David, can you remember the first time and perhaps even the last time that you met Richard

Moore?

Well, the first, I was actually listening to a podcast that he did just a couple of weeks

ago and he was talking about the first bike race he went to as a journalist. It was 2002

Criterium de D'Orfini and it was to interview me, simply because he was writing for a Scottish

newspaper and I was the only angle that maybe would kind of get the piece in there. I can't

remember that because listening back to how he tells a story, I probably wasn't in a very

good headspace, was a terrible interview yet that was kind of the first time we met and

we started to kind of build the relationship, particularly post my ban in 2004, 2005 and we

became good friends. I think we spent new years together in Scotland and 2000 and 2010, 2011.

I think Richard once told me about that trip. Did everybody get sick or something? Everyone went

down with the flu and you had to go around from bedroom to bedroom, nursing people back to

health. It was horrific. It was probably one of the most horrific new years ever and we were in this

castle that was freezing and yet it was human version. It was the first time we'd met version.

We always got on so well because you just had that dry Scottish wit and I think we've got

I didn't have many, well, you know, there's not many Scottish people lurking around in the

pro cycling world and so we had that natural sort of affinity and similar sense of humour and

always stay connected and he's always such a great supporter of mine and not at a personal level,

you know, he always kind of had my back and which I think looking at all the comments, remarks

or social media yesterday, it was a common trait that everyone experienced. I know he's such a

kind of funny one because he had quite a, he could be, how would I put it, that dry wit I was

talking about. You could never really take him that seriously and you always thought he was just

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