Cyclist accused of 'motorized cheating'

NEW YORK, June 5 (UPI) -- While professional cycling for years has been dogged by rumors -- and confessions -- of doping, a new accusation of cheating has emerged: hidden motors.

A YouTube video combining a report by cycling commentator Davide Cassani and footage from Olympic champion Fabian Cancellara's most recent wins in the Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders races has caused a sensation with accusations that Cancellara used a motor to supplement his late-stage attacks to win, The New York Times reported.

The rumors have prompted the International Cycling Union to consider a new level of scrutiny in its bike-inspection procedures to detect the purported "motorized cheating."

Team Saxo Bank, Cancellara's employer, dismissed the rumors as baseless, saying in a statement: "We are confident that the majority of those people who have come across this video see it for exactly what it is: a creative amateur artist's attempt to express a purely hypothetical idea that has no basis of fact or truth. We are confident that the public can see through the nonsense this myth has presented and respect Fabian for what he is."