I was competitive for a number of years and have followed the sport since getting off the bike. Yet, I’ve never heard of this. I guess I’ve been asleep.
Others have been accused of it. I remember watching some videos online as they had specific people doing uphill segments and were shown having a pretty easy time compared to other times when either they werent using it because maybe they were depleted, or didnt have it in the bike. I just kow there was footage of several thought to be doing it and it did seem a legitimte concern.
A long time ago I was one of the top riders in our district... placed well in the Nationals... went to the Olympic Training Center... etc. etc. Then I had to go to work and I hadn’t been training at all for quite some time.
I went down to a park near my house that has a hilly circuit. Some local racers who had always been kind of jerks to me were riding through the park at the same time and asked me how I had been doing. I told them that I hadn’t been training and was just out for a casual ride.
When we came to the first long hill of course they all attacked and I wasn’t able to keep up. Fortunately, while I was struggling up the hill a car full of girls about my age started to pass me. They had their windows down. I grabbed the passenger door handle and asked them to please pull me up to my friends. The girl who was driving gave it some gas and I caught up to the other riders at the top of the long hill and they were pretty well spent.
I of course had rested all the way up the long hill. As soon as we hit the base of the next hill I attacked and left them all behind. They had no clue how I had been capable of doing this. A couple miles later I sat up and waited for them on my way down the last hill on the way out of the park. They were all asking me how I could still drop them if I had not been training. I told them that it must just be natural ability. It wasn’t an actual event, more of a joke, but that is the closest that I ever came to cheating.