In an interview with George Lee on Radio One, Stephen Roche spoke about his falling out with Paul Kimmage, dating back to his criticism of 'Rough Ride' when it was released in 1990. Kimmage's groundbreaking book helped to expose cycling's culture of performance enhancing drugs.
In 1998 after the book had been re-issued, Roche accused Kimmage of writing about drugs in cycling for personal gain. "He's using this whole thing to give himself profile. What he's doing is encouraging parents not to put kids on bikes because he's making this drugs thing sound more widespread than it actually is. The Tour de France is the biggest annual sporting event in the world and all Paul Kimmage is doing is bringing it down. He's a sensationalist journalist."
In the interview, the former Tour de France winner apologises in a pretty insincere fashion. “Paul probably has a chip on his shoulder against me because I shot his book down but I was a young guy then and I shot from the hip and since then I’ve apologised. I’ve said ‘Paul, I didn’t know it was going on, you’re riding in the back of the peloton, you can see what’s going on ahead of you, I’m riding in the front with no wing mirrors I don’t know what’s going on in the middle."
