Franck Bouyer

Who is Franck Bouyer?

Franck Bouyer is a French former professional road bicycle racer, who competed as a professional between 1995 and 2013. Bouyer competed for the Castorama, Agrigel, Française des Jeux, Bouygues Télécom and Team Europcar squads during his career. Bouyer suffers from narcolepsy, resulting in sudden sleep attacks and cataplexy, and was unable to compete or train without Modafinil.

However, the UCI ruled in June 2004 that Bouyer could not be given a therapeutic use exemption to allow him to compete having taken the drug, so Bouyer was unable to race. The Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld the decision of the UCI citing that it could not be determined that Modafinil did not provide an extra increase in performance and that the dosage was hard to measure. Despite the rulings by both the UCI and CAS, the World Anti-Doping Agency gave Bouyer permission to return to racing in August 2005. Yet, following an appeal to CAS by the UCI, Bouyer was once again banned. In January 2007, Bouyer's contract with Bouygues Télécom expired and the team released him. Bouyer filed a civil lawsuit against the UCI and WADA in July 2007, arguing they were preventing him from working.