Suspicious Blood and Performance in the 2010 Tour de France

In this note, we analyze whether the International Cycling Union’s ‘index of suspicion’, which reflects the extent to which a rider is suspected of using doping, correlates with performance during the 2010 Tour de France Though our point estimates suggest a medium sized performance improving effect of being suspected of doping, the index of suspicion can only explain a very small part of the variation in performance. We also present some limited evidence that this could be due to the fact that doping has little effect on the outcome of the Tour de France.