Three time Tour de France champion Chris Froome has revealed that he turned down a therapeutic use exemption (TUE) during the 2015 Tour de France.
The Team Sky rider won the second of his three Tour de France titles that year, but was granted an exemption to use medication to treat a condition that required a TUE.
However, the 31-year-old cyclist says he turned it down due to moral reasons.
"I didn't feel having a TUE in the last week of the Tour was something I was prepared to do," he said in an interview with the BBC. "It did not sit well morally with me."
Froome had previously been granted TUEs in both 2013 and 2014 to treat asthma.
The Kenyan-born cyclist wants rules and regulations to be tightened up regarding the use of TUEs.
"I think Wada need to tighten their regulations around TUEs, so they're not something that we question, their legitimacy," he said.
The use of TUEs in sport have come under scrutiny in recent months.
Confidential medical records leaked by Russian hacking group Fancy Bears showed that Froome's former Team Sky team-mate Bradley Wiggins had tested positive for triamcinolone, a banned steroid which he was permitted to use under a therapeutic use exemption.
Wiggins has stated that triamcinolone had been prescribed in order to treat "allergies and respiratory problems", adding that he had been "a lifelong sufferer of asthma".
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