Three former associates of American cyclist Lance Armstrong have been handed lifetime bans for their involvement in an alleged doping conspiracy.
Team doctor Luis Garcia del Moral, consulting doctor Michele Ferrari and trainer Jose Marti were all banned from the sport for life after the United States Anti-Doping Agency found they had violated a series of anti-doping regulations.
The offences included possession, trafficking and administering a range of prohibited performance-enhancing substances, including erythropoietin (EPO), steroids, human growth hormone and masking agents, between 1999 and 2007.
Three other men, including Armstrong, were also charged in the doping conspiracy but requested extra time to prepare their responses.
Spain's del Moral and Marti and Italy's Ferrari all worked with Armstrong at various periods when he won seven Tour de France titles riding for the United States Postal Service and Discovery Channel teams.
