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.

My mother had to justify the fact that she had heart pills.

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.

The message I understood was this: Just don't get caught!

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.

I wasn't in a position to defend myself. Sometimes it's a brutal profession. The first thing I thought of at the time was revenge. I have a more levelheaded take on the issue today.

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