Bobby Julich

Robert "Bobby" Julich (born November 18, 1971), popularly called Bobby Julich, is an American former professional road bicycle racer who last rode for Team CSC in the UCI ProTour racing series. He got his international breakthrough when he finished 3rd overall in the 1998 Tour de France, becoming only the second American to finish on the podium. He is a strong time trialist who won a silver medal at the 2004 Olympic Individual Time Trial, and combined with his high versatility he has won a number of stage races on the international circuits including the 2005 edition of Paris–Nice. In September 2008, he announced his retirement as a professional cyclist.

He served as a technical director for until November 2010, when it was announced that he would move to  for the 2011 season as a race coach. On October 25, 2012, Team Sky announced that Julich would part ways with the team due to his admission to doping in the past. This departure is therefore in line with Team Sky's policy (re-asserted in the wake of the USADA Reasoned Decision and subsequent UCI/Lance Armstrong fall-out) of asking all current team personnel to admit to any past doping offences. After leaving Sky Julich worked as a coach for in 2014 before being announced by Team Tinkoff–Saxo as the team's head coach (Directeur Sportif) for 2015, however in August 2015 he confirmed that he would leave the team at the end of the year.

Biography
Born in Texas, Julich has resided in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, since childhood, with a brief time in Philadelphia, where he met his wife. Most of his living relatives reside in the New York area. Bobby Julich got his start in cycling winning the Red Zinger Mini Classics youth bicycle race in 1985. As an amateur cyclist Bobby Julich won the 1990 Junior National Cyclo-Cross Championship, and as a member of the US National Team he participated in the 1991 Tour DuPont. At the time it was the biggest stage race in the United States, and Julich finished 5th overall in a race which included fellow American cyclist and 3-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond. Bobby won the award for the Best Young Rider and was heralded as the next LeMond.

After a few "false" starts as a professional, he joined the Motorola team in 1995 alongside Italian rider Andrea Peron and fellow Americans Lance Armstrong and George Hincapie. In the 1996 season, Bobby Julich was diagnosed with re-entrant supraventricular tachycardia (RSVT), a heart condition which meant his heart would beat much faster than normal. Julich was treated with radiofrequency ablation and was ready for the 1996 Vuelta a España late in the season, a race which showed the first glimpses of his potential in international professional cycling. There, Julich held the King of the Mountains jersey for ten stages. Despite a strong performance he relinquished the jersey but did finish 9th overall, the highest placing ever by an American in the Vuelta up until Lance Armstrong finished 4th overall in 1998. It was this performance that made other teams in the peloton take notice of Julich.

When Motorola ended its sponsorship at the end of the 1996 season he joined the French Cofidis team with a few fellow Motorola teammates, including Lance Armstrong. Armstrong's cancer meant that he was not able to compete with the team, while Julich went on to participate in the 1997 Tour de France. He performed well in this Tour, getting stronger as it progressed taking two top 10s in late mountain stages including one where he finished only behind the podium finishers Richard Virenque, Marco Pantani and Jan Ullrich. Then in the final ITT he placed 4th to finish the Tour in 17th overall.

The embattled 1998 Tour de France was a breakthrough for Julich, when he took over the team leadership from Italian Francesco Casagrande. Following the doping scandal of the 1998 Tour, only 96 of 189 riders completed the race, and Julich finished third on the podium with winner Pantani and runner-up Ullrich. Julich was hailed as the next American Tour de France champion and he was once more proclaimed to follow in the footsteps of Greg LeMond. The 1999 Tour de France saw Julich as one of the favorites for the overall win, but a crash during an individual time trial forced him to quit the race, which was in turn won by the recovered Lance Armstrong.

For the 2000 season, Julich moved to another French team Credit Agricole, joining compatriot Jonathan Vaughters. He was part of the Credit Agricole team that won the team time trial stage of the 2001 Tour de France. After a move to Team Telekom of Germany in 2002, Julich rode as a domestique in support of his team captain Jan Ullrich. Julich only enjoyed lacklustre results, and at the end of the 2003 season he contemplated retiring.

Despite an offer below his wages at Team Telekom, Bobby Julich moved to the Danish outfit Team CSC in the 2004 season, where he joined up with former Motorola teammate Andrea Peron. He once again rode as a supporting rider in the Tour de France, but with the freedom to pursue his own chances during the rest of the season. Julich immediately saw his riding and performance improve, as he won a time-trial in the April 2004 race Tour of the Basque Country, his first victory since the 1998 season. With Team CSC teammate Jens Voigt, a rider Julich rode with in his time at Credit Agricole, he also won the two-man time trial LuK Challenge. Bobby Julich won a silver medal in the 2004 Summer Olympics men's individual time trial event behind Russian Viatcheslav Ekimov.

Julich's renaissance continued in 2005 with his best-ever professional season, becoming the first American to win Paris–Nice. He also won the Critérium International and the Eneco Tour, making Julich the 8th ranked rider in the UCI ProTour, helping Team CSC become the highest ranked team of 2005.

For the 2006 season, Julich planned to conserve energy for helping Team CSC captain Ivan Basso in his winning bid for both the 2006 Giro d'Italia in May and 2006 Tour de France in July. Even though he did not start his season as strongly compared to 2005, he managed to finish 3rd at the Tour of California in February and he won the prologue of Paris–Nice in March, results that even positively surprised Julich himself. For the very first Giro d'Italia participation in his career, Julich had early aspirations of conquering the pink jersey for the leader of the general classification early in the race to lessen the pressure on Basso. However, Julich suffered heavily from pollen allergy throughout the race, and he did not play a major role himself, but focused on helping Ivan Basso, as Basso won the 2006 Giro. In the 2006 Tour de France, Julich abandoned the race after he suffered a crash on the stage 7 individual time trial. He went into a turn too fast, slid on small pebbles, and he severely injured his wrist when falling.

In May 2011, Tyler Hamilton, the winner of the men's time trial at the 2004 Summer Olympics, confessed that he had used doping products, and returned his gold medal. On August 10, 2012, Bobby Julich was upgraded from the bronze to the silver medal.

In May 2013, he joined BMC Racing Team as a consultant. In November 2014, it was announced that Julich would join Tinkoff–Saxo as head coach, reuniting with Sean Yates (former sports director of Team Sky) and team founder and manager Bjarne Riis. Julich and Yates left after Riis's firing later in 2015.

Doping
On October 25, 2012, Julich admitted to "using EPO several times from August 1996 until July 1998". and resigned from the United Kingdom-based Team Sky. The team had issued a statement asking both riders and support staff to sign a document verifying that they did not use or administer performance-enhancing drugs during their careers. Julich stated that he wishes to continue to be involved in the sport to some extent, and also that he will pay the consequences for his poor decisions.

Bobby did his self-confession at CyclingNews. His open letter told that during the Tour de France of 1998 his fiancée (now wife) discovered his use from another rider's wife. She told him if it would reoccur, the relationship would be over. His name was also on the list of doping tests published by the French Senate on 24 July 2013 that were collected during the 1998 Tour de France and found suspicious for EPO when retested in 2004.

Major results

 * 1988
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Tour de l'Abitibi


 * 1989
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Tour de l'Abitibi
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Trofeo Karlsberg


 * 1991
 * 5th Overall Tour DuPont


 * 1992
 * 10th Overall Tour DuPont


 * 1994
 * 7th Overall Tour DuPont


 * 1996
 * 7th Overall Escalada a Montjuïc
 * 9th Overall Vuelta a España
 * 10th Japan Cup


 * 1997
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Tour de l'Ain
 * 1st Stage 5b (ITT)
 * Route du Sud
 * 1st Stages 2a & 2b (ITT)


 * 1998
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Critérium International
 * 2nd Overall À travers Lausanne
 * 2nd Overall Tour du Limousin
 * 2nd Polynormande
 * 3rd Overall Tour de France
 * 5th Züri-Metzgete
 * 6th Grand Prix Eddy Merckx


 * 1999
 * 2nd Trophée des Grimpeurs
 * 5th Grand Prix Pino Cerami
 * 10th Overall Route du Sud


 * 2000
 * 2nd Overall Tour Méditerranéen
 * 5th EnBW Grand Prix (with Jens Voigt)
 * 6th Overall Circuit de la Sarthe


 * 2001
 * 1st Stage 5 (TTT) Tour de France
 * 3rd Gran Premio di Lugano
 * 5th Grand Prix Eddy Merckx
 * 9th Overall Circuit de la Sarthe
 * 9th Overall Tour du Limousin
 * 9th Overall Tour Méditerranéen


 * 2002
 * 7th Breitling Grand Prix (with Kevin Livingston)


 * 2003
 * 3rd LuK Challenge Chrono (with Alexander Vinokourov)
 * 6th GP Triberg-Schwarzwald


 * 2004
 * 1st LuK Challenge Chrono (with Jens Voigt)
 * 2nd Silver medal olympic.svg Time trial, Olympic Games
 * 2nd Grand Prix Eddy Merckx (with Jens Voigt)
 * 3rd Overall Paris–Nice
 * 4th Overall Tour of the Basque Country
 * 1st Stage 5b (ITT)
 * 4th Overall Critérium International
 * 2nd Overall Tour de Georgia
 * 5th Overall Ronde van Nederland
 * 8th Overall Tour Méditerranéen


 * 2005
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Paris–Nice
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Critérium International
 * 1st Stage 3 (ITT)
 * 1st Jersey red.svg Overall Eneco Tour
 * 1st Stage 7 (ITT)
 * 1st LuK Challenge Chrono (with Jens Voigt)
 * 1st Stage 4 (TTT) Tour Méditerranéen
 * 4th Overall Tour de Georgia
 * 5th Overall Tour of the Basque Country
 * 9th Overall Tour Méditerranéen


 * 2006
 * 1st Prologue Paris–Nice
 * 1st Stage 5 (TTT) Giro d'Italia
 * 1st Eindhoven Team Time Trial
 * 3rd Overall Tour of California
 * 6th LuK Challenge Chrono (with Jens Voigt)


 * 2007
 * 1st Stage 2 (TTT) Deutschland Tour
 * 1st Eindhoven Team Time Trial
 * 2nd Overall Sachsen Tour
 * 4th Overall Tour of California
 * National Road Championships
 * 5th Time trial
 * 8th Road race
 * 7th Klasika Primavera


 * 2008
 * 10th Overall Tour de Georgia