Richard Virenque

Richard Virenque (born 19 November 1969) is a retired French cyclist, one of the most popular riders of his era with the public for his boyish personality and long solo attacks. A climber, he is best remembered for winning the Tour de France mountains classification a record seven times, and as one of the central figures of the Festina affair, the doping scandal of 1998. He grew up in the Iseba district of Casablanca in an affluent family, idolised Michael Jackson and often skipped school to fish, before the family moved to La Londe-les-Maures near the Côte d'Azur in 1979, where his parents' marriage broke down.