Chris Froome tells ITV News he refused banned steroid under medical exemption
Britain's triple Tour de France champion Chris Froome has told ITV News he was offered the chance to use a banned steroid under a medical exemption, but refused.
At the end of last year, it emerged that Froome's former Team Sky teammate, Sir Bradley Wiggins, was given a similar drug under the same rules of a permitted exemption for medical reasons.
Sir Bradley did nothing wrong when he received banned steroid injections before three major races, including his 2012 Tour de France win.
Froome said during his second Tour victory in 2015 he was offered a similar exemption to deal with a chest inflammation, but refused on moral grounds.
He told ITV News: "There was medication that could have helped me with that inflammation, to breathe normally again, but I didn't feel, going in to that last week of the Tour, it didn't sit comfortably with me.
"So I declined it, I said no."
Froome also said he is convinced that Team Sky is clean of drugs.
"There are always going to be people who are cheating," he said.
"But I can speak for what I'm doing and the people around me, I've got no reason to doubt any of them."