Jeannie Longo is a Frenchracing cyclist, 25-time French champion and 13-time world champion. Longo began racing in 1975 and was active in cycling through 2012. She was once widely considered the best female cyclist of all time, although that reputation is now clouded by suspicion of doping throughout her career. She is famous for her competitive nature and her longevity in a sport where some of her competitors were not yet born during her first Olympic competition in 1984. She was selected to compete for France in the 2008 Olympics, her seventh Olympic Games. She had stated that this would be her final participation in the Olympics. In the Women's road race, she finished 24th, 33 seconds behind winner Nicole Cooke, who was one year old when Longo first rode in the Olympics. At the same Olympics, she finished 4th in the road time trial, just two seconds shy of securing a bronze medal. She is currently number two on the all-time list of French female summer or winter Olympic medal winners, with a total of four medals, which is one less than the total number won by the fencer Laura Flessel-Colovic.
Career
Longo was born in Annecy, Haute-Savoie, in the French Alps where she began her athletic career as a downhill skier. After winning the French schools' ski championship and three university skiing championships, she switched to cycling at the urging of her coach Patrice Ciprelli. Within a few months, Longo won the French road race Championship at the age of 21. She competed both in road and trackbicycle racing events, and is an Olympic gold-medalist and thirteen-time world champion.
Doping affairs
In September 1987 Longo tested positive for ephedrine following a 3 km world record attempt in Colorado Springs. She served a 1-month ban for this offense. In September 2011, French sports daily L'Equipe reported that Longo's husband, Patrice Ciprelli, had purchased her the performance-enhancing drug EPO from China via former American professional cyclist Joe Papp. Ciprelli claimed that he purchased the EPO for his own personal use. The charges prompted an investigation of Longo by the Fédération Française de Cyclisme which cleared her in a November 2011 statement. Longo also missed three doping tests in this same time period. Normally this would be penalized the same as a positive test but AFLD had failed to notify Longo that she would be targeted for testing in that year, thus letting her off.
Palmarès
Track
Note: Beginning in 1997, the Union Cycliste Internationale awarded points to riders based on their performances. For this purpose, the races were classified. Although the system has evolved, the major stage races are category 1 and 2. In the listings below, these categories, where known, are in parentheses. GC stands for general classification. ;1981 ;1982 ;1983 ;1984 ;1985 ;1986 ;1987 ;1988 ;1989 ;1993 ;1998
