[n 2] He was a climber, best remembered for winning the King of the Mountains competition of the Tour de France a record seven times, but he is best known from the general French public as one of the central figures in a widespread doping scandal in 1998, the Festina Affair, and for repeatedly denying his involvement despite damning evidence.

His brother, Lionel, cycled, read specialist magazines and watched the Tour de France on television.

"[6][n 4]He rode for the Vélo Club Hyèrois from the age of 13 where, encouraged by his grandfather,[8] he took out his first licence with the Fédération Française de Cyclisme[2][9] He said he knew he could climb well from the start.

"[6]His first win was in a race round the town at La Valette-du-Var, when he and another rider, Pascale Ranucci, lapped the field.

In 1990 he came eighth in the world championship road race at Utsunomiya, Tochigi in Japan, riding une course d'enfer[n 7] to impress Marc Braillon, the head of the professional team, RMO, said Pascal Lino.

"[6] On the third day he took the yellow jersey as leader of the general classification after a long breakaway with two other riders on the col de Marie-Blanque in the Pyrenees.

[6] Virenque finished twice on the podium in the Tour de France (third in 1996 and second in 1997) and won several stages, among them Mont Ventoux in 2002.

He is the 18th rider in the Tour to have won stages over 10 years apart;[n 8] he wore the Maillot Jaune for two days in his entire career.

[3][12] They were, said John Lichfield, the Paris correspondent of The Independent in Britain: "235 doses of erythropoietin (EPO), an artificial hormone which boosts the red cells (and therefore endurance) but can thicken the blood to fatal levels if not controlled properly.

"[14]Virenque's teammates, Christophe Moreau, Laurent Brochard and Armin Meier, admitted taking EPO after being arrested during the Tour[15] and were disqualified.

While his former team-mates were served six-month suspensions and returned to racing in spring 1999,[18] Virenque changed teams to Polti in January 1999[17] and prepared for the 1999 Tour by riding the Giro d'Italia, in which he won a stage.

"[17] A few weeks later Virenque's name emerged in an inquiry into Bernard Sainz, the so-called Dr Mabuse of cycling who was later jailed for practising as an unqualified doctor.

[17] Race director Jean-Marie Leblanc banned Virenque from the 1999 Tour de France but was obliged to accept him after a ruling by the Union Cycliste Internationale.

[17] That year, he wrote Ma Vérité, a book which asserted his innocence[22] and included comments of how doping must be fought.

That led the satirical television programme, Les Guignols de l'info - which displayed Virenque as a moronic rubber puppet with hypodermics in his head[7] - to change his words to "à l'insu de mon plein gré" ("willingly but without knowing"),[26] and the phrase passed into French popular culture as a sign of hypocritical denial.

[n 10] Voet wrote a book, Massacre à la Chaîne, published in a legally-censored English edition as Breaking the Chain, in which he came close to identifying Virenque as an unrepentant doper.

"For sheer effrontery, Virenque's denial for over two years that he had knowingly taken drugs, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, took some beating."

Virenque was criticised by the media and satirists for his denial in the face of increasing evidence and his pretence of having been doped without his knowledge.

Voet wrote in Le Journal du Dimanche that he preferred Virenque as a young pro "because he didn't dope himself much".

[29] The president of the committee which imposed the ban, Bernard Welten, said he deserved a severe penalty because he was one of the biggest drug-takers in the team.

[8] Then, Jalabert opened links by getting his wife, Sylvie, to ask Stéphanie Virenque for the loan of a vacuum cleaner that she didn't actually need.

[31] On 5 July 2001 he joined Domo-Farm Frites,[9][32] with the help of the former Tour de France winner, Eddy Merckx who, as supplier of the team's bikes, put up the extra money that the main sponsors would not.

[27] Domo kept him the following season, after Farm Frites withdrew as co-sponsor, because it wanted to expand its carpet business in France.

[33] On 25 October 2002, on the eve of the Tour de France presentation at the Palais des Congres in Paris, he signed for another two years.

[9] Virenque returned to prominence by winning Paris–Tours on 7 October 2001[9] in a day-long breakaway in which he dropped Jacky Durand and crossed the line seconds ahead of the peloton.

Van Impe criticised Virenque for being opportunistic rather than the best climber; he said he had himself refrained from breaking Bahamontes' record himself out of reverence.

[38] Virenque ran into trouble again in 2002 when he appeared on a television programme, Tout le Monde en Parle, in June.

"[39] Virenque rode the Olympic Games road race in Athens and decided to retire, a decision he announced at the Olympia theatre in Paris on 24 September 2004.

He stayed in the public eye, winning Je suis une célébrité, sortez-moi de là!

Since 2005 he has been a consultant commentator for Eurosport, alongside Jacky Durand and Jean-François Bernard and the journalist, Patrick Chassé, where he is described as a "modest competitor" to Laurent Jalabert, the specialist on the rival state network.