Team GB performance director David Brailsford was struggling to find words this afternoon. The news that veteran British rider Rob Hayles had failed a routine International Cycling Union (UCI) blood test and been evicted from this week's world track championships left Brailsford struggling to contain his anger.

“We do not have a systematic doping programme,” he insisted. “I am as sure as I can be that Rob was not up to anything.”

For the moment, Hayles, an Olympic, World and Commonwealth Games medallist, should not be judged. He has failed the controversial 50 per cent hematocrit test, or ‘health check,’ introduced by the UCI over a decade ago in response to growing fears over the spread of blood doping in cycling. Hayles’ hematocrit — or red blood cell level — was measured by the UCI at 50.3.

This test does not prove the presence of any blood doping products, although it is well-known that one of the ways to boost hematocrit is through blood doping.

But variations in blood levels, can, as Brailsford was at pains to point out, have other causes.

The hematocrit test's ambivalent quality has made it notorious. This was the 50 per cent health check that blighted the career and life of Italian rider, Marco Pantani.

The Tour de France and Giro d’Italia winner never tested positive, but the stigma of his failed hematocrit test ruined his career.

Hayles has been tested many times, both by British Cycling and by the UCI. He is also a key member of the Team GB-Halfords Bikehut squad, launched by Brailsford in the New Year as the foundation of his long-term plan to take a British team to the Tour de France.

Whatever else befalls Team GB in these championships, Hayles must try to prove his innocence. In recent days, Brailsford and others within the Team GB set up have maintained that doping is principally road cycling’s problem. Yet such is the climate of suspicion that all cyclists — on road or track — are effectively tainted with the same brush. The Hayles Affair will only reinforce that impression.

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