Perhaps more than any Colombian, Matt Rendell knows the career of Nairo Quintana. Actually, he knows the roots of Colombian cycling. In his books Los Reyes de la Montaña and Colombia es Pasión, the Englishman analyzes the beginnings of sport in our country and its evolution.
He is a permanent visitor to Colombia. Always looking for stories, walking to the places where cyclists hang out. Boyacá, Antioquia, Nariño… For him, Nairo is a friend. The main character of his books. That is why he was at the cyclist’s press conference where he confirmed that he is not retiring from cycling.
Rendell spoke emotionally about the Nairo situation, “He is a person who has given so much to the fans. He has made us dream in yellow and now seeing him next to the dark door is very sad. Nairo has been an idol for the peasants of Colombia and Latin America. When one goes to Argentina, for example, one sees the passion there is for Nairo. Also for many athletes of indigenous heritage who say, ‘his face is our face, you open a window on the universe for us.’ For me he has been an athlete of extraordinary importance in his generation and in the social history of Colombia and it saddens me a lot.”.
However, Rendell believes that Nairo must assume what happened after the 2022 Tour de France and the positive in the tests made by the UCI for alleged use of tramadol during the competition. For Matt, there is no veto against the cyclist.
“I don `t believe. Each team has its reasons. These are very delicate times. The wild west of the 90s that continued in Colombia many years later with suspicions of payment by the Federation and without an anti-doping control laboratory. Tramadol has been a highly controversial substance for many years. In the World Tour it was used in 2012 and in 2014 it began to create a scandal. It is a controversial substance and that everyone knows and I do not see a plot. I know it’s not doping, but there is a test, a test that was examined four times, each test twice and all of them came back positive.”.
And he added, “hopefully there will be a veto, hopefully it is a conspiracy because that way spiritually we as journalists and citizens would see everything easier. If it was all the fault of a conspiracy. If it was the ideological wing of a fraud, which I hope is not the case, it is better to think that it is a conspiracy. I carry Nairo in my heart. And let’s leave it like this because they don’t want to see an adult cry”, he said excitedly.
For Rendell, Colombian cycling is going backwards, “there are fewer riders on the World Tour than last year, the same thing happens in the Pro Teams. The decision to neglect cycling, which has been an unequaled power for the nation of Colombia in the last 15 years, not to institute a talent detection and cultivation system, not to perpetuate that golden age, that precedes what we are experiencing. today. That is a decision of the Colombian sports authorities.”, he sentenced.
And he concluded, “this decline has nothing to do with Nairo. It is all against the current of what Nairo has meant for the country. It has nothing to do with Miguel Ángel López either. That is a decision of the authorities, not to invest in cycling in Colombia and it is a pity”.