No proof, but I’ve seen racers have incredibly hard to believe break through seasons. Like mid-pack one year, and on all the podiums the next year. Maybe the training was really good, but I even heard one of those riders say that they literally never did structured training, just rode a lot. Watched a master’s crit race unfold with the winner lapping the field. It’s all just filed under, “things that make you go hmmm…”
The thing about performance enhancing drugs that actually work; I’m not willing to put my general health at risk for amateur bike racing. For those of us who earn every stitch of fitness, this is another reason why results driven goals can be very unhealthy. There’s never going to be drug testing at these levels so we all just trust our competition to be fair.
I think my local race scene is generally clean, but there’s not enough on the line besides bragging rights with most of the outcomes.