrt, and the Italian sprinter's success was There were few. Petacchi was later stripped of these victories.

So far, road riders from six countries have been involved in Operation Adelas: Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Croatia, Slovenia, and Italy.

Hondo, Stefan Denifl, Georg Preidler, and Pirmin Lang confessed to blood doping, while Petacchi, Kristijan Dulasek, Kristijan Koren, and Borut Bozic were also banned for using prohibited methods or substances after an investigation.

Aust.

Austrian mountain biker Christina Kolman-Forstner was banned for four years for her involvement in the investigation.

Based on the evidence gathered during Operation Odelas, the Cycling Anti-Doping Foundation retested over 800 blood and urine samples (over half of which were from 2016 and 2017), but no positives were recorded.In a statement last month, the CADF said, "At this stage, no adverse analytical findings (AAF ) have not been reported, but we want to clarify that no final conclusions can be drawn from the reanalysis."