Despite the recent admissions of year-long and systematic violations of cycling’s doping rules from former Rabobank riders, three-time Milan-San Remo winner, Oscar Freire, has stated in an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País that he saw no wrong-doing during his nine years with the Dutch team.

Lately a number of riders have claimed they doped whilst on the Dutch team, amongst them Michael Rasmussen, Michael Boogerd, Marc Lotz, Thomas Dekker and Danny Nelissen. But Freire, who called a halt to his career in December 2012 after never being implicated or caught up in any kind of doping situation, says he firmly believes the team was “always against doping.”

“The doctors never offered me [illicit substances] in the teams I’ve been in,” he said, with those teams being Mapei, Rabobank and Katusha. “Other riders had their own doctor, but I was just with the team doctors and not with one in particular.”

Asked directly if he ever took banned drugs, the former triple World Champion told El País, “no, no, no....that’s a stupid question.”

“I can answer yes or no and people can think what they want about what I say, they can believe me or not. I’ve always given it everything and I’ve had some disappointments in cycling and with some cyclists, but also some great moments of happiness. And I didn’t dope.”

Freire tried to distribute the blame, adding that “The problem was that the methods of detection were not sufficiently efficient. We would have to blame the riders, who were the guiltiest, but also those who carried out the tests, who acted the fool.”