Francesco Conconi (born 19 April 1935) is an Italian sports doctor and scientist, with disciples such as Michele Ferrari and Luigi Cecchini.
Conconi is a professor at the University of Ferrara in Italy where he heads the Centro Studi Biomedici Applicati allo Sport or Biomedical Research Institute.
[1] Conconi is most famous for having prepared Francesco Moser for his successful attempt to break the world hour record in Mexico, 1984.
Conconi proposed that he help athletes in the sports of cycling, canoeing, rowing, long-distance skiing, speed skating, swimming and wrestling.
[2] Conconi together with his assistants including Michele Ferrari prepared Francesco Moser in his attempt to break the World Hour Record in January 1984.
Conconi theorized that heart rate could be correlated with perceived exertion in order to allow Moser to cycle at the absolute maximum of his capability.
The details of Conconi's subjects were later discovered by police after a raid at the University of Ferrara and revealed to be not amateurs but elite professionals, six of which were from the Carrera Jeans–Tassoni cycling team.
[2] The Gewiss team attracted a lot of negative attention when after taking the whole podium in the La Flèche Wallonne Classic in 1994, Ferrari in an interview with the French sports newspaper L'Équipe was acritical of the drug.
[14][15][16] Bjarne Riis the 1996 Tour de France winner was a rider of the Gewiss team and was treated with EPO in 1994 and 1995 in Conconi's Institute in Ferrara.
[18] In March 2000 the Italian Judge Franca Oliva published a report detailing the conclusions of an investigation into a number of sports doctors including Professor Conconi.
[12] The riders included Stephen Roche, Claudio Chiappucci,[20] Guido Bontempi, Rolf Sørensen, Mario Chiesa, Massimo Ghirotto and Fabio Roscioli.
[9] Files seized as part of the judicial investigation allegedly detail a number of aliases for former Tour de France, Giro d'Italia winner and World Champion Stephen Roche including Rocchi, Rossi, Rocca, Roncati, Righi and Rossini.
[4] In an investigation in front of Judge Piero Messini D'Agostini two hematologists submitted a report in which they concluded that the blood values of athletes treated by Conconi indicated doping.
These files were for patients of Conconi and included Ivan Gotti, Pavel Tonkov, Abraham Olano, Marco Pantani, Tony Rominger, Gianluca Bortolami and Giorgio Furlan.
[28] The judge had looked at medical reports of 33 cyclists in the period 1993-1995, including Chiappucci's, and all blood tests showed largely fluctuating hematocrit-values, indicative for EPO-use.