Aprilia ‘baffled’ at Iannone ban

The Aprilia MotoGP boss claims Iannone should have been acquitted and that Andrea Iannone’s ban ‘does not make any sense…’

Andrea Iannone - Aprilia MotoGP

THE boss of the Aprilia MotoGP team has given his opinion on Andrea Iannone’s 18-month suspension from racing.

Reported on Crash.net, the response from Massimo Rivola seems to hint that Iannone and his team will be appealing the suspension. They have 21-days to lodge the appeal.

Rivola said, “The sentence leaves us baffled because of the penalty levied against Andrea, but also very satisfied in its motivations … The judges recognised Andrea’s complete good faith and unawareness of assuming the substance, confirming the food contamination argument.”

Iannone, and now his team's argument, is that the Aprilia MotoGP rider consumed contaminated meat and that the positive test for a banned anabolic steroid is a case of accidental consumption on Iannone’s part.

He added, “In light of the motivations written by the judges themselves, Andrea should have been acquitted, as has always occurred to other contaminated athletes, but this situation leaves us a lot of hope for the appeal which we hope will be very quick.

“We want Andrea back on his Aprilia RS-GP. We will be by his side all the way to the end of this matter and we will support him in his appeal.”

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