Belgian police raided the homes of 21 cyclists Thursday, including that of former world champion Johan Museeuw in a search for banned performance-enhancing drugs.

An official at the public prosecutor's office in the western town of Kortrijk said detectives took Museeuw to headquarters for questioning. Spokesman Tom Janssens said police found quantities of suspicious drugs when they staged coordinated raids on the homes of professional riders, including former world cyclo-cross champion Mario De Clercq, OJ Planckaert, Chris Peers, Nico Hendrickx and Oliver Penny.

"In all these places, substances were impounded," Janssens told Belgian television, adding that all of the impounded substances were currently undergoing testing.

Janssens said the raids were made following an investigation into hormones in the agricultural sector. A number of people were being interviewed, he said.

Investigators found that a local veterinarian was not only selling hormones for use in animals but were also being distributed among Belgian cyclists, he said.

Museeuw's father told Belgium's VRT television the police told him that the investigation concerned a number of cyclists.

"Johan volunteered to go with the police," his father, Eddy Museeuw, said. "He is voluntarily cooperating with the investigation."

Police also took away Museeuw's computer and the rider was being interviewed by detectives.

The 37-year-old Museeuw, 1996 world road champion, is a three-time winner of Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders. Investigators were originally probing a suspected illegal trade in animal hormones when it became apparent a veterinary surgeon was selling drugs to professional cyclists.

A police raid last year caught Belgian cyclist Frank Vandenbroucke who was banned 18 months after quantities of erythropoietin (EPO), Clenbuterol, morphine and Nesp, EPO's newly-arrived chemical cousin, were found at his home.
(Reuters News and AFP contributed to this report)

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