Indian cricketers aren't the only ones bothered by the World Anti Doping Agency's whereabouts clause. They found an unlikely friend in former Formula One driver David Coulthard.

The former Red Bull driver, who was here on Friday, said in a chat with HT: “We've had a lot of debate on the whereabouts clause. A lot of drivers have complained that they were made to wake up at 7 am during the summer break. We are happy to be tested before a Grand Prix but not during our vacations.”

Coulthard mentioned an incident from earlier this year that, he said, showed the drivers' privacy was being invaded. “A driver was made to attend the door at 7 in the morning by a WADA testing official. He went back to tell his wife about it, only to find the official had followed him to his bedroom, even while his wife was in bed.

“I understand you are doing your job but you can't walk into someone's bedroom especially, when his wife is in bed.”

Coulthard, who now has a consultant's role with Red Bull, much like Michael Schumacher's at Ferrari, added: “Formula One has little scope of performance-enhancing drugs unlike in athletics and cycling.

“You can take recreational drugs like cannabis, firstly, because there is no legality issue about it and secondly, it can lead to hallucination instead of enhancing your performance. Actually in F1, no one's been called for using performance-enhancing drug.”