I rubbed the contents of one bag onto my upper arm on the evening of June 7, just before I went to bed. I thought: Well, it can't hurt. I flushed the packaging down the toilet.

I made a big mistake. There's no doubt about it. But there have been positive testing cases in the past where the offender wasn't attacked to quite the same extent, especially not by other riders.

I can count off on one hand the number of times I've used testosterone gel - because it doesn't really do much.

It's possible that the name Bettini came up at some point during a conversation with the German Cycling Federation's anti-doping commission, but I certainly didn't claim that he gave me any drugs. They made that up. Bettini warned me: If you said that, then things could get dangerous for you.

I stayed in Hamburg a few more days, and during that time I received a visit from Rolf Aldag, the sporting director at T-Mobile. He advised me to tell the truth.

The patient in the bed next to me told me that the newspapers were reporting on the test, and it was on television all day long.

Riders called me up afterwards to say that they had had no other choice. I couldn't understand the way they changed their tune.