latest Landis articles

[Serpico]

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this thread is for posting the latest Landis articles
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[e-RICHIE]

this thread will have links to the latest Landis articles
so - we can discuss fixed gear here atmo?

[Serpico]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/31/sports/othersports/31cnd-landis.html?ei=5094&en=07a1b9cc5210daa3&hp=&ex=1154404800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print


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Testosterone in Landis’s Body Said Not to Be Natural


July 31, 2006

Tests performed on Floyd Landis’s initial urine sample showed that some of the testosterone in Landis’s body came from an external source and was not naturally produced by his own system, according to a person at the International Cycling Union with knowledge of the results.

That finding contradicts what Landis has claimed in his defense since the disclosure last week that he tested positive for an elevated ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone after his decisive performance in Stage 17 of the Tour de France. Landis won that stage in the Alps and improbably climbed to third place over all after he had struggled and plunged to 11th place the day before. He went on to claim the Tour title.

During a news conference in Madrid on Friday, Landis said: “We will explain to the world why this is not a doping case, but a natural occurrence.” He explained that the testosterone levels throughout his career were “natural and produced by my own organism.”

But the French national antidoping laboratory in Châtenay-Malabry performed a carbon isotope ratio test on the first of Landis’s two urine samples provided after Stage 17 of the Tour de France, said the person, who works in the cycling union’s antidoping department. That test was done after Landis’s ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone was found to be more than twice the allowed under World Anti-Doping Agency rules, the person said. The rules limit the ratio to four to one. The normal range is between one to one and two to one.

Landis’s personal doctor, Dr. Brent Kay, of Temecula, Calif., said the initial result was a false positive. He did, however, acknowledge that the test found a ratio of 11 to 1 in Landis’s system. He and Landis are seeking an explanation for that high level.

“I’ve seen body builders with numbers 100 to 1,” Kay said. “Although Floyd’s was elevated, it’s not off the chart or anything.”

The carbon isotope test examines the testosterone and determines if it is natural or synthetic. The test found that Landis had synthetic testosterone in his body, the person said.

Landis, who is in New York after canceling or postponing several talk show appearances, could not be reached for comment this evening.

The urine sample Landis provided after Stage 17 was divided into an A and a B sample. Landis received the test results of the A sample last Wednesday, and he had five business days to request an analysis of the B sample. Confirmation of the A sample result is needed for any doping violation to occur. If the B sample comes up negative, the case is dropped.

Michael Henson, who is Landis’s spokesman, said Landis had sent a signed request today around 12:30 p.m. Eastern Time — about 6:30 p.m. Paris time — to the French lab to seek the analysis of his B sample.

Jose Maria Buxeda, one of Landis’s two Spanish lawyers, told The Associated Press that he had also sent a fax to the cycling union this afternoon to request that the B sample analysis go forward.

But Pat McQuaid, the president of the cycling union, said this evening that the organization had never received that request. He said the cycling union had contacted the French lab at 5 p.m. Paris time and that Landis’s request had not yet been received.

McQuaid said the cycling union then asked the lab to analyze Landis’s B sample, which he said was allowed under the organization’s rules, so the test could be concluded before the lab closed for a two-week vacation this Friday. If the tests cannot be finished before then, the results may not come until late August or early September, he said.

“It’s a two-and-a-half-day job and it’s imperative that the B test be done this week for the credibility of our sport, but also for the public interest,” McQuaid said. “This needs to be put to rest because there is too much innuendo, too much talk, too much damage being done to our sport. We have to get this process done quickly, so we can move on.”

The lab agreed to conduct the tests from Thursday through Saturday, McQuaid said. That means that Landis’s fate might be known by the weekend.

If the carbon isotope test again comes back positive, however, Landis will face a two-year suspension from the sport. He also will be stripped of his Tour de France title.

Dr. Gary I. Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and a professor at New York University School of Medicine, said Landis would have several options if his B sample shows the presence of exogenous testosterone.

“The rules say that it is a violation, but if you can show that the athlete had no fault or no significant fault, there could be a mitigation of the sanction,” he said. “No matter how it got there, the athlete has to show how it got into his or her body. It could have been sabotage or contaminated dietary supplements, or something else, but they have to prove how the testosterone got there.”

[Serpico]

http://sport.independent.co.uk/general/article1207643.ece


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Cycling: Expert calls Landis' 'natural' theory into question


August 1, 2006



As Floyd Landis, who tested positive for testosterone on his way to victory in the Tour de France, was waiting last night to discover if the counter-analysis he requested on the B sample confirms the result, a leading expert on doping in sport denied the American's claim that naturally occurring levels of the substance in his body caused the positive result.

If the positive test were confirmed, the American would be stripped of his Tour victory and Oscar Pereiro of Spain, who finished second overall in last month's race, would be declared the winner. His Phonak team said Landis would be dismissed if the B result was positive. The American, who has denied any wrongdoing, has said he intends to continue racing once he has had the hip replacement he needs.

Landis' hopes of proving that his own naturally elevated levels of testosterone caused his positive A test have been dealt several blows by experts, who have contradicted claims made by the Phonak rider and his legal team last week.

Speaking to Procycling magazine, one of the experts, Professor Michel Audran of the organisation, Sports and Industry Against Blood-Doping, said that Landis' A sample would only have been deemed positive after an Isotope Ratio Mass Spectrometry test had confirmed the presence in his urine of non-naturally occurring, or "exogenous" testosterone.

Landis had claimed on Friday that "there [was] no indication of an outside source of testosterone" in his urine sample - which would mean that his positive test would have been due to natural levels.

"When a sample shows a testosterone: epitestosterone ratio of more than 1:4, an IRMS test is now used to check for the presence of exogenous testosterone," Audran said, however. "If Landis' A sample was positive, it means that exogenous testosterone must have been found."

If the positive test is confirmed, USA Cycling, the American federation, would have a month to make a ruling, the most likely decision being a two-year ban. Landis' lawyers could then take the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and a long procedure would begin.

[Johny]

It could have been sabotage or contaminated dietary supplements, or something else, but they have to prove how the testosterone got there.”

Must be the contaminated beer.

[Serpico]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/other_sports/cycling/5233476.stm


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Pressure mounts for Landis B test


July 31, 2006

Tour de France winner Floyd Landis has officially requested the testing of his back-up urine sample in an effort to clear his name of doping allegations.

The American's request came hours after the International Cycling Union, the sport's governing body, had given the go-ahead for the B sample to be tested.

Landis is facing the loss of his title and a two-year ban after a positive test for unusual testosterone levels.

He has rejected the results, saying he has naturally high testosterone levels.

The UCI asked the laboratory Chatenay-Malabry to go ahead and test the B sample on Monday, claiming that Landis had yet to do so.

"We have done this so the whole thing can be speeded up," a UCI spokesperson said.

"We took this decision because of the importance of the case. Also the longer it goes on the more damage the sport risks suffering."

But Michael Henson, a spokesman for Landis based in New York, insisted that the cyclist himself had asked on Monday for the B sample to be tested.

"Floyd did request the B sample test. He faxed a request to his lawyers in Spain at 1245 (1745 BST), which is well within the five-day limit required of the athlete," said Henson.

The laboratory is likely to test the sample between Thursday and Saturday morning.

If the UCI had not asked for the test, and Landis had waited till Wednesday to appeal for the B sample to be tested, the result would not be known for several weeks as the laboratory shuts for the holidays at the end of the week.

The 30-year-old Landis tested positive after winning stage 17 of the race.

Speaking at a news conference in Madrid last week, he said the testosterone was "absolutely natural and produced by my own organism" and would agree to undergo tests to prove his case.

Landis also said he expected the second sample to return a similar result to the first but insisted that he is innocent.

"We will explain to the world why this is not a doping case but a natural occurrence," he said.

"I would like to (make it) absolutely clear that I'm not in any doping process. In this particular case, nobody can talk about doping."

The Phonak rider produced one of the most memorable displays in Tour history when he stormed to victory in Morzine by almost six minutes.

The win put him back into contention for the yellow jersey a day after his chances looked to have evaporated when he cracked on the final climb of stage 16.

[Big Dan]

Here I'm thinking that Greg made up all that "isotope" stuff talk....... :confused:
Sure that Jack Daniels stuff can hurt you........

[Serpico]

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/fn/4084063.html


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Despite Scandal Phonak Sells Landis Goods


July 31, 2006

Despite suspending Floyd Landis and threatening to fire him if he can't clear himself of doping allegations, Phonak is still cashing in on the Tour de France champion's name.
ADVERTISEMENT
Click to learn more...

Phonak suspended Landis after he tested positive for high levels of testosterone following the 17th stage of the Tour and has also decided to pull its sponsorship of the team, citing continued doping issues in cycling.

Still, on the team's Web site, Phonak has a window urging visitors to "Do It Like Floyd Landis!"

"Take a spin in Floyd Landis's outfit," the site beckons. "As of today, friends and fans of the Phonak Cycling Team can wear the same outfit worn by Floyd Landis, winner of three tours this season, while touring on their bikes. The Phonak Shop is open."

A link to Phonak's online shop is provided on the site.

Christian Winiker, a partner for the company Contract Media which represents Phonak Cycling on media matters, said the team would not comment on Landis-related issues until the result of the cyclist's B-sample was returned.

Fans can buy the "Tour de France Special Edition" set, which includes the Phonak cycling team jersey, its cycling shorts, a water bottle, key ring, "Magic Towel" and autographs for 238 Swiss francs (US$190). Sizes large and extra-large were already sold out.

Sunglasses, socks, race caps, helmets and gloves are also for sale.

Landis, who has denied wrongdoing, was expected to ask for an analysis of his backup "B" sample by Monday evening. He could be stripped of his title if the second sample is also positive.

The International Cycling Union, the sport's governing body, had refused Phonak a racing license for 2005 because of the team's doping record.

The team was only allowed to race after appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which ruled last year that Phonak should have a two-year license.

Three Phonak riders _ Hamilton, Oscar Camenzind and Santi Perez _ were all found guilty of doping violations in 2004 and fired.

Phonak's sponsorship of the team will be replaced at the end of the season by ishares, a subsidiary of Barclays Bank.

[Serpico]

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,19970466-5001023,00.html


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Landis must pay for actions


August 1, 2006

Disgraced Tour de France winner Floyd Landis should be sued as well as banned if he is found guilty of doping, says leading Sydney race promoter Phill Bates.

The call for a harsher penalty if Landis' B-sample confirms the A-sample that recorded a positive for testosterone, says Bates, would be due to Landis bringing the sport into disrepute.

Bates says the ramifications of Landis' doping controversy are already serious and widespread.

And if guilty, Bates believes Landis should be accountable for it financially by the Tour organisers and cycling's world governing body, the Union Cycliste Internationale.

"It impacts so much that if he is guilty it's more than giving him a two- or four-year (ban)," said Bates yesterday.

"(With) the damage that he has done to the Tour de France and the sport, the UCI and the Tour organisers need to pursue him financially."

Bates said his proposed action should be used against all drug cheats.

"They need to clean them out so they haven't got one cent to bless themselves with," he said. "If they are going to be cleaned out financially, they will start thinking about whether it is worth risking what they have won over the years."

However, Bates said the Landis case - the first that will see a Tour winner stripped of his title if he is guilty - is by far the worst to strike cycling.

"All those guys involved (in drugs) have brought their sport into disrepute," he said. "Some of those guys have won millions and millions of dollars in contracts.

"They should treat the sport with a lot more respect."

Bates said the effects of the Landis scandal are already being felt in Australia.

It has made sponsorship harder to secure for events like the Ride for Life cancer charity event at Centennial Park on Saturday, the Sydney Thousand track meet on October 29 and the Cronulla International criterium race on December 16.

Meanwhile, the German T-Mobile team of Australian rider Michael Rogers has sacked sporting director Olaf Ludwig because of his "handling of the current doping problems".

The team began under a cloud when leader Jan Ullrich, teammate Oscar Sevilla and director Rudy Pavenage were disallowed starts and sacked for implication in the Spanish drugs inquiry.

[Needs Help]

moved

[Serpico]

http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,druck-429321,00.html


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Beer, Whiskey, Testosterone and Misery


July 31, 2006

US cyclist Floyd Landis says his high testosterone may have come from his pre-race drinking binge. Not likely. The sport is so infested with cheats and frauds that it might never be able to clean up its act.

It was the very picture of misery. Floyd Landis hardly looked up as he scaled the French Alps toward the stage finish at La Toussuire -- the yellow jersey, drenched in sweat, clung to his body. For all his suffering, Landis, 30, could have been a hobby cyclist.

But it also was the image of hope. Hope that there would be no more rampant doping. Landis' achievement on that 16th stage of the Tour de France looked honest. He couldn't take the strain. This was no superman who never weakened along the entire 3,657-kilometer stretch of the month-long tour; no Iron Man who took the mountain passes over the Pyrenees and Alps in his stride. The sport of cycling appeared to have regained some credibility.

But it didn't take long for the hope to fade; indeed, it lasted about one night. The next day, Landis left the competition in the dust. Unstoppable, he almost effortlessly ascended some of the most difficult mountains on the tour and when he arrived in Morzine after 200 kilometers in searing heat, he punched the air. He hopped easily off the bike, not a hint of the disaster one day earlier. Instead he was back in the running to win the race. "I have not seen such a feat in 20 years," marvelled tour director Christian Prudhomme.

Desperation or calculation?

Today Prudhomme knows he was marvelling at a possible fraud. Only one week after his feat, Landis became the latest professional cyclist to come under suspicion of having doped --- and he may become the first person in the history of the Tour de France to have his victory taken away. Analysts in Paris found an excessive amount of the sexual hormone testosterone in a test of his A-sample done in Morzine. Results from his B-sample should be made available this week.

Only a mix of desperation and ice-cold calculation could have led this son of Mennonites from Farmersville, Pennsylvania to use such an easily detected substance. He wanted to win the Tour at all costs -- and he needed to make up about eight minutes between himself and the front-runner in the 17th stage -- the last stage in the Alps -- in order to preserve his chances.

Accept defeat, or cheat? Evidence suggests that Landis may have chosen fraud -- and delivered the next low blow to a sport becoming increasingly accustomed to doping scandals -- and elaborate excuses to cover them up. Victors of the last three major cycling races -- the Giro d'Italia and the Spanish Vuelta in addition to the Tour de France -- have been accused of doping.

Landis, during a press conference last Friday, denied having taken performance-enhancing drugs. He said "two beers and at least four whiskeys" had caused his testosterone level to rise. Landis, in other words, crushed the world's cycling elite a night after a binge.

Not likely. In no other sport does one find the impudent, concerted fraud that cycling has been infested with. Only last May, Spanish police uncovered a drug ring closely linked to cycling; the investigator said the ring had 58 racers as clients, including Ivan Basso and Germany's cycling star, Jan Ullrich. After the "Operación Puerto" doping case, sponsors, race promoters, team heads, media, anti-doping activists and officials discussed whether and how to rescue the sport of cycling. No one doubts any longer that cycling is contaminated with drugs. The Spanish daily El País even prophesied that the Landis case means "a death sentence for the sport of cycling."

A testosterone comeback

That Landis got caught is surprising enough -- hardly anyone is netted in the obligatory tests. Athletes bent on manipulation have criminal doctors and biochemists working with them -- and international networks provide athletes with anything that the pharmaceutical industry has to offer and at levels just under the permissible values.

The ability to administer precision doses has led to a testosterone comeback in the doping scene. Even the doyen of international anti-doping research, the late Manfred Donike, who died in 1995, was fascinated with how athletes "pop these things the night before the competition, in order to be in tip-top shape on the next day." During training, this wonder drug promotes muscle build-up and shortens regeneration time. During a competition, it serves another function: It increases an athlete's drive, the urge to fight.

In order to identify testosterone, Donike developed an indirect testing method: Investigators measure the relationship of testosterone to epitestosterone in urine. In the normal male, this relationship lies between 1:1 and 2:1. In order to take into account individual variations present in top athletes, cycling associations settled on a maximum value of 4:1. Anyone who crosses that boundary is considered to have used supplements. With Landis, the A-test supposedly showed a value of 11:1 -- a completely astonishing result, even for an athlete who can hold his alcohol.

The doping authorities of former East Germany (also known as the German Democratic Republic or GDR) fiddled around for years with new possibilities of manipulation aimed at neutralizing Donike's investigative method. Their tremendous knowledge of fraud found new life under capitalism. US chemist Patrick Arnold of Illinois said he studied German documents carefully. Together with Victor Conte of California, Arnold sold hormone preparations through his firm Balco until both were exposed. Today, the name Balco is synonymous with the greatest doping scandal in US history. One of Balco's most ambitious plans was to refine the old GDR doping method by using testosterone. On one hand they tested urine in private laboratories to see how fast certain top athletes metabolized doping preparations. On the other hand, they developed new creations like "The Cream," a gel with testosterone and epitestosterone, which Balco passed off to its clients as a fail-safe trick. On top of that, they presented a menu of testosterone products, epo (erythropoietin) and growth hormone.

"You've got to have a heart"

So why did Landis get caught like an amateur? The high testosterone ratio suggests it was no accident-- as might happen if a patch or a gel on his scrotum had a greater effect than planned. It is much more likely that Landis, after his disastrous Stage 16, took something like Andriol, a popular testosterone supplement also known as "Mexican Bean" and normally used only in training. It would hardly be the first time an athlete ignored all reason to enhance performance.

Whether or not it turns out to be true that Landis took testosterone, cycling is in deep trouble. No one believes any more that the sport can get the doping problem under control on its own. The field is too full of criminals, liars and cover-up artists.

Take the case of Richard Virenque. The 36-year-old Frenchman was deeply involved in the first big doping scandal of the Tour de France in 1998 when his team Festina was uncovered as doping its riders. Virenque denied it for a full two years -- only when the burden of proof was overwhelming did he yield a tearful confession. But after only seven months' suspension, he was back on the team.

While he no longer races, Virenque remains a presence on the tour. He works as a TV commentator, and an organization that finances heart operations for poverty-stricken children uses his mug on their advertisements. On life-sized posters, Virenque wears a jersey bearing the words: "To win the Tour, you've got to have a heart."

The hypocrisy of this sport also is demonstrated by the performance of Hagen Bossdorf, head of sports for one of Germany's leading television stations. In his nightly-news commentary last Thursday, he played the role of truth-seeker. "The TV broadcasters must stand by their right to cease reporting on cycling races when doping has been positively determined," said the TV man. "It is difficult to bear the broadcast of a sport so corrupt that journalists can no longer adequately judge the athletes' accomplishments."

Such comments represent something of a turn-around for Bossdorf. As a Tour de France commentator earlier in his career, Bossdorf preferred to rant about cheese, wine, and castles on the Loire than to talk about doping. He contributed to a pleasant autobiography of Jan Ullrich -- prohibited from racing in this year's tournament because of doping suspicions -- and moderated programs by Telekom, whose cycling team cooperated with ARD. And it was Hagen Bossdorf who together with ARD pushed a court case against the molecular biologist Werner Franke, the doping expert from Heidelberg who had accused him and ARD of being" part of the criminal business of cycling" and participants in "systematic lying" with their reporting on the sport. The trial ended with a settlement. Anyone may now suggest that ARD ignored and failed to discuss the topic of doping adequately.

(continued)

[Serpico]

(continued from previous)

The nightmare

Now, all of a sudden, everyone wants to be part of the solution. Last Wednesday, one day before Landis's positive test was made public, Rudolf Scharping sat with a gloomy, worried expression in the Salon Imperator of Hamburg's Park Hyatt hotel. The president of the Federation of German Cyclists was a guest before the Cyclassics race -- a traditional post-Tour criterion.

When asked about the Spanish doping scandal swirling around German star Ullrich, Scharping leaned forward and straightened out the microphone. "Thank God that happened before the race so there's a chance to recover from this terrible shock," said Scharping, a former German defense minister. "Something like that after the race would have been a total nightmare."

Now he has the nightmare.

The sport of cycling has now lost a whole generation of stars. Like Landis, Jan Ullrich probably will never again race professionally. By now, the International Cycling Union has viewed the 500-page investigation report from Spain and will send its analysis this week to the Swiss association, which issued Ullrich's license.

By late August at the latest, a disciplinary commission will release its verdict. It is "likely," says law professor and commission president Gerhard Walter, that Ullrich will be banned.

Pat McQuaid, president of the ICU, also is expecting a conviction. And if Ullrich and his attorneys should manage to fend this off, says the Irishman, "we will drag this to the International Court Of Arbitration For Sport."

Like Landis, Jan Ullrich is simply bad for business.



The Body's Bottlenecks

Athletes get an astounding level of performance out of the human body, but even the best- trained bodies get exhausted. Sports doctors don't agree on the ultimate limiting factor of human endurance: Some say the heart's pumping capacity amounts to a biological bottleneck for an athlete's performance; others say it's the blood's capacity for oxygen.

Other mammals have larger hearts - - relative to the size of their bodies - - than humans. This parameter won't change. So the blood's role as oxygen carrier has become the focus of illegal performance enhancement.

Hormones

Doping extends a body's absolute limits as well as its ability to heal. Testosterone and human growth hormone (HGH) can quicken recuperation times. Both occur naturally in the human body. They help with muscle development as well as muscle regeneration.

Testosterone is the most commonly used anabolic steroid among high- performance athletes - - at least in the preparation phase just before a competition. Testosterone not only works quickly; it also metabolizes quickly and disappears quickly from the system.

Testosterone doping is easy: Athletes can tape an ordinary medical testosterone patch - - the kind used for men in hormone- replacement therapy - - on the scrotum, and leave it there for about six hours. The small dose doesn't show up in a doping test, but the body will rejuvenate more quickly than normal.

Human growth hormones (HGH) - - which help with faster cell growth - - are also used to speed up rejuvenation. However it can lead to a deformation of the hands and feet.

The supply of oxygen in the blood determines how many fats and carbohydrates the body can metabolize. This capacity is genetic, but it increases with intensive training. Top athletes can take in more than double the average amount of oxygen per kilogram of body weight than ordinary, untrained people.

The kidney hormone erythropoietin - - better known as "epo" - - helps increase performance by stimulating production of red blood cells. Athletes who take this hormone usually have characteristically bronze calves. Doping tests for "epo" have existed since 2000.

Blood Doping

A second variant, less easy to detect, is doping with blood - - someone else's or the athlete's own. Extra blood with a high hemoglobin content helps athletes to store and use more oxygen.

Since blood from human or animal donors can lead to serious infections or even immune- system shock, the so- called "own- blood doping" method has become a modern sure- fire method. Athletes give up blood, which is then enriched with haemoglobin. Shortly before competition they receive the blood again by IV.

Genetic Doping

Experts also expect athletes in the future to adopt another kind of performance enhancement - - "genetic doping," which would work by increasing the concentration of substances natural to an athlete's own body.

Researchers at the University of Chicago have spliced the epo gene into viruses natural to the bodies of experimental monkeys. Their red blood cell counts rose abruptly by 70 percent for several months - - which can be life- threatening.

Thus, for this sort of treatment to be practicable, it would have to be able to deactivate (as well as activate) certain genetic changes. At Stanford University, mice were implanted with little bits of skin bearing the epo- gene mutation. A regulator gene accompanied this gene- sequence and acted as a switch, which reacted to a certain skin cream. Only when the cream was applied to the implanted skin patches would the doping- genes start producing more blood.

Prohibition

Since 2003, laws have regulated the definition of "doping" in more detail. There are three points: raising oxygen- transport capacity in the blood, trying to circumvent doping tests, and genetic doping.

Individual sporting leagues publish detailed "red lists" of medicines and doping agents. One controversial area is training athletes in vacuum chambers, to boost the blood's oxygen intake - - something the former East Germany did with its long- distance athletes.

[e-RICHIE]

from above article:
The sport of cycling has now lost a whole generation of stars. Like Landis, Jan Ullrich probably will never again race professionally. By now, the International Cycling Union has viewed the 500-page investigation report from Spain and will send its analysis this week to the Swiss association, which issued Ullrich's license.


i don't get this part. if basso, beloki, vini, et al
are soon able to ride again, why is jan not atmo?

[Serpico]

http://www.theage.com.au/news/sport/world-body-to-look-at-spy-cameras-for-doping-crusade/2006/07/31/1154198075603.html


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World body to look at spy cameras for doping crusade


August 1, 2006

The International Cycling Union has hinted strongly at systematic police involvement — including hidden cameras — to bust open drug use in the sport following this year's Tour de France, in which nine riders were barred and winner Floyd Landis tested positive for testosterone.

Landis was due to find out last night if the counter-analysis he has requested confirms the result.

If it was confirmed, the American was to be stripped of his tour victory and sacked by his team.

Pat McQuaid, the UCI president, acknowledged that drug cheats and dopers had to be treated as criminals if the sport was to recover from a shocking month which featured drug scandals before and after the tour.

"We will look at all aspects, the competition, events, calendar, teams and the management of teams," McQuaid said. "If we can do that then we'll regain some ground and credibility.

"In this type of investigation authorities like the police can go a lot further than a sporting authority. They can put in hidden cameras and the like to crack a network, a drugs supply ring. Of course, it's sad it has come to this but it's the way it has to be.

"We just can't take it any more. The cycling world cannot accept that riders will cheat to destroy the sport that we love. It's impossible to have a small circle who are willing to risk anything in this way. Sportsmen don't take drugs because of the sport, but because they're selfish and are prepared to cheat."

Said McQuaid of Landis: "If it comes back negative I'll be the first to shake his hand. I'll be delighted and thrilled for him."

Rudolf Scharping, president of the German Cycling Federation, said it was time to catch and punish doctors and other shadowy figures who helped tarnish cycling's reputation.

"Doping doesn't happen on its own," he said. "We've got to do a better job of getting to the people behind the scenes. We've got to track down the doctors that are behind these problems."

T-Mobile announced it is to part with manager Olaf Ludwig as it attempts to clean up the team's image following the drugs scandal that embroiled Jan Ullrich on the eve of the tour.

[bulliedawg]

Landis Claims Bonds Gave Him Left Over Flaxseed Oil

[Serpico]

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1220514,00.html


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Tour de Testosterone
A failed drug test taints cyclist Floyd Landis' heroic victory. Is he flawed, or is the testing?


July 30, 2006

This one hurt. A sudden, fall-off-the-bike at 40 m.p.h., road rash, legs mangled in the wheel hurt. After Marion Jones, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa, aren't we immune to the fact that our beloved athletes might not have achieved immortality on talent alone? Hell, no. Last week came word that Floyd Landis--the fun-loving Mennonite from Pennsylvania, the guy whose Alpine comeback in the Tour de France was dubbed, properly, "The Ride of the Century" (and he did it with a bum hip to boot)--that guy might have cheated.

Landis tested positive for abnormal testosterone levels, a result confounding and dumbfounding, given that a number of prerace favorites were tossed from the Tour under a cloud of doping suspicion. Could he have been so brazen--or stupid? "I hoped there was a genuine hero in the making," says **** Pound, head of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), who is quick to add that people shouldn't convict Landis right away. Still, it's painful. "Oh God," he says, "another nosebleed for the sport."

There's hope for Landis lovers inspired by his back-from-the brink tale: his guilt is far from established, and the case has other twists ahead. "It's going to be more complicated and longer than anybody thinks," says Gérard Dine, president of the Biotechnological Institute in Troyes, France, and an antidoping consultant to French and international sporting authorities. Phonak, the Swiss sponsor of Landis' cycling team, revealed last week that on the day of Landis' miraculous comeback, an abnormally high ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone was found in his urine. (Testosterone is a muscle-building anabolic steroid; epitestosterone, a related substance, has no performance-enhancing effects.) Specifically, Landis' testosterone-to-epitestosterone (T/E) ratio was above the 4-to-1 limit set by WADA; the ratio for most people is between 1 to 1 and 2 to 1. The team suspended him immediately.

So did Landis put synthetic testosterone into his body? He has denied using any illegal substances. One possibility is that there was an error in the testing. That will be known when the French national antidoping laboratory in Chatenay-Malabry examines a second, B sample, to confirm its initial findings. If the B sample matches the A sample, Landis could lose his Tour title. Landis has promised to fight any adverse findings and would likely appeal them to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

Even if the B-sample ratio is also high, some antidoping experts say that could mean that Landis' body produced excess testosterone on its own. "We know there is a small percentage of the population who are going to have a natural production of testosterone that is above the norm," says Dine. Another possible explanation lies in what Landis consumed the night before his 125-mile comeback: he has admitted to trying to erase the worst performance of his career by downing some whiskey. Medical research has linked alcohol with an elevated T/E ratio.

The most vexing mystery is why Landis would suddenly take testosterone as the Tour wound down, since it might not have been of much help. "It doesn't add up," says WADA member Dr. Gary Wadler. "If you're going to get any benefit out of steroids, you would have to have been on the steroids before the Tour de France ever started." Landis notes that he had passed seven other drug tests on the Tour. Plus, testosterone may not be an ideal drug for a quick endurance boost. "It clearly has an effect on power--for throwing a shot put, hitting a baseball," says John Amory, a University of Washington Medical Center endocrinologist. "It wouldn't be my first choice."

What's unknown--and crucial--for Landis is the result of another test on his urine samples, the one that measures the carbon-isotope ratio. This examines the atomic makeup of the testosterone in Landis' body. If the ratio of carbon isotopes matches those found in synthetic testosterone, Landis will be in trouble. But even then, the debate might go on because some scientists say this particular test is not infallible. Says Dine: "With testosterone, there is no scientific consensus."

Landis seems prepared for an ugly ride. "Unfortunately, I don't think it's ever going to go away, no matter what happens next," he said of the allegations. Landis has fallen off his bike before. Let's see if he can get back on this time.

[Serpico]

http://sport.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1107492006


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Landis test shows he was three times over limit


July 30, 2006

IF THE result of the B sample expected today of Floyd Landis's urine confirms the A positive, he is likely to become the first Tour de France winner to be relieved of the title. The International Olympic Committee laboratory at Châtenay-Malabry also carried out a carbon isotope test which confirmed that the testosterone present in Landis's body was not a product of his own system, but was synthetic. In other words, it was administered.

The lab also revealed the massive dose of testosterone in the winner's system. The test for testosterone measures the ratio between the naturally occurring epitestosterone to testosterone. The ratio in a normal person stands at 1:1. Landis's was a resounding 11:1. The acceptable limit has recently been lowered to 4:1.

The American is protesting his innocence, claiming that research will exonerate him and that he suffers from a thyroid condition. However, he has been tested dozens of times in the past, including six times on the Tour and never produced these results.

His team, Phonak, is standing by him, at least until the result of the B test becomes known, though they have suspended him in the meantime.

Landis is the eighth rider wearing the Phonak colours to be banned or suspended. Among those the company has already fired is Olympic gold medallist Tyler Hamilton.

Landis tested positive after his miraculous performance on stage 17 of the Tour. The day before, a clearly distressed Landis had lost ten minutes in the mountains, but the following day, to general surprise, he got away from the peloton on the flat and continued to hold the differential he had built up in the mountains. All that remained for him to do was, as expected, win the time trial easily on the penultimate day and enter Paris in triumph.

"What I need to prove now," said Landis, "is there are variations in my testosterone-epitestosterone level that are out of the ordinary."

He has since let it be known that he drank a couple of beers and four whiskies the night before his surprising recovery in the Tour. If that is a strand of his defence, he might want to think again. US sprinter Dennis Mitchell tried the same argument in 1998, throwing in the added circumstance that he had also made love several times, all of which contributed to his high testosterone.

They're still laughing about that one. Mitchell was banned.

[Fixed]

I don't think he'll be back ..i think he was banking on one more payday .
I'm no doc that's for sure, but I don't think anyone can be a euro pro on a fake hip. I feel sorry for him .
cheers

[Big Dan]

It's on ESPN yo....

http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/cycling/news/story?id=2535787

[Serpico]

http://thestar.com.my/sports/story.asp?file=/2006/7/31/sports/15000107&sec=sports


http://www.essex.ac.uk/armedcon/images/logo/agence.france.presse.gif


IOC president Rogge says drug cheats are criminals


July 31, 2006

Athletes who dope are like criminals and sports authorities must make fighting the problem a priority, International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said on Saturday.

“The problem of doping won't disappear overnight. Doping in sport is like criminality in society,” Rogge said after revelations Tour de France winner Floyd Landis tested positive for muscle-building hormone testosterone.

“Doping is one of our responsibilities but above all one of our priorities. We are working hard to fight and eliminate it.”

However, Rogge, who was attending a meeting of European Olympic committees in Rome, suggested cycling, which in recent years has been rocked by one doping scandal after another, was a pacesetter in exposing drug cheats.

Cycling was one of the few sports to introduce widespread testing of hematocrit levels that indicate abuse of blood-boosting agent erythropoietin (EPO), he said.

“As for cycling, we are looking for the solution to the problem,” he said, adding, “few federations have the hematocrit test but cycling is one of them.”

[Serpico]

http://sports.bostonherald.com/otherSports/view.bg?articleid=150623


http://news.bostonherald.com/siteImages/sportsTopLogoV3.gif


Cycling officials consider using police to help crack down on doping


July 30, 2006

The president of cycling’s international said police may be used to help crack down on doping in the sport.

Pat McQuaid said Sunday he would conduct a full audit of the sport after Tour de France winner Floyd Landis tested positive for elevated levels of testosterone.

“We will look at all aspects, the competition, events, calendar, teams and the management of teams,” McQuaid told BBC Radio on Sunday. “If we can do that then we will regain some ground and credibility.”

McQuaid said the sport wasn’t the cause of the recent scandals, but rather athletes that “are selfish and are prepared to cheat.”

“In this type of investigation authorities like the police can go a lot further that a sporting authority,” he said. “They can put in hidden cameras and the like to crack a network, a drugs supply ring. Of course it is sad it has come to this but it is the way it has to be.”

Landis’ B sample has yet to be tested but he’s been suspended from his Phonak team pending the results. If found guilty, Landis could be stripped of the Tour title and fired from the team.

“If it comes back negative I will be the first to shake his hand,” McQuaid said. “I will be delighted and thrilled for him.”

Also on Sunday, 40 riders in the Cyclassics race in Hamburg, Germany, underwent unannounced doping tests. All of the tests, which were administered by the UCI, came back negative. Three-time world champion Oscar Freire won the race.

[Serpico]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-0607310138jul31,1,6261272.column?coll=chi-sportsnew-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true


http://www.chicagotribune.com/media/thumbnails/blurb/2006-05/23213366.jpg


French-fried conundrum Landis doping case not at all clear-cut


July 31, 2006

The more you look at the Floyd Landis case, the murkier it seems. The facts that have been made public simply don't add up. They provide no clear-cut explanation for why the 2006 Tour de France champion apparently was found positive for testosterone, a banned performance-enhancer, on only one of the eight doping controls Landis said he underwent during the race.

The U.S. cyclist's public relations blitz after his "A" sample positive test was announced Thursday--CNN's "Larry King Live," NPR's "All Things Considered," ESPN's "Outside the Lines," two teleconferences with U.S. media and a news conference in Spain--did nothing to clear up the situation. Both Landis and Brent Kay, the orthopedist who has treated the cyclist's bad hip, offered a few theories but no detailed information to support the cyclist's denial of having used testosterone, a hormone that builds strength and can aid in recovery from injury or exertion. "Athletes have been very successful in duping journalists for 50 years, and Landis could be doing a Gomer Pyle routine, for all I know," said Penn State professor Charles Yesalis, an expert on performance-enhancing drugs. "But a one-time use of testosterone would have been completely inappropriate for an athlete who wants a short-term boost. So you start brainstorming to think why he might have tested positive."

This is what we know: Landis had an elevated testosterone/epitestosterone level after the July 20 stage in which he improbably rallied from a huge time deficit to get back in contention for a title he won three days later. Sources have told the Tribune that Landis' "A" sample level was 11-1, confirming what was first reported by a German TV network. Any ratio above 4-1 is considered evidence of having supplemented the body's natural testosterone with external testosterone. An elevated T/E ratio leads most of the top anti-doping laboratories, including the Paris lab handling Landis' analysis, to seek a second test based on carbon isotope ratio (CIR) that is said to provide definitive proof the testosterone taken was external. A French newspaper said the Paris lab did perform the CIR test and it showed evidence of external testosterone. Analysis of Landis' "B" sample--all samples are divided into two parts--will take place soon, probably this week. If it does not confirm the "A" result, Landis will be cleared of any wrongdoing.

Relatively few cases, mostly involving EPO, produce conflicting "A" and "B" results. "I expect the `B' sample to come back positive," Landis said. Landis said he has a higher T/E ratio than the average of 1-1 for men, but he did not specify what his usual ratio is. Seeing red flags "I believe you can't win the Tour de France without drugs," Yesalis said. "But there are a lot of red flags in the Landis case. You can't forget that the French lab involved in the testing has been mired in controversy or rule out someone might have set him up." Unless he was framed by tampering with his urine sample, external testosterone in his sample would constitute a doping offense. Intentional or not, athletes are held responsible for the presence of banned drugs in their bodies. A naturally elevated T/E ratio could be grounds for dismissal of the case.

Studies have shown men to have variations in T/E levels from one test to another of up to 30 percent, according to Christiane Ayotte, director of the Montreal anti-doping lab. That means an athlete with a baseline T/E level of 4-1 could come up as high as 5.2-1 and still have a chance to be cleared unless the CIR test shows evidence of external testosterone. "Elevated values are confirmed in triplicate for accuracy and the [carbon isotope] test is done," Ayotte wrote in an e-mail. Ayotte said an elevated ratio alone might suggest evidence of doping. "It is not impossible to think athletes are having access to `human' testosterone and, consequently, a `negative' [carbon isotope] result for a clearly abnormal profile will not prevent reporting of a [positive] finding," Ayotte wrote. "We had one such case two years ago." The nagging question still is why Landis' T/E level would have gone over the allowable just once, especially given that experts like Yesalis and New York University medical school professor Gary Wadler think an athlete would have been highly unlikely to use testosterone for a quick boost. Its effectiveness is greatest with long-term application. "If you wanted to cheat, there are so many other options which are more effective and wouldn't have gotten you caught," Yesalis said.

One potentially plausible explanation offered by those familiar with doping practices is Landis, despite his professions of innocence, was using testosterone over the long term but either masking it or diluting it to avoid detection. That reasoning holds that the positive owed to making a mistake with the doping program one day. Such mistakes are not uncommon. Several Dutch cyclists who died in the late 1980s are believed to have taken too much of the oxygen booster EPO, thickening their blood so deadly clots occurred. "At this level of sport, an athlete has medical handlers and staff looking after things," Yesalis said. "Is it possible one of them made an error or Landis broke the protocol they laid out? Yes. Is it likely? No." If the "B" test supports the "A" and there is no evidence of tampering, Landis may decide to question the reliability of the tests. However he challenges the result, Landis must do it under European rules of jurisprudence, where the burden of proof is on the accused.

Because most of the media commenting or writing about the case are so unfamiliar with doping and doping control, there is a tremendous amount of misinformation being disseminated and, perhaps, some rush to judgment. "When you look at what we've done to Floyd, it's almost like when we rounded up the Japanese-Americans and put them in concentration camps in World War II," Kay said. "It's almost this medieval witch hunt right now." "I'm not looking for sympathy," Landis said. Just answers. Like the rest of us.

[Serpico]

http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,19963402-12428,00.html


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Armstrong backs Landis


July 30, 2006

FLOYD Landis, fighting a doping scandal that could cost him the Tour de France crown, made his case on U.S. television yesterday and received a vote of confidence from seven-time Tour winner Lance Armstrong.

Landis, appearing on CNN's Larry King Live program from Madrid, reiterated that his positive test for an abnormal testosterone-to-epitestosterone level "was a shock as much to me as anyone else".
He said he would do everything he could to clear his name.

Armstrong, who has himself been dogged by doping allegations that he has consistently denied, spoke to the Los Angeles-based King on the broadcast by telephone.

"Obviously, I was very surprised," Armstrong said of Landis's positive result, which has yet to be confirmed by a B sample test. "Although I still believe in Floyd and believe him to be innocent, it's not good for cycling."

Armstrong said that there was never any suggestion during the three years Landis was on Armstrong's U.S. Postal team that the younger rider would be seduced by the lure of performance enhancing drugs.

"If we ever suspected anything to lead us to believe he was a cheater, we would have parted ways long before we did.

"When he did leave, he left for a better offer from another team."

Armstrong also noted that the French laboratory that conducted the test on Landis, who rides for the Swiss-based Phonak team, was the same one which was involved in some of the allegations against himself.

"I'm a little sceptical of this particular laboratory," the now retired Armstrong said.

[Serpico]

http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/sports/story/0,4136,110938,00.html


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CYCLING may be encountering its toughest battle for legitimacy yet.


July 31, 2006

With Floyd Landis in danger of being stripped of his Tour de France title, some in cycling are wondering whether something drastic - like temporarily shutting down the sport - is necessary to prevent a terminal exodus of sponsors and disillusioned fans.

Pat McQuaid, president of the International Cycling Union, stopped short of endorsing a suspension of the racing calendar, but said he hoped to appoint independent experts to examine everything from athletes' contracts to team managers' backgrounds.


'I'm planning a complete audit of the top level, because that's where people are ruining the sport,' he said. 'It's shocking that people act so stupidly and damage the sport.'

If the backup test does not exonerate Landis - and perhaps even if it does - the Tour de France could be haunted by this year's competition for years.

Jean-Francois Lamour, France's Minister for Youth, Sports and Associations, said the scandal was a 'serious blow' to the Tour de France's credibility.

American Greg LeMond, a three-time Tour winner added, 'Short-term, it could be a disaster for cycling. Sponsors will drop out, television will stop broadcasting it, the public will be turned off. I'm not sure how much more of this everyone can take.'

Realistically though, despite a spate of drug scandals in recent years, it's unlikely that the current crisis will result in the Tour being cancelled.

Except during World Wars I and II, the Tour has made a journey through France every year since 1903.

McQuaid said that such a drastic move would alienate the sport's stakeholders - race organisers, national federations and sponsors. He pointed out that Landis is the only rider in the field who had a positive drug test.

'This is not the time for knee-jerk reactions,' McQuaid said.

[Serpico]

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/07/30/sports/BIKE.php


http://www.seven.com/images/logos/logo_herald_tribune_100w.gif


Hard to make sense of the Landis case


Samuel Abt

July 30, 2006

Some elements of the Floyd Landis case simply don't make sense. No, not the question of why any rider would use illegal performance- enhancing drugs when he knew that, if the drugs helped him to victory, he would have to give a urine sample for testing that would reveal the drug use.

That question is an old one and has never been answered adequately. The best explanation may be that the rider is either plain dumb or convinced that he has taken such small quantities or masking agents that they will not reveal the drug use.

And no, not the question of whether a polite, accommodating and seemingly sincere rider can also cheat.

That question was answered in the Tyler Hamilton case. Hamilton, the American who preceded Landis as leader of the Phonak team and who is as friendly a fellow as there is in bicycle racing, has spent the past two years arguing in vain in the courts that he did not transfuse blood to win races.

The baffling question is: How did the 30-year-old Landis, a rider of character but no overwhelming stature, personable but not particularly articulate or introspective, become in one month such a colossus of attention?

If, as Aristotle thought, great tragedy requires great figures, Landis - in the midst of a major disgrace as he faces the loss of his victory in the Tour de France on doping charges - is an unlikely leading character.

Yet the former farmboy from Pennsylvania has been in the spotlight for weeks.

Before the Tour started on July 1, he was merely a contender, the rider who finished ninth last year and then won the Tour of California, Paris-Nice and the Tour de Georgia this year. In his pre-Tour prep race, the Dauphine Libéré, he finished far back.

Then, with the forced absence of such favorites as Ivan Basso, Jan Ullrich and Francisco Mancebo because of doping suspicions and with Alexandre Vinokourov's withdrawal because his team could not field enough acceptable riders, Landis became a favorite.

At center stage, he became a newsmaker when he announced that he had concealed for years a degenerative condition in his right hip that was so bad that it needed replacement surgery soon.

This was not an offhand announcement. It appeared in The New York Times Magazine with the condition that it be published during the Tour de France.

Why was that? a reporter asked Landis.

A bit unconvincingly, he explained that the news would come out sometime and he preferred to have it known during the Tour "when everybody is here."

That seemed to be the truth, but not the whole truth. Something was missing, though what is still anybody's guess.

Explaining the condition, Landis also said he had been granted a waiver by the International Cycling Union to treat the condition with cortisone, an otherwise banned drug.

His next surprise was his collapse during the 16th of 20 daily stages, when he appeared to be riding in slow motion on the last of four climbs in the Alps.

"I had a very bad day on the wrong day," he said after finishing in 23rd place, 10 minutes 4 seconds behind the winner, and dropping from first place over all to 11th, 8:08 behind the new leader, Oscar Pereiro, a Spaniard with Caisse d'Epargne.

Although Landis offered no explanation for his collapse, his physiologist, Dr. Allen Lim, did.

"That bad day was the accumulation of fatigue," Lim said. "At some point, the body goes into shutdown mode and there's nothing you can do about it.

"It wasn't a good day for his body to want to lighten the load, but he really had no control over it. His body was going into self-repair mode."

That sounded good, especially the next day - the now-legendary 17th stage to Morzine - when Landis romped to a victory by more than five minutes after a solo breakaway that turned into an individual time trial over 125 kilometers, or 77 miles. He moved into third place over all, 30 seconds behind Pereiro, and sealed his victory two days later in a long race against the clock.

In a news conference after the time trial, Landis contradicted Lim's explanation.

"I forgot to eat," the rider said. "By the time I started to eat, it was too late. I bonked," the sport's word for running out of power.

"He admitted he bonked?" a disbelieving Lim said later. "He did bonk. He came back to the hotel and kept saying, 'What a jerk, what an idiot.'"

Stranger and stranger, concealing a commonplace bonk.

That 17th stage is the one where Landis's urine sample showed illegally high levels of testosterone.

Now, defending himself and his right to the Tour victory, Landis has said in quick succession that he had no explanation for the high testosterone level, that he has a naturally high level of the male sex hormone and that what he really has is a naturally high level of the ratio between testosterone and epitestosterone, a natural precursor.

The sport's rules allow riders up to a 4-to-1 ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone. Most males have a 1-to- 1 or 2-to-1 ratio, although some athletes have tested to levels far above 4 to 1 naturally.

Landis has also said that he did not know what his tested level was. That seems unlikely, because the International Cycling Union, in reporting Wednesday that there had been an "adverse analytical finding" on one rider, later identified by his Phonak team as Landis, said it had informed the rider of his tested level.

The next step is a test, in a French laboratory this week, of the second half, or B sample, of his urine after the first half, or A sample, showed the outlawed drug.

This test will presumably also show whether the testosterone was natural or ingested by injection, pill or patch.

Since the laboratory, at Châtenay- Malabry, will be closing Friday for the standard one-month French summer vacation, the results are expected to be made public quickly.

If the B test is negative, Landis will be cleared. If it is positive, he will be convicted of doping. In the second case, the cycling union will move to deprive him of his victory.

He then has the option of an appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland.

Landis's doctors and lawyers will argue, as some riders have done successfully before, that his body produces testosterone at high levels.

They may also argue that his alcohol intake the night after the collapse on Stage 16 influenced the positive finding. Landis has hinted as much in saying he had two beers and four shots of whiskey with teammates who were trying to comfort him.

All of this is a long way from the top step of the victory podium in Paris on July 23, when the Tour finished. It is an even longer way from the frozen roads of Pennsylvania, where a 15-year-old boy used to train on his bicycle at night after he finished his chores at home.

That picture, the one of Landis in layers of sweaters and plastic bags between two socks on each foot to ward off the cold, is the one that seemed so right only a week ago. This is who I was, it said, this is where I came from and this is who I am.

The other picture, Landis, surrounded by lawyers and doctors, insisting that he did no wrong, is reality, however.

What actually happened? How did a somewhat obscure bicycle racer become international news? Where do all these questions about his hip, his collapse and his revival come from?

Some parts of this case really make no sense.

[Serpico]

http://sports.bostonherald.com/otherSports/view.bg?articleid=150593


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LeMond: Sing it, Floyd


July 30, 2006

Three-time Tour de France champion Greg LeMond says the doping charges against fellow American Landis could be “what cycling has needed for many years” in order to discourage cheating.

“If he is confirmed positive, I hope he has the courage to tell the truth,” LeMond said in an interview with French weekly Le Journal du Dimanche. “He alone can change the face of the sport today. His example could be a symbol of change.”

In a veiled reference to seven-time winner Lance Armstrong, long dogged by doping allegations, LeMond added: “I hope that (Landis) won’t do what another American did: Deny, deny, deny.”

[Serpico]

http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/othersport.cfm?id=1104112006


http://images.scotsman.com/network/banner_logo.gif


Tarnished hero spins a web of deceit


July 30, 2006

ONE night during the Tour de France, Dave Zabriskie, an American riding with the CSC team, was making his way to his hotel room when he encountered Floyd Landis pacing the corridor. Landis was in a world of his own, oblivious to his countryman's presence. "I've got to win this bike race," he shouted to himself. "I've got to win this bike race."

Zabriskie thought it typical of Landis. A driven man, he was psyching himself up for the next day's stage.

The lengths to which Landis was prepared to go to win this bike race are now known. The sport of cycling has taken so many punches from the drug testers that you'd think it would be desensitised to scandal by now. The Festina Affair of 1998, Operation Puerto of 2006 and a heavy catalogue of disgrace and tragedy in between should have made people shock-proof, but still, when Landis's positive test for a performance-enhancer became known last week the cycling world reeled anew. It was instructive viewing.

After a miraculous performance on the killer mountain stage between Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne and Morzine on July 20, Landis was tested and the test came back with high traces of testosterone, an old favourite of those who take short cuts to glory. Only the terminally gullible will have been surprised by this. The day before the climb to Morzine, Landis cracked horribly on the ascent to La Toussuire. He lost bags of time to his rivals and was in such a state of distress at the end of the stage that some thought him incapable of continuing the Tour. Twenty-four hours later he produced arguably the most powerful surge in the history of the race. Even Lance Armstrong's eyes were popping. Many of his rivals said, in coded language, that they had never seen anything like it in their professional lives.

Later, Landis said that listening to Metallica records helped get him in the right frame of mind. A heavy dose of testosterone might have helped, too. His positive test was reported as cycling's shame last week. Throughout the world it was written that the game was discredited once more. Not true. What it was, in fact, was a key day in cycling's salvation. So often the lines are blurred. Landis has been exposed as a cheat. That, surely, is a good thing. The message sent to the next generation of bike riders is a powerful one. If they didn't know it already then they know now that the testers these days mean business.

'Take the drugs if you like but realise that we're coming to get you if you do.'

What was surprising about the Landis business was not that he tested positive but that so many people believed in him in the first place.

"In its best, most redemptive moments, sports will shine a light on the unbending and indomitable human spirit," wrote the Philadelphia Inquirer just before the news broke last week, "and in so doing repair our sad sense of innocence lost. Just about the time we have given in to despair, when all seems irreversibly soiled by the dopers and head-butters and steroid freaks, someone will happen along to cleanse and disinfect. That current someone is named Floyd Landis."

You would expect this from the American media. We're not slow in acclaiming false sporting gods in this part of the world but they bring it to another level across the water. They need their heroes more than most and in Landis they saw another Armstrong. But others bought into the fairy tale of the hero with the degenerative hip triumphing over excruciating pain to realise his life's dream.

Lance beat cancer. Floyd beat the bone-on-bone hurt of a hip that was likened to a lump of rotten wood. And he beat other things, too.

Raised in the small village of Farmersville, Pennsylvania he was brought up as a Mennonite Christian by God-fearing parents. As a kid he did without radio and television and computers, he went to church twice weekly and was always dressed conservatively. He rebelled. In Amish Country, it didn't take much to earn a reputation for wildness and a fondness for riding a bike did it for Floyd. His parents disapproved. When Floyd left home after high school they were mortified but he won them over.

In their yard at home the Landis's have two signs hanging. One says 'To God be the glory', the other, 'Floyd's the man'. No doubt they will keep believing in their boy's innocence but his tale of schmaltz doesn't wash with too many others. That it ever did is a wonder. But it does no longer. And for that we give thanks.

[Archibald]

http://sports.bostonherald.com/otherSports/view.bg?articleid=150593


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LeMond: Sing it, Floyd


July 30, 2006

Three-time Tour de France champion Greg LeMond says the doping charges against fellow American Landis could be “what cycling has needed for many years” in order to discourage cheating.

“If he is confirmed positive, I hope he has the courage to tell the truth,” LeMond said in an interview with French weekly Le Journal du Dimanche. “He alone can change the face of the sport today. His example could be a symbol of change.”

In a veiled reference to seven-time winner Lance Armstrong, long dogged by doping allegations, LeMond added: “I hope that (Landis) won’t do what another American did: Deny, deny, deny.”
Breaking News: Greg Lemond

Minneapolis, MN -- Greg Lemond today released a statement that said he has, reluctantly and with great sadness, been forced to add the 2006 Tour de France to the long list of tours that he should have won. Lemond initially believed, and was even quoted in an earlier interview as saying, that this was the first clean Tour de France in many years. However, in light of the recent positive doping test of tour winner Floyd Landis, Lemond has concluded that, in all likelihood, he himself should have won the tour this year.

This brings the total number of Tours de France That Lemond Should Have Won (TDFTLSHW) to 167. Lemond first won the tour in 1986. However, as he has explained many times over the years since, he should have won the Tour in 1985, but was lied to by Bernard Hinault and cheated out of the race victory. Lemond next should have won the Tour in 1987 and 1988, but was incapacitated by a shotgun blast from his brother-in-law. While the incident was ruled an accident by the police, Lemond believes that his brother-in-law was working with Hinault and a young Texan by the name of Lance Armstrong to remove him from the sport.

Lemond came back to win the Tour in 1989 and 1990, but lost in 1991 due to the fact that, as incredible as it may sound, every other rider in the Tour de France besides Lemond was taking performance enhancing drugs. Lemond believes these drugs were supplied by Bernard Hinault, who realized that if nothing were done, Lemond would continue to win the Tour for the next 50 years. The drug-tainted Tour would continue through 2005, including the reign of Lance Armstrong. In the absence of doping, Lemond clearly would have won the Tour from 1991 to 2005, bringing the total number of TDFTLSHW to 21.

Going back before 1985, Lemond believes that in all likelihood, he would have won the Tour de France each year since his birth in 1961 if a) he had known about it and b) he had not had the small stature and limited leg length common to children between the ages of 0 and 10. As Lemond explains, clearly it would be unfair to him to discount the Tour wins he should have achieved were he only able to reach the pedals of his bicycle. This brings the TDFTLSHW to 45.

While Lemond concedes that some may believe him to be "stretching it" by including in his TDFTLSHW years from Tours before his birth, he claims that if one is to think about it logically, the only possible conclusion is that the greatest bike rider in the history of the Tour would absolutely have won the Tour since its inception in 1903, if only he had been alive at that time. It was not Greg Lemond's fault that his parents were not alive and able to conceive him in time to ride the initial Tour in 1903; thus, it would be unfair to strip him of the Tour wins that he rightly should have been awarded.

Note that there have been 11 years since its creation in 1903 that the Tour de France was not held due to the two World Wars. Clearly, stopping the Tour due to worldwide war would have been unfair to Greg Lemond, had he been alive, and would have in all likelihood, been a move orchestrated by Bernard Hinault, had he himself been alive, to keep Lemond from winning the tour. Thus, Lemond believes that these years should also be included in the TDFTLSHW, giving him a total of 103 wins.

Finally, Lemond explains that he has included the years between the invention of the bicycle to the first Tour de France (1839 to 1903) in the TDFTLSHW. Had the French had the foresight to create the Tour de France in a more timely manner, Lemond would have definitely won it each and every year, again assuming he had been alive (see above). Obviously Lemond cannot be blaimed for the shortsightedness and general ineptitude of the French, and therefore the victory from the Tours de France that should have been held in these years must be credited to Lemond, bringing the final tally of TDFTLSHW to 167.

Note that while Lemond has not yet been able to rationalize including years before the invention of the bicycle in the TDFTLSHW, he has created a company to pursue such an effort. The company is hard at work on a rationalization and hopes to produce one for him within the year.

http://www.doperssuck.com

:)

[Serpico]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/29/sports/othersports/29cycling.html?_r=1&ex=1154318400&en=9c5e27b1f01ce02d&ei=5087%0A&oref=slogin


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Landis Case Poses Challenge to Cycling’s Legitimacy


July 29, 2006

While Lance Armstrong inspired an American renaissance in cycling, a culture of doping was eating away at the sport, with some of the best riders in the world implicated in drug scandals. Now, with Floyd Landis testing positive for high levels of testosterone during the Tour de France, cycling may be encountering its toughest battle for legitimacy yet.

Landis could be stripped of his Tour de France title if a secondary urine sample confirms the positive result, and some people in cycling are wondering whether something drastic — like temporarily shutting down the sport — is necessary to prevent a terminal exodus of sponsors and disillusioned fans.

Perhaps this is a reactionary response from those who maintain that cycling suffers from institutional denial about doping. But if the Tour de France is forced to strip the title from its champion, the notion that cycling has failed at exerting control over the doping problem will only gain traction.

“The cycling world cannot accept that a few people are taking away the credibility of the sport they claim to love,” said Pat McQuaid, president of the International Cycling Union.

Promising a comprehensive inquiry into the sport’s problems, but stopping short of endorsing a suspension of the racing calendar, McQuaid said he hoped to appoint independent experts to examine everything from athletes’ contracts to team managers’ backgrounds.

“I’m planning a complete audit of the top level, because that’s where people are ruining the sport,” he said in a telephone interview yesterday. “It’s shocking that people at the top act so stupidly and damage the sport.”

McQuaid stressed that he would not pass judgment on Landis until a laboratory has tested the secondary sample. Results of that test are expected within a few days. If the backup test does not exonerate Landis — and perhaps even if it does — the Tour de France could be haunted by this year’s competition.

“If it follows through — if Floyd is to be found a positive — I think it would be a good impact on the sport, long-term, because it would be a wake-up call and would help clean up the sport,” said Greg LeMond, a three-time Tour de France winner and the first American to win the event. “I think cycling needs something like this to happen for people to realize how big the problem is.

“Short-term, it could be a disaster for cycling. Sponsors will drop out, television will stop broadcasting it, the public will be turned off. I’m not sure how much more of this everyone can take. Obviously, when there is a situation like this, it makes people wonder about the sport and reconsider what they feel about it.”

In May, the police in Madrid raided what they described as a doping laboratory and seized steroids, hormones, the endurance-boosting drug EPO, nearly 100 bags of frozen blood and equipment for treating blood. The investigation led to the removal of several of the top contenders from the field on the eve of the Tour de France.

That scandal and Landis’s situation have created the biggest doping crisis for the sport since 1998, when the nine-man Festina team was kicked out of the competition after performance-enhancing drugs were found in the car of a team trainer.

The cascade of doping issues has led many of those who follow the sport closely to feel that cycling is overwhelmed and may need to be radically overhauled.

“It is bloated and sick and needs to go into a rest home,” said Jeremy Whittle, the cycling correspondent for The Times of London. “It’s a combination of the grueling nature of the event, the influx of corporate sponsorship and the corruption of so many of the people who are involved in it.”

But it is unlikely that the current crisis will result in the cancellation of the Tour. Except during World Wars I and II, the Tour de France has been held every year since 1903. (Officials from the Tour organizer, Amaury Sports Organization, did not reply to several requests for comment.)

McQuaid said that such a drastic move would alienate the sport’s stakeholders — race organizers, national federations and sponsors. He pointed out that Landis is the only rider in the field who had a positive drug test.

“This is not the time for knee-jerk reactions,” McQuaid said.

The German television network ZDF said Thursday that it would consider dropping its coverage of the Tour de France because of Landis’s positive drug test, according to The Associated Press. The Tour generates a large part of its revenue from television contracts.

ZDF demanded guarantees from cycling’s world governing body and Tour organizers that they would make a stronger effort to address the problem of doping in cycling. “We have signed a television contract for a sports event and not for a display of the performance of pharmaceuticals,” said Nikolaus Brender, the channel’s editor-in-chief, according to The A.P.

Signs of fan apathy were already apparent. Television ratings were down worldwide, and Johan Bruyneel, the manager of Armstrong’s former team, Discovery Channel, estimated that roadside crowds were down 40 percent this year. (Armstrong’s retirement was a popular explanation for the decline in TV ratings and attendance.)

Defenders of the sport, including Armstrong, have maintained that cyclists were caught doping so frequently because the sport nobly confronted the issue and instituted rigorous testing after Festina. But in 2005, cycling had a higher percentage of adverse analytical reactions than any other Olympic sport, with 3.78 percent of urine samples producing a positive result.

“I look at the riders as victims, in a way,” LeMond said. “Sure, they are adults who are fully responsible for their own actions. But I was able to race in a period where riders had a choice whether to race clean or not. Now, they don’t have a choice. If they don’t get on a doping program, they are pretty much forced out of the sport, or they are faced with riding in the Tour de France, knowing they have absolutely no chance at competing.”

In this year’s Tour, one of the top riders, Tom Boonen of Belgium, said that the especially demanding route only encouraged riders to find artificial methods so they could endure.

“They say they want to fight doping, but then they give us a program like this,” Boonen, the world road-cycling champion, told reporters after a tough day in the Pyrenees. “I’m also supporting the battle against doping, but with these sorts of stages, the battle will never be won.”

Suffering has always been a central part of the Tour de France, and perhaps doping has, as well. Critics have long argued that cynicism about doping is so deeply engrained in the culture of the sport that it will never be rooted out. They point to the fact that Richard Virenque, the French star at the center of the Festina scandal, denied then admitted his involvement in the scandal — and was allowed to reclaim a prominent position in cycling.

After serving his suspension, Virenque won several races and Tour de France stages before retiring to serve as a TV analyst.

The next stage of Landis’s career is unknown. But regardless of how his case unfolds, cycling’s battle with doping will almost certainly continue.

[Serpico]

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,,19946158-661,00.html


http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/images/logo-ninn.gif


Champ's drug test shock


July 29, 2006

A DRUG scandal has thrown the world's greatest cycling race into turmoil and cast doubt on one of its most stirring wins. American Floyd Landis has denied cheating his way to victory in the Tour de France, despite testing positive for abnormally high testosterone.

If found guilty, Landis could become the first champion to be stripped of his crown.

If cleared, Landis conceded the shadow of doping disgrace would probably follow him forever.

"I would like to be assumed innocent until proven guilty," he said.

Landis, 30, yesterday denied taking performance-enhancing testosterone during the tour and also denied using drugs during his career.

He said he still believed there was a good possibility of clearing his name.

But he added that with cycling's long history of doping controversies, "I wouldn't blame you if you were sceptical".

Triple Tour winner Greg LeMond yesterday hit out at the corruption of cycling. "The problem is the sport is corrupt and it corrupts everybody. I still believe it was one of the cleanest tours ever. But is it 100 per cent clean? No," he said.

News of Landis's A sample result sparked a savage reaction from Victoria's top cycling official Joe Ciavola, who said he had little respect for any elite cyclist who races in Europe.

"I said the other day cycling has got to be right up there with the filthiest sports," Mr Ciavola said.

International Cycling Union president Pat McQuaid said: "Floyd Landis has to be regarded as innocent until such time as the B sample confirms the result.

"But if that analysis is positive I will be very, very angry. It would be a disaster for the tour.

"We will have to do a complete audit on the sport in the days ahead to see where we go from here."

News of the test broke four days after Landis raised his arms in triumph, capping a spectacular comeback and continuing the streak of American victories begun by seven-time champ Lance Armstrong.

The victory was particularly inspiring because Landis won despite a hip problem he has suffered since a 2003 crash

The Tour's second-place finisher Oscar Pereiro, who will become champion if Landis is not cleared, said he was in no mood to celebrate.

"Should I win the Tour now it would feel like an academic victory," said.

Landis's positive reading came on the day he rode brilliantly through the Alps to reclaim time lost the previous day.

Riding alone in front through most of the gruelling Alpine stage, Landis erased nearly all of an eight-minute deficit, climbing from 11th place to third.

Two days later, Landis retook the overall lead during the three-week race's final individual time trial.

On Sunday, as he rode down Paris's Champs-Elysees on the way to the finish line, he was welcomed as a hero.

On the eve of the tour, pre-race favourites Jan Ullrich and Ivan Basso were removed after being linked to a Spanish doping investigation.

Australian Tour de France rider and Olympic gold medallist Stuart O'Grady expressed dismay at the news.

"One day you shake his (Landis) hand on the tour victory and on the next you're told he's positive," he said.

"If it's really true then I don't know what to think any more."

Another Olympic gold medallist, Mike Turtur, said Australia's premier cyclists should not be tainted by the scandal.

"We can't tarnish Cadel Evans, Stuart O'Grady, Robbie McEwen and Michael Rogers with the same brush," Turtur said.

The last time a yellow jersey winner was disqualified from the tour was in 1904 when defending champion Maurice Garin was stripped of his title when it was judged he had taken a train during the race, rather than completing the full route.

[Serpico]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_soshnick&sid=aaGSdQMbTUbI


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Floyd Landis Tests Fans' Faith in Sports Heroes


August 1, 2006

Just when sports fans thought it was safe to believe -- OK, to admire and trust -- Floyd Landis and his out-of-whack testosterone kick us in the teeth.

Here we go again with dirty drug samples and denials. This time, however, the usual cynics and curmudgeons have company. Even true believers who hailed the Tour de France winner as a shining example of how things should be now have doubts about Landis. Who can blame them?

Landis was touted as the kid from a modest Mennonite family who beat a bum hip to be the best. He was that rare breed in sports these days: an undisputed feel-good story. Until he wasn't.

``It's hard to get your head around that maybe this was fraudulent,'' says Robert Rhodes, assistant editor of the Newton, Kansas-based Mennonite Weekly Review, a national publication that covers the Mennonite community.

At a time when sports fans are conversant in such things as human growth hormone and blood doping, how can people be sure of what they see on the court, the field or even on a bicycle ascending into the Alps? Especially a bicycle.

After all, the past three winners of cycling's major races in Europe are linked with taking drugs to boost performance. Roberto Heras, who won the Tour of Spain, is banned. Ivan Basso, implicated in a blood-doping scandal, was suspended on the eve of the Tour, as was favorite Jan Ullrich.

Landis, for a nanosecond anyway, restored the public's faith in man's ability to accomplish great feats, to test the limits with an effort that seemed, well, superhuman.

Pleading Innocence

Landis pedaled into the hearts and minds of those watching the Tour, an iconoclast offering purity to a sports world contaminated with the likes of Barry Bonds, Tim Montgomery and a cesspool of sullied superstars.

In an instant, though, warm and fuzzy turned cold and farcical.

For the record, Landis says he didn't cheat, that he never used performance-enhancing drugs. At least he didn't wag his finger like Rafael Palmeiro, who declared his innocence before Congress and then tested positive for steroids.

Sitting before a melange of microphones and cameras, his baseball hat turned backward, Landis last week begged for time and truth.

``I ask not to be judged, much less to be sentenced by anyone,'' was his plea.

He deserves that. Every athlete does. Let's see what his backup urine sample reveals this week. Should it come back clean, there will still be doubters. Landis says so himself. His victory, even if allowed to stand, will be forever questioned, he concedes.

Epic Climb

To understand how far Landis may fall, we must review how high he climbed.

He dominated the 17th stage of the race by more than five minutes, astonishing cycling aficionados and catapulting himself into contention after a horrific showing the previous day. Cycling historians were left jaws agape, marveling at what they termed an epic performance.

Landis had them captivated at the offices of the Mennonite Weekly Review, where Rhodes and his staff were tracking their favorite racer's progress on the Web. He actually had Americans talking about a Tour de France that didn't include Lance Armstrong.

``We were practically on our feet,'' Rhodes says, referring to Landis's stage 17 performance. ``We just couldn't believe it.''

There's that word again. Believe.

It used to be that blind trust, or perhaps naivete, made belief in the accomplishments of athletes so easy. At the 1980 Olympics, when a rag-tag bunch of American college hockey players upset the Russians, sportscaster Al Michaels asked viewers if they believed in miracles. We did believe, and in guts and determination.

Parade Postponed

When a gimpy Kirk Gibson played World Series home-run hero in 1988, Jack Buck shouted that he didn't believe what he just saw. Only he did believe, in Gibson's ability to do great things.

But do we believe anymore? Do we hold out hope? The parade in Landis's home town of Farmersville, Pennsylvania, has been postponed indefinitely. Belief has been suspended, pending further results.

``I'm certainly not convinced that Floyd necessarily did anything wrong,'' Rhodes says. ``At the same time it's a painful possibility.''

Just days after news of Landis's positive test went public, sprinter Justin Gatlin tested positive, too. His coach says the co-world-record holder in the 100 meters was set up by a massage therapist.

``We look on with disbelief instead of astonishment,'' Rhodes says.

You'd better believe it.

[Serpico]

http://sport.guardian.co.uk/breakingnews/feedstory/0,,-5987158,00.html


http://www.pravednes.cz/img/reuters.gif


Landis will learn fate on Saturday, say UCI


August 1, 2006

Tour de France winner Floyd Landis, who tested positive for testosterone on his way to victory in cycling's showpiece event, will know on Saturday if the counter-analysis he has requested confirms the result.

"On Saturday morning, we should know, that is what the French laboratory told us," International Cycling Union (UCI) spokesman Enrico Capani told Reuters by telephone on Tuesday.

The sample will be tested at the Laboratoire National de Depistage du Dopage (LNDD).

"Yesterday afternoon we have asked them to analyse the B sample because Mr Landis had not asked them to do so," he added.

"The laboratory will communicate the results to the Phonak team and to us."

If the positive test were confirmed, the American would be stripped of his Tour victory and Oscar Pereiro Sio of Spain, who finished second overall in this month's race, would be declared the winner.

BIGGEST EVENT

It would be the first time in the history of the sport's biggest event that a Tour winner has been disqualified for doping.

His Phonak team said Landis would be dismissed if the B result was also positive.

The American, who has denied any wrongdoing and said his body naturally produced high levels of testosterone, has said he intended to continue racing once he has had an operation on his hip.

The 30-year-old tested positive for the male sex hormone after an astounding comeback in the last mountain stage of this year's Tour in the French Alps, just a day after a very poor performance which all but knocked him out of contention.

If the positive test is confirmed, USA Cycling, the American federation, would have a month to make a ruling, the most likely decision being a two-year ban.

Landis's lawyers could then take the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and a long procedure would begin.

Testosterone can speed up recovery after exercise and generally improves stamina and strength.

[Serpico]

http://local.lancasteronline.com/6/24469


http://lancasteronline.com/images/headers/lolhdrlogo.gif


Family: Title will be stripped


August 1, 2006

Family and friends of Tour de France champion Floyd Landis expect him to become the first cyclist ever stripped of the sport’s most-sought-after title over doping allegations.But even in the face of damaging new details, they are clinging to hope the Farmersville native has naturally high levels of testosterone and will be proven innocent — title or no title.

“The bottom line is the truth,” said Tammy Martin, a family friend who has served as their spokeswoman.

Martin said she and the Landises, who have stopped granting interviews, anticipate the Tour de France title will be stripped from the cyclist.

The New York Times and several other international news agencies have reported that Landis’ initial urine test showed some of the testosterone was synthetic — contradicting the cyclist’s claim he has naturally high levels of the hormone.

And in a separate blow to his case, Landis’ personal doctor confirmed the ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone in the first sample was 11:1, nearly three times the maximum allowable limits under Tour de France rules.

“You just can’t explain it naturally, with alcohol or any of that,” Charles Yesalis, a recently retired Pennsylvania State University professor and doping expert, told the New Era today. “They can say anything they want, but I’ve never heard anything like that.”

And, adding intrigue to a case that has gripped not only the sport but fans across the world and in Landis’ hometown was the timing of requests for the second analysis.

Spain’s Oscar Pereiro, the Tour de France runner-up, would be declared the winner if Landis loses the title. It would be the first time at the Tour the winner was disqualified for doping.

At Green Mountain Cyclery, the Ephrata bike shop where Landis used to hang out as a teen, owner Mike Farrington stood behind his longtime friend despite the new developments.

“If I didn’t know Floyd, I wouldn’t know what to believe, but because I know Floyd, I know that he didn’t do anything wrong,” Farrington said.

He criticized the leak of information to the press. He said much of what he has read about the testing and procedures has been conflicting and confusing. He dismissed the unnamed sources and contended that Landis has been robbed of his chance to defend himself.

And, he added: “All the information I’m getting is from a lab that has screwed up more tests than they have done right ... Who am I supposed to believe?”

Landis tested positive for an elevated ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone following the 17th stage of the Tour de France in the Alps, where he made a remarkable comeback after a poor performance the day before.

Because the ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone was more than twice the limit of 4:1, the lab performed a carbon isotope ratio test on the first of the cyclist’s two urine samples to determine whether it’s natural or synthetic, the Times reported, citing an unnamed source.

The result showing synthetic testosterone does not need to be confirmed with a second test, said Dr. Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and a spokesman for the American College of Sports Medicine.

“The rules say that it is a violation, but if you can show that the athlete had no fault or no significant fault, there could be a mitigation of the sanction,” Wadler told the newspaper. “No matter how it got there, the athlete has to show how it got into his or her body. It could have been sabotage or contaminated dietary supplements, or something else, but they have to prove how the testosterone got there.”

Landis has insisted his body’s natural metabolism — not doping — caused the result, and he would undergo further tests to prove it.

His personal doctor, Brent Kay, told The New York Times that his initial test showed a ratio of 11:1, but cautioned that such a result was “not off the chart.” He maintained it could be due to natural causes, bacterial contamination, alcohol consumption before the test or contamination of the specimen during testing.

“I’ve seen bodybuilders with numbers 100 to 1,” Kay told the newspaper. “Although Floyd’s was elevated, it’s not off the chart or anything.”

But Yesalis said such a claim is not “scientifically accurate.”

“Something that’s 6 to 1 is way, way out on the tail of the curve,” he added, “and 100 to 1 is just outrageous.”

A study of almost 4,000 male athletes reported that 99 percent had a ratio of less than 5.6:1. The prevalence of a ratio greater than 6:1 in healthy, non-steroid users is less than 0.8 percent, the study said.

If Landis did have naturally high testosterone levels, it should have shown up in earlier tests.

It did not. Landis’ testosterone levels were apparently normal in tests given after previous stages of the Tour de France, as well as other races in which he has competed in the past.

Meanwhile, Landis’ lawyers in Spain said they filed an official request for a test of the cyclist’s “B” sample late Monday. The UCI said it had filed its own request earlier because of concerns about the case dragging on.

The French news service Agence France Press reported that the UCI had grown “impatient” Monday evening and was demanding the second test be expedited.

“We have done this so the whole thing can be speeded up,” a UCI spokesperson told AFP. “We took this decision because of the importance of the case. Also the longer it goes on the more damage the sport risks suffering.”

But a spokesman for Landis, Michael Henson, said the cyclist had asked early that day that his B sample be tested.

“Floyd did request the B sample test. He faxed a request to his lawyers in Spain at 12:45 eastern time, which is well within the five-day limit required of the athlete,” Henson told AFP.

If Landis had waited till Wednesday to appeal for the B sample to be tested, the result would not be known for several weeks. The laboratory, Chatenay-Malabry in Paris, closes for the holidays at week’s end, according to the news service.

The analysis of Landis’ B sample is expected to take place Thursday through Saturday, International Cycling Union spokesman Enrico Carpani told the AP today.

The results will be announced on Saturday. If the “B” sample is negative, Landis would be cleared. If it is positive, which Landis’ lawyers say they expect, he could be stripped of his Tour victory and banned two years.

Landis had five business days from last Wednesday to request his B sample be tested. It is unclear why he waited until Monday.

In an interview with CNN’s Larry King on Thursday, the cyclist implied at one point that he already had requested the second analysis.

“I am waiting now a requested B sample test,” Landis told King five days ago, according to CNN’s transcript.

Later in the interview, King asked Landis: “Now what about the second tests, are you taking them yet or awaiting results or what?”

Landis replied: “The protocol, the way it works, is after the A sample, I’m notified of the abnormality. I have five days to request a B sample test. I’m not waiting for any particular reason. I just spent the last two days trying to come up with a plan and organize things in my life...

“But this evening, here, United States time, the (fax) needs to be sent to Colorado Springs, to the federation there. We will be requesting the B sample be tested,” Landis said.

If Landis is proven to have doped, it would not surprise the likes of Yesalis.

“The way they’ve spun it to sports journalists — and they’ve bought into it; they’ve been complicit — is that there’s a few bad apples in the barrel in elite sports,” he said. “The truth is there’s a large number of sports where there’s only a few good apples in the barrel.”

Landis will have 30 days to appeal a ruling by Tour de France organizers and professional cycling’s governing body. It will take at least that long before anything is clear, he said.

“Whatever the outcome of this, Floyd’s career has already been shot. It’s going to take him years to recover from this — if he’s able to recover at all,” Farrington said.

Martin said she and his family will continue to support Landis.

“If I make a mistake, I like to make a mistake on the side of mercy.

“If I make a mistake on the side of mercy, I won’t regret it,” Martin said this morning.

“We still love Floyd, and I can’t say too much more.”

[Fixed]

it gets worse bro

[ada@prorider.or]

seen all this
meaby landis should start a newspaper

if you seen all the article´s

[Avispa]

http://local.lancasteronline.com/6/24469

Family and friends of Tour de France champion Floyd Landis expect him to become the first cyclist ever stripped of the sport’s most-sought-after title over doping allegations

I wonder why they are so sure...

In any case, this is one the things I always find so fascinating about us, Americans... We either win big time (7 Tours in a row!) or screw up royally (first cyclist ever stripped of the Tour title).

Go figure, can't wait for Saturday...

[Serpico]

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB115444904804023475-b3Yk05K97EtFKvdjhAVAvcCleyE_20060831.html?mod=tff_ main_tff_top


http://www.ziggs.com/images/ns/homeWSJ.gif


Floyd Landis's Alcohol Defense


August 2, 2006

One evening nearly two decades ago, four Swedish men in their mid-thirties gathered to quaff about 10 alcoholic drinks over six hours. Two weeks ago, American cyclist Floyd Landis says he drank two beers and "at least" four shots of whiskey after the worst day of his professional career.

Besides a taste for the bottle, these five men have something in common: The day after drinking, their urine showed an elevated "T/E ratio" of testosterone to epitestosterone, hormones that occur naturally in the body.

For Mr. Landis, the test result was bad news: It may cost him the Tour de France title, as the elevated ratio is indicative of the use of banned performance-enhancing substances that raise testosterone levels. On the other hand, that Swedish night on the town -- part of a body of research on alcohol's effect on testosterone levels -- might help him clear his name.

Testosterone and epitestosterone generally are in balance in the body, but some athletes inject steroids or other substances to artificially raise their testosterone levels, which can help long-term muscle building. (Though it generally takes more than a single day for any muscle-building effect to appear.) The day after his drunken night, Mr. Landis's T/E ratio was found to be 11-to-1, well above the 4-to-1 limit set by international cycling. But athletes' testosterone levels vary widely; for example, a test of saliva in U.S. university students this year found an eight-fold range of the hormone. If Mr. Landis's T/E ratio is normally toward the high end, a night of drinking could have raised it dramatically, putting him above cycling's limit.

That's the theory, anyway.

While Mr. Landis wanted to forget a rough day at the office, the Swedes were drinking at the behest of researchers in the department of clinical chemistry at Huddinge Hospital -- researchers investigating the case of a Swedish athlete whose T/E ratio had ebbed and flowed with his alcohol intake. In the study, the T/E ratio increased among the four male volunteers by a factor of 10% to 50%.

"Our interest here was just to demonstrate that we would see an effect," said Ingemar Bjorkhem, a co-author of the study and now a professor of clinical chemistry at Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm. "We expected to see an effect."

The study was published in the journal Clinical Chemistry. As Dr. Bjorkhem recalls, he was one of the four study participants, though when asked if it was hard to find volunteers, he replied, "maybe not." It's also, as far as he remembers, his only opportunity to drink alcohol for a research study.

A handful of other studies conducted in Europe have confirmed this effect, but they've generally been limited to just a few participants, and they've found differing results. A 1996 study by researchers at the German Sport University in Cologne found an average increase in T/E ratio of 300% to 400% among six female volunteers and an average increase of 50% to 100% among five males. (The men's results were all over the place, ranging from a decrease of 40% to an increase of 300%).

"The influence was statistically significant," Mario Thevis, professor for preventive doping research at German Sport University, told me. (I wasn't able to read the study myself, as it's not available online.) Dr. Bjorkhem said that the late German drug-testing expert Manfred Donike also confirmed the result several times, but didn't publish all of these findings.

A 2001 review of the literature conducted by Simon Davis, then a postdoctoral student at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., found alcohol-induced increases in the T/E ratio ranging from 30% to 277%. Excerpts from Dr. Davis's report, which was prepared confidentially on behalf of a U.K. athlete accused of doping and wasn't peer-reviewed, surfaced online last week (see it at Dirt Rag Forums) and was cited by Bloomberg. "I'm surprised it got out, really," Dr. Davis told me. "It was an internal document about the doping case." (He declined to identify the athlete who'd been under suspicion.)

This is one case where several studies don't necessarily yield a reliable conclusion, however.

"The literature isn't completely clear," Richard Hellman, president-elect of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists, told me, adding that the studies tested "just a few people" and found "so much variance" in the change in T/E ratio.

"The information is suggestive, but it's not certain," Dr. Hellman said.

Cycling union doctor Mario Zorzoli told me by telephone that Mr. Landis's test was the only positive one on the tour, out of six to eight tests for each stage, and at least five other tests for Mr. Landis on the days he was the overall race leader. That suggests that only once during the race, out of at least six tests, was Mr. Landis's T/E ratio 4/1 or higher.

The alcohol studies have been referred to in the press and cited by Mr. Landis's doctor, Brent Kay, since the T/E test result became public last week. When CNN's Larry King asked him about it last week, Dr. Kay said that "there are, in fact, a number of studies that show that alcohol definitely can have an effect on this … we're not speculating that that was the cause, but certainly there's documentation in the scientific literature." In a press conference, Dr. Kay put the number of scientific studies at five, according to NPR. The possible linkage of alcohol to elevated T/E ratios was also reported by the print Journal, Time, the Boston Globe, the New York Times and the Associated Press.

A colleague of Dr. Kay's at O.U.C.H. Medical Center (O.U.C.H. stands for Occupational Urgent Care Health/Sports), a group of sports medicine specialists in Temecula, Calif., told me Monday that Dr. Kay was no longer answering press calls about the test result, and was now focusing on Mr. Landis's planned surgery to replace his degenerative right hip.

Doctors and drug-testing specialists say the possibility that alcohol may profoundly affect the T/E ratio is one of several drawbacks with the test that's caused Mr. Landis so much trouble. "Not only is the analytical validity of the test in question, but the premise that a ratio of 6/1 infers a doping offence is also unsafe," Dr. Davis wrote in 2001. (Since then, cycling officials have lowered the threshold for test failure to 4/1.)

Dr. Hellman said blood should be tested as well as urine, because urine contains only the waste products of the hormones, rather than the hormones themselves. (Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and an associate professor at New York University School of Medicine, told me he disagreed, because levels fluctuate more widely in blood.) Dr. Hellman also suggested more-frequent testing of athletes, including before events, to establish baselines, since T/E ratios vary so widely among different people.

"If someone's career is hanging in the balance, you don't want to say, 'There's an 85% chance that this test is right,' " Dr. Hellman told me.

Mr. Landis's situation is further clouded by a dearth of numbers from the tight-lipped International Cycling Union, which hasn't officially released Mr. Landis's test results -- so it's not known whether his testosterone level was elevated, or epitestosterone suppressed, or both.

A new wrinkle: The New York Times, citing an unnamed person at the cycling union, reported Monday night that a follow-up test confirmed Mr. Landis's urine contained some testosterone not produced naturally by his system. This result would have been determined by analyzing the atomic makeup of the testosterone molecule, via a technique called mass spectrometry. (Read more about this on Wikipedia.)

Such an analysis is based on the phenomenon that atoms of a given element, such as carbon, can have differing weights, depending on which subatomic particles make them up. The Isotope Ratio Mass Spectrometry reportedly used on Mr. Landis's urine would measure the ratio of Carbon-13 to Carbon-12 in his testosterone, and compare that to the ratio in his cholesterol. Natural testosterone in the body is derived from cholesterol, and so it should have the same ratio of C-13/C-12, but synthetic testosterone would have a different profile.

Dr. Thevis, from the Cologne sports lab, told me this method is reliable: "There have been a lot of studies showing that differentiation is absolutely reliable and reproducible." Dr. Zorzoli declined to confirm the Times report, but, speaking generally, said, "If the case is on the evidence of exogenous testosterone, alcohol intake doesn't create exogeneous testosterone in body."

But a more-cautious note was sounded by Dr. Davis, who is now the technical director for Mass Spec Solutions Ltd., a Wythenshawe, U.K., maker of mass-spectrometry devices. "Quite regularly there are errors in the isotope tests," he said. "It's a very difficult analytical technique."

In response to the report, Dr. Kay told the Times the test may have been inaccurate, adding that a wide range of factors, including alcohol consumption, may have been responsible for the test result.

The apparent sensitivity of the testosterone test's numbers to alcohol consumption, and the announcement of partial test results without full disclosure by the cycling union, has created a milieu for cyclists that is "almost Kafka-esque," Dr. Davis said. "The phrase often bandied about is 'chemical McCarthyism'."

[Serpico]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sports/2003168814_landis02.html


http://www.trymedia.com/images/corporate/press/associated_press_logo.gif


Landis' 2nd set to be released by lab Saturday


August 2, 2006

American cyclist Floyd Landis, the Tour de France winner whose initial doping tests turned up positive, gets another chance to clear his name when a second set is expected to be released Saturday.

But the 30-year-old Landis and his lawyers previously have indicated they expect the "B" sample to show the same elevated ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone found in the "A" sample last week.

Michael Henson, a spokesman for the cyclist, confirmed Tuesday that a urine test on Landis after the Tour's 17th stage turned up an 11:1 ratio — above the 4:1 limit allowed. A 1:1 ratio is considered average.

The "A" sample was provided July 20 by the Phonak rider after he zoomed his way back into contention by winning a tough Alpine leg of the Tour.

Landis has insisted his body's natural metabolism — not doping — caused the elevated test result, and said he would undergo further tests to prove his point.

But a report in The New York Times cast doubt on Landis' defense. The newspaper cited a source from the UCI, cycling's international federation, saying that a second analysis of the "A" sample, testing for carbon-isotope ratio, had detected synthetic testosterone in Landis' system.

The "B" sample, collected from Landis at the same time as the "A" sample, will be unsealed in the presence of Landis' lawyer and tested at the same Chatenay-Malabry lab near Paris.

If the test comes back negative, the cyclist would be cleared. But if the tests confirm the "A" sample results, Landis could become the first winner of cycling's premier race to lose the title in a doping case. Should that occur, Tour runner-up Oscar Pereiro of Spain would be declared the winner.

Landis has already been suspended by the Phonak team pending the final test results, and could be fired. He could also face a two-year ban from the sport.

Although UCI counsel Philippe Verbiest confirmed an isotope test had taken place, he declined to provide details.

UCI president Pat McQuaid said he had not seen the test results, but emphasized Landis was presumed innocent until found guilty and guaranteed the cyclist would be given the chance to defend himself in front of an arbitration panel before any penalties would be imposed.

"It could take weeks," McQuaid told The Associated Press by telephone.

McQuaid added that even if the "B" sample confirms the "A" results, no penalties would be decided "until the disciplinary process is completed." That process could also drag out if Landis decides to appeal a UCI ruling before the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

Asked about the Landis case, **** Pound, president of the World Anti-Doping Agency, said, "I sure would hate to be the brand manager for cycling right now."

[Serpico]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/01/AR2006080101715.html


http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/article/pieces/twpLogo_125x20.gif


A Decision On Landis Could Take A Few Weeks


August 2, 2006

Tour de France champion Floyd Landis is expected to learn the results of his second doping test on Saturday, and even if that sample is positive it could take weeks to decide if he will be stripped of his title.

Analysis of the backup sample is expected to take place tomorrow through Saturday at the Chatenay-Malabry lab outside Paris, the International Cycling Union (UCI) said yesterday.

If the "B" sample is negative, Landis would be cleared. If it is positive, which his lawyers expect, he could be stripped of his Tour victory and barred for two years. Landis could become the first Tour winner to lose the title in a doping case.

He will be given "due process" to defend himself before an arbitration panel -- which could delay any possible penalties -- if he continues to deny the allegations, UCI president Pat McQuaid said.

"It could take weeks," McQuaid told the Associated Press by telephone. If the test is confirmed, no penalties could be decided "until the disciplinary process is completed."

It could take even longer if the case goes to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

Landis tested positive for an unusually high ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone after the 17th stage of the Tour de France, where he staged a remarkable comeback in the Alps to make up for a poor performance the day before.

[Serpico]

http://dnj.midsouthnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060802/SPORTS/608020326/1006


http://media.publicbroadcasting.net/wmot/newsroom/images/links/4458.gif


Can't anyone here accept responsibility?


August 2, 2006


Would somebody please stand up and take some responsibility. The time has come for someone — anyone — who has tested positive for a banned substance to fess up.

With all of the wanton lying we are witnessing on just about every sportscast, it stands to reason that the first star athlete to admit to cheating could become somewhat of a hero.

As things stand, former slugger Mark McGwire — he of the Michelin Man physique — will need a miracle from above if he hopes to attract enough votes to be voted into baseball's Hall of Fame on the first go around next year.

Isn't it ironic that Jose Canseco, the man most folks vilified when he came out with his tell-all book, now looks like a prophet? The entire steroids mess might begin to clean up if other users would come forward and tell the world about their experiences with performance enhancing drugs.

In the meantime, the joy created by a seemingly heroic ride to the Tour de France championship by Floyd Landis was about as temporary as that generated by Rosie Ruiz's bogus Boston Marathon win years ago. To make matters worse, Landis insisted that he would show the world that his positive test was not a doping case but instead a natural occurrence. Yesterday came word that his urine sample contained some testosterone that was not naturally produced. In essence, synthetic. Oops.

It's actually feasible that Landis might become the guy who says the heck with all this pressure and lying and tells the truth. The moral teachings inherent in his strict Mennonite upbringing could win out eventually. Let's hope so.

Another champion who has generated headlines similar to Landis is former University of Tennessee track star Justin Gatlin. The co-world record holder in the 100 meters has tested positive for testosterone or other prohibited steroids and could face a lifetime ban from the sport.

Gatlin must have spent some time with the star of the BALCO steroids scandal Barry Bonds. Their wives tales are so similar.

Bonds has only admitted to applying a cream he says he didn't realize contained performance enhancers, and Gatlin says his positive test comes from a similar source.

Oh sure Justin, how could we not buy into a masseuse with a grudge to bear rubbing a banned substance into your legs? That makes perfect sense.

Can these guys not see how silly they look? Come to think of it, maybe they can. How sad is that?

One infuriating aspect of today's focus on athletes and performance enhancing drugs has been their callous assault on baseball's home run records.

Bonds, McGwire and Sammy Sosa have all cheated to put up their impressive numbers, and not one of them seems to care.

Bonds will remain defiant, and McGwire will continue to avoid the spotlight.

Sosa has indicated that he would like to play again. If a team decides to give him a shot, Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig should insist Sammy admit he used steroids as a condition for his return to the game.

I wonder what Bonds would do if everyone came clean? Here's hoping we find out.

[e-RICHIE]

http://dnj.midsouthnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060802/SPORTS/608020326/1006


http://media.publicbroadcasting.net/wmot/newsroom/images/links/4458.gif


Can't anyone here accept responsibility?

howzabout armfloyd atmo -

[Big Dan]

Yo....... :cool:

[Serpico]

http://www.centredaily.com/mld/blue/15179843.htm


http://www.konarka.com/img/logos_articles/state_college_centre_daily.jpg


Doping scandal may take down another ‘hero’


August 2, 2006

Floyd Landis had everyone at his mercy a week ago. Magazine writers were lining up outside his house, pleading for interviews, sound bites and feature stories. Landis was America’s latest Cinderella story; the next Lance Armstrong.
In case you’ve been living under a rock recently or you somehow have the uncanny ability to tune out anything that has to do with cycling — which probably means you’re skimming through this column right now — Landis, an American, overcame an eight-minute deficit to win the 2006 Tour de France, despite the dire need for hip-replacement surgery. Every movie production company in Hollywood must have been planning for someone to star as Landis in the next underdog-type, Cinderella story. Landis was on top of the world.

But that’s clearly not the case anymore. On Thursday, a blood test revealed Landis had a high ratio of testosterone in his body. Those same “nice” reporters became evil villains, viciously probing for lies and coverup trails. Cinderella walked in on her husband with another woman — Landis was America’s latest steroids scandal; the next Barry Bonds.

While a second test will reveal the truth behind this alleged indignity (this story was submitted Sunday afternoon), do the results even matter? Kobe Bryant was found not guilty of his crime, yet some people still point to him and call him a rapist. O.J. Simpson was declared not guilty of murder, yet there are those who portray him as a killer. If Landis’ second test is negative, some will believe that either a conspiracy or an illegitimate sample produced the results.

Although America’s legal system presumes that an individual is innocent until proven guilty, the Court of Public Opinion maintains the polar opposite. People are questioning why Landis seemingly changes his story every five minutes. Others look at his recent interviews and wonder if a guiltless man would carefully read every word off a piece of paper. When Landis appeared on a TV at my local gym, one of the trainers started yelling as if he were a public-service announcement: “Juicer on the bike! Cheater on the bike! Don’t ever take steroids; it’ll ruin your life!” I’m skeptical as well. If Landis naturally has high levels of testosterone in his body, why wasn’t that fact revealed in an earlier examination? And how does someone in need of hip surgery go from Urkel to Rocky in a single day?

I wrote a column about a year ago suggesting that both Major League Baseball and the government either sanction severe penalties for steroid users or discontinue testing in sports all together. I’d like to apply this to cycling and every professional sports league in which illegal substances give players an unfair advantage.

Ignorance is bliss, and the public was willing to embrace a hero who overcame very long odds on foreign soil. No one wanted to suspect Landis of anything illegal and dishonest. Now those same individuals are scorning an alleged juicer who can’t seem to figure out his story.

Not only does sleazy ex-convict Jose Canseco become a know-it-all truth-teller in a steroids witch hunt, but what if our other sports heroes are unmasked as juicers? What would happen if the French actually produced legitimate evidence against Armstrong for a change? What if Ryan Howard’s recent victory at the Home Run Derby was a byproduct of doping? I don’t want to know that Donovan McNabb took something for his sports hernia, which seemed to appear and disappear from week to week during the 2005 season. It sounds preposterous — there’s no way these guys would ever take steroids, right?

But we would have said the same thing about Landis a week ago.

[Serpico]

http://www.ldnews.com/editorials/ci_4126061


http://www.legacy.com/images/Cobrands/Logos/LDNEWS_paper.jpg


The rumor mill


August 2, 2006

To spin Shakespeare, “Did he or didn’t he, that is the question.” The answer as to whether Lancaster County native and (for now) 2007 Tour de France winner Floyd Landis did or didn’t use some kind of performance-enhancing substance or method to take him to victory won’t come for a little while yet — until his backup urine sample goes through testing.
Landis’ first sample, given after an eye-opening stage victory on the next-to-last day of the famed cycling race, showed unusually high levels of testosterone, and that was all that was needed to light the firestorm of controversy, again, in a sport that is riddled with, if not performance enhancement itself then at least rumor and innuendo regarding performance enhancement.

We’re not going to jump on the bandwagon and offer an opinion as to whether Landis did or didn’t do one thing or another. If you seek such speculation, it’s easy to find.

What is unfortunate is that, whatever the result of Landis’ backup test and whatever the outcome of his tour title — whether he retains it or whether it’s stripped and awarded to the second-place finisher instead — the controversy and questions will never go away.

The world of sports, once the realm of on-field statistics, and then, later, the realm of big-business cash contracts and endorsement deals, has now become a world of bending (or breaking) the rules in order to do just a little better than one could have with one’s God-given talent and natural workout routines.

We’ve seen what’s become of baseball today. Baseball hit rocky shores after the strike in 1993 wiped out the World Series — and drove away many fans. The game enjoyed a resuscitation in the late 1990s, in part because of Cal Ripken going for and eventually breaking Lou Gehrig’s iron-man streak (and never were there questions about how he did it, to our knowledge) and the titanic displays of home-run hitting by Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds and others.

As it turns out, there is a trend in belief, backed up by plenty of circumstantial evidence but very little concrete knowledge, that performance-enhancement had a great deal to do with the spectacle baseball became in the last decade. Further, the rumor-mill maintains, it’s an open secret that baseball’s executives and owners knew what was fueling the power barrage, but it was winked at because the fans were returning, the money was flowing and the happy days were there again.

That’s all gone by the wayside, with the result that all the accomplishments by players from the “steroids era” are now suspect, even if they haven’t specifically been named as users. The entire sport has been tarnished, and efforts to clean it up are ongoing.

Cycling went through its own series of doping scandals, culminating with the dismissal from the Tour de France of several top-level riders.

Now, there comes Landis.

Landis is battling a degenerative hip condition, and he said he also took medication for a thyroid condition. He maintains his innocence, as far as performance-enhancement goes, but the media, as always, aren’t going to take that at face value. Unfortunately, neither will the media wait for test results to provide an answer. There’s too much time involved — the story will wither on the vine unless the latest rumors and possibilities are churned up as quickly as possible.

We’re willing to give the benefit of the doubt to Landis, since he is, very nearly, a home-town boy. We hope that his B sample comes back clean and that he is allowed to keep his title, which he earned on the highways and in the mountains of western Europe. But we know that the results of that second test won’t be the end of the story. That won’t happen anytime soon — perhaps not before the next Tour de France is ready to begin.

[Serpico]

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2006/08/02/landistest_hea.html?category=health&guid=20060802120000


http://www.turunkaapelitv.fi/kuvat/logot/discovery.gif


Test Used on Tour de France Winner Is Accurate


August 2, 2006

The test to detect synthetic testosterone — used on Tour de France winner Floyd Landis' urine sample — is highly accurate, experts say.

Philippe Verbiest, the lawyer for cycling's world governing body, confirmed Tuesday that a carbon isotope ratio test, which detects a subtle chemical difference between the natural and synthetic versions of testosterone, was done.

The New York Times has reported the test detected the synthetic hormone, but Verbiest refused to give any details of the result.

The test focuses on carbon atoms in testosterone molecules. These atoms come in different types, called isotopes. The ratio of one particular isotope to another isotope is different in synthetic versus natural testosterone. The test detects that difference.

When the lab procedure is performed correctly it is very accurate, said Dr. Don Catlin, the director of the UCLA Olympic doping lab. He helped develop the test.

Dr. Gary Wadler, an internist and author with expertise in the area of drug use by athletes, said he's not aware of anything other than synthetic testosterone that will produce a positive test result.

When athletes take synthetic testosterone to boost performance, it typically helps them get stronger, recover faster from workouts, prevent tissue breakdown and increase their assertiveness, said Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency who stressed he was not speaking for that group.

Testosterone can be injected, he said, though athletes are moving toward taking it by skin patch or cream, which allows lower doses that might escape detection. Typically, athletes take the hormone daily for weeks or months during training, Wadler said, because it takes a while for the benefits to appear.

Taking doses of synthetic testosterone would not raise the body's production of the natural hormone, and if anything it might suppress that production, Wadler said. It also might suppress production of epitestosterone.

Landis tested positive for an unusually high ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone after a tough Tour Alpine stage on July 20 — when he staged a remarkable comeback just a day after a poor performance.

Michael Henson, a spokesman for Landis, confirmed Tuesday that the cyclist's July 20 test turned up an 11:1 ratio — far above the 4:1 limit. The results of the backup sample will be announced Saturday.

People typically have a ratio of 1:1 or 2:1. Once an athlete's level surpasses 4:1, the test to look for synthetic testosterone is administered.

Few people reach that level naturally, Catlin said.

"The human body gets (its) testosterone ratio at birth, and it stays with you for life. It could vary a little bit, but it will never waver more than 30 percent from your mark," he explained.

"You can map out your levels through life, and if it spikes significantly, that's a spike pattern and it's not natural — something must have been taken to get into the testosterone metabolic chain."

The lack of a positive test before July 20 might suggest Landis took a single dose and then immediately put in his stunning performance.

That's puzzling, Wadler said.

"Things don't add up," he said. "Most of us (experts) have a hard time fully understanding that sudden and dramatic effect. ... I can't quite put it all together."

A person also can increase his body's production of testosterone by taking another substance, called luteinizing hormone, Wadler said. But that substance also is banned.

There are legitimate reasons for an athlete to take synthetic testosterone. If an athlete's body doesn't make enough of the hormone naturally, such as after the testicles are removed surgically, he could seek an exemption from anti-doping rules, Wadler said. Landis does not fall into that category.

As for suggestions that Landis' consumption of beer and whiskey could have raised his testosterone to epitestosterone ratio, that still would not explain that dramatic a spike, Catlin said.

"There are a few cases of people getting stoned drunk and they can get a bit of a spike in their ratio — up one or two — but that increase is rare," Catlin said.

[Serpico]

http://www.procycling.com/news.aspx?ID=2352


http://www.martyjemison.com/images/links/pc_logo_link.gif


UCI ask for test on Landis’s B sample


August 1, 2006

It seems both the UCI and Floyd Landis have asked for the American's B sample from the Tour to be tested, while the New York Times claims the testosterone that showed up in the American's A sample was not naturally produced.

In the apparent absence of a request from Floyd Landis for his B sample taken after stage 17 of the Tour de France to be tested, the International Cycling Union asked on Monday evening for the test to be carried out. “We have done this so the whole thing can be speeded up,” a UCI spokesperson said. “We took this decision because of the importance of the case. Also the longer it goes on the more damage the sport risks suffering.”

However, it seems that what initially looked like a significant oversight on Landis’s part is nothing more than a misunderstanding or the erratic functioning of a fax machine. According to the American’s spokesman, Michael Henson, “Floyd did request the B sample test. He faxed a request to his lawyers in Spain at 12:45 eastern time (on Monday), which is well within the five-day limit required of the athlete.”

Landis could have waited until Wednesday to make a request for a counter-analysis to be carried out, but this would have meant a significant delay in the results being delivered as the French lab shuts for a number of weeks at the end of this week.

Whoever made the request, Landis’s B sample is now expected to be analysed at the Chatenay Malabry lab near Paris at some point between Thursday and Saturday morning. Landis has said that he expects the second sample to return a similar result positive result for testosterone, but insists he is innocent. “I’d like to make it absolutely clear that I’m not in any doping process,” he said at a press conference in Madrid last Friday.

He added that he would show the levels “are absolutely natural and produced by my own organism”, but this statement is contradicted by a report on the New York Times’ website quoting an unidentified UCI official as saying the testosterone that showed up in Landis’s A sample is from an external (exogenous) source. According to the source, the carbon isotope test on Landis’s showed the presence of synthetic testosterone.

The paper added that the official had told them Landis’s testosterone level was more than twice the permitted four-to-one ratio. Contacted by the paper, Landis’s personal doctor, Brent Kay, acknowledged the American’s test showed a ratio of 11-to-one, but added this could be due to natural causes, bacterial contamination, alcohol consumption before the test or contamination of the specimen during testing.

Sticking with the doping theme, the Spanish Guardia Civil’s Operacion Puerto blood doping investigation is reported to have taken another turn. According to Spanish daily El Pais, they are now collaborating with their German colleagues having identified a German doctor suspected of supplying undetectable EPO to clients in Spain, allegedly including the doctor at the centre of the investigation, Eufemiano Fuentes.

[Serpico]

http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/20060802-0532-us-dopingtests.html


http://www.discountednewspapers.com/images/Logos/san-diego-union-tribune-logo-175.gif


More than 2,200 doping tests result in 10 violations in second quarter


August 2, 2006

The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency performed 2,262 doping control tests in the second quarter of 2006, resulting in 10 violations.
Sprinter Justin Gatlin was included in the tests, according to statistics released Tuesday. But his positive test for testosterone or other steroids wasn't part of the 10 infractions because USADA hasn't resolved his case yet.

Gatlin said Saturday that the USADA had informed him of the positive test. Tour de France winner Floyd Landis' positive testosterone test was not performed by USADA.
Of the 10 suspensions, two were for testosterone or related substances – one by a judo athlete and another by an in-line roller skater. Also during the quarter, sprinter John Capel tested positive for marijuana and received a two-year suspension.

The USADA tests took place during and outside of competition. USADA considers out-of-competition testing the most effective method of deterrence. Those made up 54 percent of the second-quarter domestic tests.

Track and field athletes (708) and swimmers (227) were the most-tested groups.

[e-RICHIE]

the virtual drive-thru (http://www.cafepress.com/car_roof_racks/1652029) atmo.

[Big Dan]

FloydStrong??

and the lawyers go wild...................... :eek:

[Ray]

...a bit long to post, but here's the link:

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w060731&s=hacker080206

-Ray

[Serpico]

good find Ray, TNR is the only magazine I have a subscription to

:beer:

[dbrk]

This article appearing on MSNBC makes mention that Floyd's lawyer in this matter is none other than the attorney that has represented Tyler Hamilton, which does nothing, as far as I am concerned, to commend the case that will be made for Landis. Anyone who can make the chimeric twin argument with a straight face is...well...a better man than I. Look here for some recent attorney speak: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14157559/from/RS.2/

darn shame, the whole mess,

dbrk

[BBB]

And his lawyer in Spain was the guy who represented Heras.

[Johny]

"It's outrageous, egregious...preposterous". :)

[Avispa]

This one, from Samuel Abt on the Herald Tribune:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/07/30/sports/BIKE.php

And this one, from The New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/02/sports/othersports/02landis.html?_r=2&ref=sports&orefslogin&oref=slogin

[Serpico]

"It's outrageous, egregious...preposterous". :)

"If the hematocrit is legit--then you must acquit!"
.
.

[Serpico]

http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/cp/sports/20060803/s080314a.jpg?size=lU.S. cyclist Floyd Landis' lawyers Jose Maria Buxeda, right, and Luis Sanz answer reporters as
they leave the National Anti-Doping Laboratory in Chatenay-Malabry, south of Paris, Thursday.


http://www.canada.com/topics/sports/story.html?id=401a6e42-c7a7-4622-8a45-a3b4d3fa87ed&k=5121


http://www.trymedia.com/images/corporate/press/associated_press_logo.gif


Backup doping test begins in Floyd Landis cycling case


August 3, 2006

Testing began Thursday on Tour de France winner Floyd Landis' backup doping sample, while his lawyer reiterated he expects the result to confirm the original positive finding for elevated testosterone levels.

However, Landis is "certain" he hasn't ingested banned substances and is "pretty sure" he can prove his innocence, lawyer Jose Maria Buxeda said outside the French laboratory.

The result of the "B" sample test will not be available before Saturday, Buxeda said.

However, the entire process of determining whether the American cyclist is guilty of doping or whether his body naturally produced the higher than normal testosterone levels - as he contends - could take six months to a year, the Spanish lawyer said.

Buxeda and another lawyer, Luis Sanz, were present for the start of the testing. Landis was at his California home.

"The reason why Mr. Sanz and myself said that probably the result is going to be the same is because statistically the results of the B sample usually - not always - but usually confirm the results of the A sample," Buxeda said.

Michael Henson, a spokesman for the cyclist, confirmed Tuesday that a urine test on Landis after the tour's 17th stage turned up an 11:1 ratio - far above the 4:1 limit allowed. A 1:1 ratio is average.

Landis made a stunning comeback in the 17th stage after falling way behind a day earlier.

Landis is "certain he hasn't ingested any prohibited substance and . . . he knows there is a natural explanation to the (initial) finding," Buxeda said.

"He's pretty sure we will be able to prove, if this result is confirmed, that it is due to natural causes, to a natural reaction of his body, either (normally) or in the circumstances he was in that particular stage."

Buxeda suggested that dehydration was one potential explanation.

"For instance, in cases of dehydration, maximum effort, etc., sometimes the body does not behave as it usually does and that could maybe explain abnormal results, as it could be if the result is confirmed in our case," he said.

Landis has said he would undergo further tests to prove that his body's natural metabolism - not doping - caused the elevated result.

Landis showed a testosterone imbalance in an initial urine sample taken during the Tour de France. Both A and B samples were provided July 20 after he sped his way back into contention by winning a tough alpine leg of the multistage race.

If the tests confirm the A sample results, Landis could become the first winner of cycling's premiere race to lose the yellow jersey in a doping case. Should that occur, Tour runner-up Oscar Pereiro of Spain would be declared the winner.

Landis has already been suspended by his Phonak racing team pending the final results, and could be fired. He could also face a two-year ban from racing.

"The process could be six, eight months, until one year," Buxeda said because the rider has a right to defend himself. "Of course, if it doesn't confirm the A sample, the case is closed."

Under UCI rules, a negative B sample is accepted as the definitive response and the positive A sample is ignored.

[e-RICHIE]

snipped from the wsj online -
"In response to the report, Dr. Kay told the Times the test may have been inaccurate, adding that a wide range of factors, including alcohol consumption, may have been responsible for the test result.

The apparent sensitivity of the testosterone test's numbers to alcohol consumption, and the announcement of partial test results without full disclosure by the cycling union, has created a milieu for cyclists that is "almost Kafka-esque," Dr. Davis said. "The phrase often bandied about is 'chemical McCarthyism'."

[ada@prorider.or]

Floyd wants to be ready to defend himself, in case the B sample comes back positive

???????????????


pack his bags
or

spend a fortune to legal advisors that does not help?????????

out of the scene for 4 years
2 years uci
2 year proteam (ethic code)



i still waiting for tyler ,as he said i spend evry penny i have to prove i am not guilty

to prove he is not!!!!!!!!!!

[Big Dan]

:help:

[Serpico]

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/cycling/2006-08-02-landis-lawyer_x.htm?csp=34


http://images.usatoday.com/_common/_images/usat_logo.gif


Landis' lawyer attacks process


August 2, 2006

Howard Jacobs, a lawyer hired by Tour de France winner Floyd Landis, said Wednesday that he is troubled by how the International Cycling Union (UCI) has handled his client's case.
Jacobs also said the documentation sent to him by the French lab that performed the tests on Landis' samples contains a claim that the carbon isotope test is positive, proof Landis ingested synthetic testosterone.

"But there's zero documentation supporting that — nothing," said Jacobs, who also has represented cyclist Tyler Hamilton and sprinter Tim Montgomery in doping-related cases. "Ultimately, they're going to have to back that up."

Landis claimed innocence last Thursday when it was announced he failed the first half of his doping test, or A sample, for high levels of testosterone. The B sample is going to be tested during the next several days. If it's positive, he will face a two-year suspension and could lose his Tour title.

Jacobs criticized the UCI for leaking the results of the Tour de France winner's A sample. That action breached the organization's rules, which he says "prohibit any public statement by the UCI until completion of an athlete's B testing at the absolute earliest."

Results of the B sample are set to be released Saturday, and Jacobs said until they are made known, "There is not even a formal doping charge that has been filed against Mr. Landis.

"While there has been much speculation and reporting as to the cause of the A positive, the fact remains that the B sample has not been tested."

Drug violations: The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency performed 2,262 doping control tests in the second quarter of 2006, resulting in 10 violations.

Sprinter Justin Gatlin was included in the tests, according to statistics released Tuesday. But his positive test for testosterone or other steroids wasn't part of the 10 infractions because USADA hasn't resolved his case.

Gatlin said Saturday that the USADA had informed him of the positive test. Landis' positive testosterone test was not performed by the agency.

Of the 10 suspensions, two were for testosterone or related substances — one by a judo athlete and another by an in-line roller skater. Also during the quarter, sprinter John Capel tested positive for marijuana and received a two-year suspension.

The USADA tests took place during and outside of competition. USADA considers out-of-competition testing the most effective method of deterrence. Those made up 54% of the second-quarter domestic tests.

Track and field athletes (708) and swimmers (227) were the most tested groups.

[Serpico]

http://www.eurosport.com/cycling/sport_sto937148.shtml


http://nicolasdessum.free.fr/pages/images/logos/liens/l_eurosport.gif


Rogge: Is the Tour too much?


August 3, 2006

In the wake of a wave of crippling doping allegations IOC President Jacques Rogge has suggested that the big Tours examine their workload.

"We have to dare to ask the tours of France and Italy whether the load is ideal," the president of the International Olympic Committee told Belgian newspaper Sportwereld.

"In this context, a panel of specialists together with the riders can examine what the ideal load is."

"I'm not the only one who's said that: [World Champion] Tom Boonen has also said it."

Rogge had lent his support to cycling after news broke that Tour de France winner Floyd Landis tested positive for excessive testosterone levels after his amazing comeback victory during stage 17, saying the sport was still "credible."

The Landis news came after several of the Tour's top riders, including favourites Ivan Basso and Jan Ullrich, had been booted for doping allegations arising out of a federal investigation in Spain.

But after it was revealed that 100m Olympic Champion Justin Gatlin had failed a dope test, Rogge called for harsher measures.

Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme made it very clear that no modifications to the race's length would be considered speaking at the start of the Tour of Germany on Tuesday.

"We will neither shorten the stages nor the total distance," he said. "Nobody had the idea to shorten the 100 metres to 90 after the positive test of Justin Gatlin, did they?"

Rogge still pressed for additional measures, including better surprise testing.

"And by that I mean real unannounced controls, out of the blue. So you don't say: in an hour or early tomorrow morning we'll be here or there," Rogge said.

"Secondly, we have to catch a lot more of the entourage: sports directors, trainers, doctors, physiotherapists."

Rogge called the Landis and Gatlin affairs "disappointing," but urged the sporting community to "fight harder."

"You have to be a little bit realistic: 800 million people do competitive sport. They are not all angels: whining and deceit are part of human nature, and sport is not holier than society," he said.

"But it is our sacred duty to fight."

[Serpico]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/03/sports/othersports/03landis.html?_r=1&oref=slogin


http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/misc/nytlogo153x23.gif


Landis Hires Lawyer Versed in Sports-Doping Cases


August 3, 2006

On his first day back home in California, the Tour de France winner Floyd Landis, awaiting test results that will determine his future, yesterday hired Howard Jacobs, a lawyer who has represented a host of athletes in cases involving performance-enhancing drugs.

On Saturday, the result of drug tests on the second of Landis’s two urine samples will come back from the French lab that tested his first sample last week. That initial A sample came back positive for an abnormal ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone. It also tested positive for traces of synthetic testosterone, which means that the testosterone had come from an external source and was not natural.

The B sample result will be crucial in determining whether Landis will be formally charged with using performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France.

“He wants to be ready to defend himself, in case the B sample comes back positive,” Jacobs said in a telephone interview. “I’m not one to accept what the lab says as proof. I haven’t seen the document. You need to see documentation to see how they got their numbers.”

Landis’s first urine sample, taken after his amazing performance in the Alps on Stage 17 of the Tour, showed an 11-1 ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone. The rules limit that ratio to 4-1. Those results were confirmed by a person at the International Cycling Union, as well as by Landis’s personal doctor, Brent Kay. Jacobs also acknowledged those results.

While in New York early this week, Jonathan Vaughters, one of Landis’s former teammates on the United States Postal Service team said Landis was still in shock over the positive test. During a news conferences last week, Landis said that the testosterone in his system was “natural and produced by my own organism.”

Vaughters said, “He’s just trying to let everything sink in right now.” Vaughters had been talking to and sending text messages to Landis throughout and after the Tour. “He’s pretty exhausted right now, too. He just finished a three-week race, and hasn’t slept since all this stuff came out. It’s been pretty tough for him.”

[Serpico]

http://www.velonews.com/news/fea/10633.0.html


http://slam.canoe.ca/Hamilton2003Images/velonews.jpg


Retired pro: ‘No one can win without doping'
'Cycling is a dirty world and it will stay that way forever'


August 3, 2006

An unnamed retired Italian sprinter insists that cycling has lost the war on doping and that no one can win major three-week races like the Giro d'Italia without resorting to banned performance-enhancing practices.

La Gazzetta dello Sport ran the candid interview with the ex-pro, now retired for five seasons who won "six major races" during his career at the elite level. He now works as a carpenter, but didn't want his name to be published in the story.

"Do I know a racer that wins clean? None. No one can win the Giro without doping. I don't believe it's possible," he said in La Gazzetta dello Sport. "Cycling is a dirty world and it will stay that way forever."

The interview came in Italy's largest sports daily as cycling tries to come with the grips of a string of doping scandals that threaten to derail the legitimacy of the sport.

Tour de France winner Floyd Landis' pending counter-analysis for unusual levels of testosterone and the ongoing "Operación Puerto" doping investigation in Spain have shed new light on the fight against doping in cycling.

According to cycling's newest "Deep Throat," doping is entrenched at the highest levels of the sport.

"When you arrive at a team, they tell you, ‘The thing is like this, this is the reality. If you want to race, you'll need help," he said. "I didn't need a trainer. The team got me everything I needed."

The interview was similar to a series of stories with Jesús Manzano, an ex-pro who gave lengthy interviews with the Spanish daily AS two years ago. Manzano put his name and face with the reports, but received payment for the interviews.

The Gazzetta interview with the ex-sprinter outlined his doping program, using EPO, human growth hormones and testosterone capsules.

"I took EPO every three days for a month and (human growth hormones) every two days to increase my muscular mass. I also took capsules of testosterone, that way I could train longer and better," he described. "For EPO, I used injections for insulin with the minimum doses and I introduced it myself subcutaneous. I did the shots myself. If I had to do the bad things, I preferred to do them to myself. I also took vitamins, sugar and Creatine intravenously."

The ex-pro refused to blame the teams and the cycling culture in general and said the blame lies with the racers themselves.

"Riders dope themselves to have less fatigue, but also to win. You can ride 70,000km a year and win nothing. If you ride with just ‘bread and water,' you can maintain your form just one or two months at maximum," he said.

[Big Dan]

posted already.. :cool:

[ada@prorider.or]

You need to see documentation to see how they got their numbers.”



where is that stated in the uci rule´s that they have supply this documentation ???

i cannot find this anywhere in its rule´s?!

[Serpico]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2006/aug06/aug03news2


http://www.cyclingnews.com/graphics/2002/cn120x18.gif


Landis hires Jacobs for doping defence


August 3, 2006

Floyd Landis has hired Southern California based attorney Howard L. Jacobs, who has extensive experience defending athletes accused of doping such as Tyler Hamilton and sprinter Tim Montgomery. Jacobs told the New York Times Wednesday that "Floyd wants to be ready to defend himself, in case the B sample comes back positive."

Jacobs, a former professional triathlete came out swinging against the UCI for leaking the results of the Tour de France winner's positive 'A' sample drug test, saying it breached the UCI's own protocols for notification. "I am troubled by the actions of the UCI and how they have spoken out about this case, which is in direct contravention of the UCI's own rules and the World Anti-Doping Code. While there has been much speculation and reporting as to the cause of the 'A' positive, the fact remains that the 'B' sample has not been tested," Jacobs said in a statement.

On July 26, the UCI sent a communiqué revealing that one unidentified cyclist had tested positive at the Tour de France, but it refused to release the name until the backup sample had been tested. Landis suddenly disappeared from a post-Tour criterium in Holland and on July 27, it was Landis' Phonak team that announced Landis had tested positive after stage 17. "The (Phonak) team management and the rider were both totally surprised of this physiological result," said the team in a statement a week ago. "(Landis) will ask in the upcoming days for the counter analysis to prove either that this result is coming from a natural process or that this is resulting from a mistake in the confirmation. In application of the Pro Tour Ethical Code, the rider will not race anymore until this problem is totally clear. If the result of the B sample analysis confirms the result of the A sample, the rider will be dismissed and will then pass the corresponding endocrinological examinations."

Jacobs added the UCI should have known the rider's name would have come out, once the announcement of a positive test was made "due to the confidentiality breaches that have been previously noted by many at the French laboratory" where the testing took place. UCI president McQuaid confirmed Jacobs's point in an interview with VeloNews on July 27, saying "(The UCI) know that the French laboratory [where the testing was done] has a close connection with L'Équipe, and we did not want this news to come through the press, because we are sure (the French lab) would have leaked it."

Jacobs also cited a New York Times story that said a carbon isotope ratio (CIR) test had detected synthetic testosterone in Landis' system and said the report came from inside the UCI. "This (leak) raises even more concerns, particularly following the provisional suspension earlier this year of a high-ranking UCI official for leaking documents and/or information to the French newspaper, L'Equipe", Jacobs declared, referring to UCI anti-doping head Dr. Mario Zorzoli, who gave a rare on-the-record interview to the NY Times on July 29.

Regarding the supposed positive result of Landis for exogenous testosterone via a CIR test, Brent Kay, Landis' doctor did confirm the finding to the NY Times, but Jacobs was adamant when he told the AP "Let's be clear, the UCI are the ones who said the CIR test was positive." And Jacobs stated that he had seen no proof of the positive CIR test. "While there is an allegation that the CIR is positive, the UCI do not provide any documentation that backs that up. To say I agree with that conclusion, I can't do that, because I haven't seen the documents." Once the results of Landis' 'B' sample come back, if they are positive, these will sent to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in Colorado Springs, CO, which would then begin a disciplinary procedure against Landis, one that Jacobs is sure to be involved in to defend the American Tour de France winner.

[Serpico]

http://www.velonews.com/news/fea/10632.0.html


http://slam.canoe.ca/Hamilton2003Images/velonews.jpg


The Landis Case: Savior 'B' samples a rarity


August 3, 2006

A small vial tucked away inside the Châtenay-Malabry laboratory near Paris contains what is probably one of the most-watched batches of urine in recent sports history.

Officials are expecting a Saturday conclusion to a counter-analysis of Floyd Landis' "B" samples, taken after his heroic victory in stage 17 into Morzine during the 2006 Tour de France. Lab technicians began work on the counter-analysis on Thursday.

Landis' own attorneys expect the tests to confirm the unusual T/E ratio, which was confirmed by Landis' representatives to reflect an 11-to-1 ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone, well above the 4:1 T/E threshold that triggers potential doping indicators.

"The reason why Mr. Sanz and I said that probably the result is going to be the same is because statistically the results of the `B' sample usually - not always - but usually confirm the results of the `A' sample," attorney Jose Maria Buxeda told The Associated Press on Thursday outside the lab.

Not a lot is at stake; just the outcome of cycling's biggest race and the overall credibility of the sport. If the counter-analysis comes back positive, Landis will face a two-year racing ban and the loss of his Tour crown.

If it comes back negative, however, the 30-year-old Californian will have dodged a major bullet and retain his distinction as the third American to have won cycling's biggest prize.

Insurance
Why an "A" and "B" test anyway and how often does the second test negate the first?

The two-step testing process is supposed to remove any chance of human error from skewing test results, but rarely does a second "B" test return a negative result.

A few exceptions
In 2001, Bo Hamburger earned the dubious distinction of becoming the first cyclist to fail the EPO urine test after it was introduced into cycling. His "B" test also confirmed the result, but a second counter-analysis - a highly unusual breach of protocol - revealed lower levels of the banned blood booster and the Dane was eventually exonerated.

Two more riders failed the EPO test in 2001, including Spanish track gold medalist Juan Llaneras and Italian Massimo Strazzer, but both were cleared of doping charges after "B" samples came back negative.

Since then, the noose has gotten tighter around doping cheats.

No major "B" samples returned a negative result until 2005, when a new, "two-dimensional" baseline was introduced in EPO detection methods.

That year, Fabrizio Guidi - an Italian rider on Phonak - failed a urine test for the banned blood booster ahead of the HEW Cyclassics, but his "B" sample came back negative and he was cleared to race.

Triathletes also suffered a spate of EPO test controversies in 2004-05. Belgian triathlete Rutger Beke failed both "A" and "B" tests, but later had his 18-month competition ban lifted by Flemish officials after he argued successfully there was a bacterial infection of his samples.

Last year, Virginia Berasategui and Ibán Rodríguez both failed EPO tests at a Lanzarote Ironman only to have charges dropped against them because of inconsistent readings of urine samples.

Despite a rally of calls criticizing the validity of the EPO test, WADA officials continue to voice confidence in the current testing methods.

Mishandled or miscommunicated?
One of the most famous "B" sample saviors involved 2004 Olympic time trial champion Tyler Hamilton, whose "A" sample tested positive for homologous blood doping - the illegal injection of another person's blood.

Lab officials at the anti-doping lab in Athens had operated under the assumption that the new test would require a minimum percentage of foreign red blood cells to trigger a positive. Since Hamilton's "A" sample showed signs of exogenous blood, but not at the level the assumed minimum level, laboratory staff froze the "b" sample - along with a urine sample - for storage.

WADA and Olympic officials, however, had earlier eliminated the minimum, saying that a binary test - foreign blood is either there or it's not - needed no minimum. Once frozen, however, the blood cells were rendered unsuitable for counter-analysis. Hamilton kept his Olympic gold medal, but he was caught up in the same net three weeks later after winning a time trial stage at the Vuelta a España.

Despite vigorous arguments denying the allegations, Hamilton was slapped with a two-year racing ban that ends next month.

Other athletes have dodged sanctions after botched processing and handling. Two-time Olympic middle distance runner Bernard Lagat was cleared of EPO charges in 2003 after the "B" sample wasn't properly refrigerated.

In 2001, Russian runner Olga Yegorova failed an EPO test, but required parallel blood tests were not commissioned and charges were dropped.

Long after the fact
While most testing occurs immediately after a sample is supplied, a heated dispute arose in the summer of 2005 over the review of stored samples from an event that had occurred six years earlier.

In August of 2005, the French sports daily L'Equipe obtained lab test results suggesting that about a dozen urine samples from the 1999 Tour de France were shown to be positive for signs of EPO.

The samples had been stored at the French anti-doping laboratory at Châtenay-Malabry since the 1999 Tour, an event held two years prior to cycling's full adoption of the urine test for EPO - a procedure developed at that same lab.

L'Equipe reporters managed to obtain release forms tying the anonymously numbered samples to individual riders. Using those forms, L'Equipe asserted that six of the "positive" samples came from that year's winner, Lance Armstrong of the U.S. Postal team.

The ensuing uproar, triggered a pair of follow-up investigations. The UCI appointed Dutch lawyer Emile Vrijman last October to review the case. Vrijman issued his report in May, faulting the lab, the newspaper, WADA and the UCI for violating riders' privacy rights, releasing the results and violating established procedures.

WADA, however, continues to investigate, noting that Vrijman never addressed the core issue, whether or not the samples were in fact positive for EPO. No matter what the result, current protocol would not allow a sanction, since all of the 1999 samples tested were themselves "B" samples and will, therefore, not be subject to counter-analysis.

A long process
Assuming that Landis's case is not resolved by a "savior ‘B' sample," it could be several months before the case is ultimately resolved, although there is considerable pressure from both sides to move the matter through the system as quickly as possible.

According to sources at the UCI, the entire process could take several months, with the final CAS appeal not likely to be concluded "until sometime this autumn."

So far, the test results are moving much faster than in a similar case involving Roberto Heras, whose positive doping test for EPO was not revealed until two months after the conclusion of the 2005 Vuelta a España.

Heras was eventually stripped of his Vuelta crown and banned for two years by the Spanish cycling federation in February 2006. Like Heras, Landis would also face an additional two-year exclusion from riding on a ProTour team, meaning that the American would be nearing the end of his career before he could ride in another major Tour.

[e-RICHIE]

serp pal -
have you ever seen this film (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085794/) atmo?

[Climb01742]

more info, FWIW, from an e-mail from a harvard med school phd:

"Notice they don't report on the ratio of synthetic T to epitestosterone in the urine... just the total T. Assuming this lab used some methods of validation (quality control), standard "known" concentration samples should have been used to determine any possible background of the assay- where does that standard "known" concentration come from? I am glad you asked- it is a synthetic stock of the steroid the scientists are interested in measuring... hmmmm... in this case a synthetic form of T.

"Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry allows identification and characterisation of steroids and their metabolites in the urine but may not distinguish between pharmaceutical and natural testosterone." Saudan et al, July 1 2006 - A PAPER JUST RELEASED!!! and published, something WADA knows nothing about.

The only published test for determining natural vs. synthetic with respect to this case involves the epitestosterone- Aguilera et al., 2002
concentrations which are fine in the Landis sample-

I am unfortunately all too familiar with WADA's regulations on doping due to a previous project of mine --- all of their 'limits' with respect to hormonal profiles or circulating substance concentrations are based on completely arbitrary 'cut-off' values based on the 'normal' person --- not even athletes (for instance the allowable 4:1 ratio here). They have no rhyme or reason for their cut-off values- so If someone is a significant deviation from the norm then they are screwed.

Long story short - Landis should not be found guilty, and a new foundation needs to be set up to start testing the WADA lab staff for drugs (Hallucinogens to be specific)."

could the whole deal be more screwed up?

[ada@prorider.or]

Long story short - Landis should not be found guilty, and a new foundation needs to be set up to start testing the WADA lab staff for drugs (Hallucinogens to be specific)."



well according to me he race a european race under uci rule´s
there fore the test is under uci and not wada

wada can take the results ,but the test stays uci rule´s
and not other way around

[Serpico]

serp pal -
have you ever seen this film (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085794/) atmo?

yup, been awhile though

lotta polyester

[dbrk]

Yet another article on MSNBC. In this one Landis's lawyer now suggests dehydration as the cause of unusal t-et levels. Floyd's lawyers are only making this look worse, imhoatmoyo.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14059185/

a sorry state of affairs,

dbrk

[fiamme red]

serp pal -
have you ever seen this film (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085794/) atmo?You mean he's stalking Landis as De Niro stalked Jerry Lewis? :confused:

[e-RICHIE]

You mean he's stalking Landis as De Niro stalked Jerry Lewis? :confused:
no - i thought he was trying to patch things up atmo.

[goonster]

The note from the Harvard PhD is interesting (even if it sounds a bit garbled), and I concur with the comments regarding GC mass spec analysis, but it does not address the radioisotope test. The radioisotope test sounds pretty straightforward, and I have yet to hear how someone would talk themselves out of that one. (Keeping in mind that that result is not official yet, and that no analytical methods can difinitively answer the "did he dope?" question)

Floyd: After Stage 17 you told you had "just one" beer, but now you're saying you had three oat sodas and a bunch of shots. So, what was it? :butt:

[Steve Hampsten]

Somehow I see Bjarne Riis in the Sandra Bernhard role as Masha.

Just one person's opinion...

[Serpico]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/08/03/sportsline/main1862960.shtml


http://www.xdsnet.net/images/references/cbs_news.gif


Dehydration Latest Defense For Landis
Cyclist's Lawyer Makes Claim As 'B' Sample Is Set For Release Saturday


August 3, 2006

Dehydration is the latest possible reason offered for Tour de France winner Floyd Landis' elevated testosterone levels.

"Maybe a combination of dehydration, maximum effort," said Jose Maria Buxeda, a lawyer for Landis, after testing began Thursday on the cyclist's backup doping sample.

But that defense was flatly rejected by one of the world's top anti-doping officials.

"In 25 years of experience of testing testosterone ... such a huge increase in the level of testosterone cannot be accepted to come from any natural factors," said Prof. Christiane Ayotte, director of Montreal's anti-doping laboratory.

"If dehydration was the case, then marathon runners would be testing positive all the time. Tennis players would be testing positive all the time. Dehydration is a medical condition that requires hospitalization. It has been invoked in the past, but not one case, to my knowledge, has been successful in this argument."

Speaking at the Chatenay-Malabry laboratory, which is conducting the analysis, Buxeda said he expects the "B" sample to confirm the original positive result, which showed a testosterone imbalance in a July 20 urine specimen.

The results are expected Saturday.

However, Buxeda contends a second positive sample would not be enough to find Landis, a native of Lancaster County, Pa., guilty. He also seemed to question the validity of the French lab, which is accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Olympic Committee.

"I wouldn't say that they know. I would say they can presume. They do not have the certainty," Buxeda said.

By contrast, Landis is "certain" he hasn't ingested banned substances, Buxeda said.

If the "B" sample is positive, the results will be sent to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, which would handle the case.

If found guilty, Landis would be stripped of the Tour de France title and banned for two years, although the process could take several months to clear any appeals.

Since July 27, when Phonak was notified of the positive doping test, the cyclist and his defense team have offered varying explanations as to why Landis turned up a testosterone-epitestosterone ratio of 11:1 in a July 20 test after he sped his way back into contention after winning the tough Stage 17 of the three-week Tour. That 11:1 ratio is nearly three times above the 4:1 limit.

Other potential causes offered have been cortisone shots taken to ease pain in Landis' degenerating hip; drinking beer and whiskey the night before stage 17; thyroid medication; or his natural metabolism.

The latest theory — dehydration — appears to contrast with events.

Landis pushed ahead at the 45-mile mark and then rode alone for the remainder of the 124.3-mile ride.

A jubilant Landis conceded afterward that riding in front for hours had constituted an "advantage," because it meant he was constantly within reach of his Phonak team car.

Even under a baking sun, he had far more opportunity to drink fluids than had he been trapped alongside others in the main pack, where it takes longer for team cars to reach cyclists.

As he rode up the Alps, Landis regularly splashed his face with water and gulped liquids regularly provided by the Phonak car only yards behind.

"It was nice to be alone," Landis said after the stage. "It was an advantage."

He also said he planned to drink beer that night.

Allegations that the Chatenay-Malabry lab might not be reliable also were made last week by seven-time Tour winner Lance Armstrong.

He previously said his urine samples might have been mishandled by the lab, defending himself against allegations by French sports daily L'Equipe that he tested positive for EPO during the 1999 Tour.

Last Friday, Armstrong told The Associated Press that he "can't help but be aware the lab that found this suspicious reading is the same one that was at the center of the L'Equipe affair."

But WADA chief **** Pound maintained testing in an accredited lab is "properly done."

Earlier this week, a New York Times report cited a source from the International Cycling Union saying that a second analysis of Landis' "A" sample by carbon isotope ratio testing had detected synthetic testosterone, meaning it was ingested. Landis' personal doctor, Brent Kay, also confirmed to the New York Times that the test found the man-made hormone.

On Wednesday, U.S. attorney Howard Jacobs, who also represents Landis, accused the UCI of a breach of ethics for leaking results.

"I am troubled by the actions of the UCI and how they have spoken out about this case, which is in direct contravention of the UCI's own rules and the World Anti-Doping Code," Jacobs said.

The carbon isotope testing method, however, received strong backing from the director of the Drug Control Center at London's King's College.

Calling it "the most definitive measure we have at this time," David Cowan added that "if there is a synthetic found (in the sample) than any defense is difficult to prove."

[Serpico]

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Ethics at Work: Doping or performance enhancement?


August 4, 2006

The line is getting harder to draw. Sports doping scandals have become routine, but this week's scandal adds a new dimension. Floyd Landis, who had a tentatively positive result following his dramatic Tour de France victory, was a survivor of the substance-testing carnage that preceded the Tour and which saw some of the leading individual and team contenders barred - and sprinter Justin Gatlin, who shares the world record for 100 meters, has been a leading spokesman against drug use in sport.

Considering the propriety of performance enhancement in sports encompasses a number of areas of ethics: business ethics, since money is often the incentive (although it is thought that hundreds of thousands of amateur athletes also use them); bio-ethics, since the body is being artificially modified; and, of course, sports ethics, since most performance enhancers are used in sports or in quasi-sports like bodybuilding. Many police officers also have been caught using them to perform well on fitness examinations and to perform their job.

One basic question is what sport is really all about. It is instinctive to think that spectators are interested in seeing the fastest, strongest, most agile competitors, and so a lenient attitude towards performance enhancement is guaranteed and perhaps justified. But I think the evidence is against this instinct. Sports fans want to see a competitive match-up. Women's tennis attracts audiences similar to those of men's tennis, even though women are no match for men on court. Today's heavyweight boxing matches, with some fighters in the 150-kilogram range, are not more exciting than those of a century ago when 100 kilo fighters were rare. A complementary consideration is that spectators enjoy being able to identify with the competitors - weekend athletes enjoy seeing and emulating the pros. Drug use, which doesn't interest most casual sportspeople, is an obstacle to this. So, I definitely think that the sporting establishment has an interest in limiting the use of artificial enhancements.

But there are also some contrary arguments heard. First of all, the ability to have an equitable policy is dependent on having adequate policing, and this is a question of technology, namely the horse race between drug use and drug detection. For decades, substances being abused were readily available and the ability to detect them was negligible so control was not really practical. In the last few years, astonishingly sensitive new tests gave authorities the upper hand. Over the counter supplements are easily detected, and more sophisticated techniques require the services of a few leading experts, whose connections to athletes can be tracked with relative ease. This combination led to the high-profile disclosures we have been treated to recently. However, there is evidence that the tide is turning back in the other direction. New enhancement technologies are being developed that are virtually impossible to detect, such as so-called "gene doping." Within a few years, these techniques will be used therapeutically and will be within the expertise of hundreds of ordinary physicians.

Another problem is drawing the line between "enhancement" and "therapy." Here's a simple example: A number of leading golfers (including Tiger Woods) and baseball players have had laser surgery to "correct" their eyesight. But many athletes leave this surgery with betterthan-normal eyesight. We could forbid athletes from having this surgery (currently no sport does), but it seems a little silly to bar pro athletes from an enhancement procedure enjoyed by literally millions of ordinary citizens. Another example: Floyd Landis will be barred from cycling if it is determined that he used steroids. In a few months, Landis is scheduled to undergo hip replacement surgery to repair damage resulting from a fall. Once the doctors open him up, they will do everything they can to create the most functional joint they can. It may very well be that his functioning following surgery will exceed that which preceded his accident. But he will not be disqualified from competition because he needed a new joint.

In short, as more currently arcane enhancement techniques reach the mainstream, forbidding them to athletes will be more difficult to enforce and justify. This includes gene therapy, reconstructive surgery, attention enhancing treatments and the like.

For this reason, some sports ethicists believe that the focus on enhancement is completely misplaced. Instead, the focus should be on danger. Steroids, they argue, are not bad because they make us stronger but rather that they are bad to the extent they promote disease, rage and aging. The claim is that the only valid interest of sporting authorities is to restrict dangerous substances. This may be good ethics, but based on my view of sports (as explained above) I think it is bad business.

From the point of view of business ethics and governance, I agree that no policy can be ethical if it cannot be equitably enforced. Subject to that essentially technological restriction, I think it is in the interest of fans and athletes alike to enforce the strictest practical ban on substances and techniques that are not commonplace medical treatments, even if these substances and techniques are not dangerous.

[Serpico]

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2006/08/04/lemond_raises_call_for_legitimacy/


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LeMond raises call for 'legitimacy'


August 4, 2006

If he cheated -- and we'll know tomorrow if he did -- Tour de France champ Floyd Landis should be stripped of his title. So says the great Greg LeMond, in town to ride in this weekend's Pan-Mass Challenge. LeMond, who was clean when he won the Tour in '86, '89, and '90, told us yesterday it'll be ``one of the tragic stories in sports" if the champ's doping sample comes back dirty. ``I can't even imagine what he'd go through," said LeMond, who's called for a mass crackdown on doping in cycling. Asked how prevalent performance-enhancing drugs are in the sport, LeMond shrugged. ``It's widely believed that whoever wins the Tour takes drugs, but it's not true," he said. ``It's 100 percent possible to win it clean." How about winning it seven consecutive times, a la Lance Armstrong? ``That's for you to decide," said LeMond. ``Legitimacy has to be brought back to the sport." Estranged since LeMond raised questions about a doctor Armstrong was seeing, the cyclists no longer talk. ``It hasn't been a pleasant story with him," said LeMond. ``He's not worth my time."

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Wrestling with the truth


August 4, 2006

A vindictive masseuse secretly rubbed his legs with a cream that made him flunk a drug test, the sprinter claims. A night spent drinking Jack Daniels and beer somehow spiked his testosterone to Incredible Hulk levels, the cyclist insists. The stories are bizarre but increasingly familiar.

"I used to always say to the boxing guys, 'When are you going to be straight like us and just admit that all of this is fake, too?'" Diamond Dallas Page said from Hollywood this week with a throaty laugh. "I guess I could say that to a lot of people these days!"

The man they still call "DDP" remembers back to the 1980s, when everybody was all worked up about pro wrestling being phony. Even "20/20" investigated. Can you imagine?

Guys like Iron Sheik, Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka, even Hulk Hogan himself, they must feel as if they're back standing on the top rope lately when they see all the hand-wringing about when the next syringe will drop. Mainstream sports are becoming more like pro wrestling each day. Even the story lines -- mainly, the excuses for screwing up -- are almost as colorful.

If you want to keep watching sports, you have three choices:

1. Go through life wondering about every home run, touchdown catch, gold medal, etc.

2. Assume that, while there are some rule-breakers, the majority of athletes are clean until proven otherwise.

3. Ignore everything your brain is telling and completely suspend reality.

The first option is a joyless existence. The second one, while logical, still sets you up to get burned -- who'd think a humble Mennonite like Floyd Landis would cheat his way through the French Alps?

Maybe it's time to consider Option 3. Call it, "The Pro Wrestling Approach." Believe nothing. Accept everything. And put aside any indignation long enough to enjoy what you see.

"People would say to me all the time, 'I know that stuff you do out there is (fake),'" DDP said. "'But that match against Randy Savage ... man, you guys just don't like each other!' It was the same way you want to believe in Santa Claus."

A lanky kid named Page Joseph Falkinburg growing up in Point Pleasant, DDP became part of the pro wrestling's heyday. He has since reinvented himself, developing a hybrid yoga program for average guys and admits he used steroids to build the physique necessary to become a star.

Page blames the pressure athletes have to cheat on fans who constantly demand better performances -- a nice theory, but one that absolves the athletes of their own all-consuming drive to reach the top, make millions and etch their names in history.

Lately, they mostly achieve infamy. Landis, Justin Gatlin, the Balco dopers and all the others are making it impossible for us to believe what we see from athletes. You can get mad. Or you can refuse to let them ruin the enjoyment you get from sports.

American cyclist Tyler Hamilton blames his failed blood test on a mysterious unborn twin left in his body at birth? The natural indication is to see a cheater making up a wild excuse.

Under the pro wrestling approach, you would say, "And I'm betting that twin was implanted there by evil French scientists out to frame our cycling superstars!" You should say this at a high volume, preferably into a microphone held by Mean Gene.

Make your fantasy even better than their fantasy, your world even more warped than the-flaxseed-oil-made-me-do-it stuff they dream up. Take a lesson from the pro wrestling fans. They've been doing it for decades.

Sure, deep down, wrestling fans know that mankind didn't really kidnap Vince McMahon's son in 1999 to set up a title match against The Rock, one he only won when "Stone Cold" Steve Austin unexpectedly saved the day when he stormed into the ring, knocked out The Rock and slapped the unconscious referee's hand against the mat three times.

Oh, but they wanted to believe. So they didn't let these things we call details and facts and reality get in the way of a good story.

"What we did out there was real," DDP said. "I just happened to know what was going to happen at the end."

Pro wrestling was 15 years ahead of the curve in mainstream sports, teaching us how to ignore common sense and embrace something you know is fake. So if you ask me, Landis was framed. Who would do such a thing? Why, who else? Tyler Hamilton's mysterious unborn twin.

Quick, somebody call Vince McMahon and set up a tag team.

[Serpico]

http://www.dailynewstribune.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=74517


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Cycling legend LeMond weighs in on doping


August 4, 2006

Three-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond yesterday said the raging doping controversy over 2006 winner Floyd Landis should prompt a crackdown on performance enhancers.

In town to promote a cancer fund-raiser and his new line of bicycles, LeMond said he still wants to believe the American ran a clean race.

"A lot of people are trying to race clean, and they’re the victims of this whole mess," LeMond said while signing autographs at the International Bicycle Center. "The news with (Landis) was shocking, but hopefully cycling officials will take the opportunity of the moment to implement change."

Landis showed elevated testosterone levels in an initial urine sample taken during this year’s Tour de France. Both "A" and "B" samples were provided July 20 after he sped his way back into contention after winning the tough Stage 17 of the three-week Tour.

LeMond said he believes cyclists use banned substances for the same reason they are used in other sports: for marginal competitors to level the playing field.

"Some people are more willing than others to achieve a level playing field any way possible," LeMond said.

He said when he was still competing in the Tour de France, he was aware other cyclists were using something to unnaturally better their performance, including blood doping, which entered the sport in the 1970s.

LeMond said blood doping was not made illegal until 1986, two years after an incident involving the U.S. cycling team that won nine gold medals at 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

In 2004, American cyclist Tyler Hamilton, then riding for Phonak, tested positive for blood doping at a Spanish race and now is serving a two-year ban. He has denied blood doping.

LeMond said he believes the absence of performance-enhancing substances and blood doping would improve the sport.

"If it’s a clean race, whoever wins is the winner, and it’s more exciting," he said.

Before Lance Armstrong overcame testicular cancer and won seven in a row, and prior to the scandal that has overshadowed Landis’ victory this summer, the only American to win the Tour de France was LeMond.

LeMond, who won in 1986, 1989 and 1990, posed for photos as part of a charitable event for this weekend’s Pan-Massachusetts Challenge.

LeMond will join 4,300 cyclists as a first time rider in the 27th annual PMC, which will span 192 miles over the weekend.

Billy Starr, founder and executive director of the PMC, said he met LeMond this winter when the two went skiing together.

"(LeMond) is a very real, philanthropic person," said Starr. "We’re tickled that he’s going to get the PMC experience."

The PMC is held annually to raise money for cancer research and treatment at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Proceeds raised account for nearly 50 percent of the Jimmy Fund’s annual revenue.

"LeMond has had cancer in his family, so we thought it would be appropriate to have him ride in the PMC," said Starr.

LeMond said he had two surgeries over the winter, so he hadn’t been cycling for medical reasons. However starting today, he’ll be at the back of the pack of riders when they leave from Sturbridge.

"I had heard about the PMC before," said LeMond. "And I told (Starr) that if I could get in shape for it, I’d participate this year. I’ve been cycling a few times a week to get prepared, and here I am."

LeMond arrived at store to applause from the dozens of fans. Other than signing autographs and having his photo snapped, LeMond also discussed many aspects of his life, from France’s weather in July to the diet of a cyclist in training.

Gregg Smith, operations manager for International, said asking LeMond to appear was a no-brainer.

"Having someone of (LeMond’s) marquee, as well as the positive influence he’s had on cycling his whole career, it’s huge to have him come by the shop," said Smith. "He’s helped cycling as a sport become more in the American consciousness."

Ashland resident Peter Waisgerber brought his 9-year-old daughter Anna to meet LeMond.

"It’s a great experience to meet somebody that’s won the Tour de France, and (LeMond) is truly a cycling hero," said Waisgerber.

Waisgerber said he’s cycled in the PMC for 15 straight years, while his brother Steve has been doing it for 20 years. Waisgerber had LeMond sign a special poster for Steve, acknowledging his brother and fellow cyclist as a cancer survivor.

"Now (Steve and I) both ride in memory of friends and family we’ve already lost to cancer, and for those who continue to battle with it," said Waisgerber. "The fact that (LeMond) is going to be joining us in that effort this year is very cool."

LeMond was also at International to introduce his new 2007 line of LeMond bicycles, which were on display throughout the shop.

"It’s the best engineered carbon bike in the world, and I mean that," LeMond told onlookers.

[Serpico]

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Landis caught in doping war


August 5, 2006

American Floyd Landis became the latest casualty in the war against doping after a second drugs sample confirmed a positive test for excessive amounts of the male sex hormone testosterone on the Tour de France.

The American is now likely to become the first winner of the world's most famous cycling race to lose his title because of a positive dope test and he also faces a two-year ban.

A statement issued by the International Cycling Union (UCI) on Saturday said Landis's B sample taken after his win in the 17th stage on July 20 had confirmed a doping offence.

"For us, he cannot be the Tour de France winner anymore," Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme told Reuters from his holiday residence. "Technically we cannot say he has lost his title but he has soiled the yellow jersey."

Landis, who again denied ever taking drugs, was immediately sacked by his Swiss team Phonak.

"Landis will be dismissed without notice for violating the team's internal Code of Ethics," Phonak said in a statement.

"Landis will continue to have legal options to contest the findings. However, this will be his personal affair and the Phonak team will no longer be involved in that."

His Phonak team mate Bert Grabsch added: "This is a catastrophe and huge disappointment for me and the whole team."

In a statement on his Web site the 30-year-old American said he had never taken a banned substance.

PROCEDURE

"I have never taken any banned substance, including testosterone. I was the strongest man in the Tour de France, and that is why I am the champion," Landis said.

"I will fight these charges with the same determination and intensity that I bring to my training and racing. It is now my goal to clear my name and restore what I worked so hard to achieve."

His lawyer Howard Jacobs said he was waiting to receive full laboratory documentation for the B test.

"In consultation with some of the leading medical and scientific experts, we will prove that Floyd Landis's victory in the 2006 Tour de France was not aided in any respect by the use of any banned substances," Jacobs said.

Landis and Jacobs will also question the UCI's premature release of the A sample findings and the anonymous leak of the carbon-isotope test results to the New York Times on July 31, the statement said.

The UCI statement said an analysis of the B sample confirmed the result of an adverse analytical finding notified by the anti-doping laboratory of Paris on July 26.

"In accordance to the anti-doping rules, the Anti-Doping Commission of the UCI will request that the USA Cycling Federation open a disciplinary procedure against the rider."

Spaniard Oscar Pereiro Sio, who finished second 57 seconds adrift of Landis in the overall standings, is now likely to be declared the winner of the race.

"Today is another step forward but I don't know what the UCI's decision is yet, or what Floyd's defense is going to be," Pereiro told Spanish state television.

"Much though we would like it I am not yet the winner of the Tour and I imagine it will be another couple of months before I know."

ASTOUNDING COMEBACK

Pereiro, who is due to give a news conference in Vigo at 1600 GMT, would then become the first Spaniard to win the Tour since Miguel Indurain's last victory in 1995.

Landis, 30, tested positive for testosterone after an astounding comeback in the last mountain stage. It came just a day after a very poor performance which all but knocked him out of contention.

Landis now has 10 days to respond to the documents that are provided, according to U.S Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) rules.

Those documents, Landis's response and any documents USADA would provide will go to a review panel some time after the 10 days.

The review panel will make a recommendation whether or not there is a case. USADA, based on that recommendation, will then decide whether to charge Landis.

If USADA does charge the Phonak rider, he would have an opportunity to contest that decision and the recommended sanction before a U.S panel of judges.

Landis's lawyers could then take the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and a long procedure would begin.

Testosterone speeds up recovery after exercise and generally improves stamina and strength. Last weekend Olympic 100 meters champion Justin Gatlin admitted he had tested positive for testosterone and since then two European sprinters have also tested positive for the hormone.

On the eve of start of the Tour de France, nine riders, including 1997 winner Jan Ullrich and Giro d'Italia champion Ivan Basso, were suspended by their teams because of their implication in an investigation over a blood doping scandal in Spain.

[Serpico]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/more/08/05/landis.positive.ap/?cnn=yes


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Proof positive
Backup sample confirms finding; Landis fired by team


August 5, 2006

Floyd Landis was fired by his team and the Tour de France no longer considered him its champion Saturday after his second doping sample tested positive for higher-than-allowable levels of testosterone.

The samples contained synthetic testosterone, indicating that it came from an outside source.

"I have received a text message from Chatenay-Malabry lab that indicates the 'B' sample of Floyd Landis' urine confirms testosterone was taken in an exogenous way," Pierre Bordry, who heads the French anti-doping council, told The Associated Press shortly after the "B" sample results were released.

Lab head Jacques De Ceaurriz said the isotope testing procedure was "foolproof."

"No error is possible in isotopic readings," he told the AP.

Landis had claimed the testosterone was "natural and produced by my own organism."

The Swiss-based team Phonak immediately severed ties with Landis, and the UCI said it would ask USA Cycling to open disciplinary proceedings against him.

"Landis will be dismissed without notice for violating the team's internal Code of Ethics," Phonak said in a statement. "Landis will continue to have legal options to contest the findings. However, this will be his personal affair, and the Phonak team will no longer be involved in that."

Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme said Landis no longer was considered champion, but the decision to strip him of his title rests with the International Cycling Union.

"It goes without saying that for us Floyd Landis is no longer the winner of the 2006 Tour de France," Prudhomme told the AP in a telephone interview. "Our determination is even stronger now to fight against doping and to defend this magnificent sport."

Prudhomme said runner-up Oscar Pereiro of Spain would be the likely new winner.

"We can't imagine a different outcome," Prudhomme said.

If stripped of the title, Landis would become the first winner in the 103-year history of cycling's premier race to lose his Tour crown over doping allegations.

UCI lawyer Philippe Verbiest said Landis would officially remain Tour champion pending the American disciplinary process.

"Until he is found guilty or admits guilt, he will keep the yellow jersey," he said. "This is normal. You are not sanctioned before you are found guilty."

If found guilty, Landis also faces a two-year ban from the sport.

Despite the second positive test, Landis maintained his innocence.

"I have never taken any banned substance, including testosterone," he said in a statement. "I was the strongest man at the Tour de France, and that is why I am the champion.

"I will fight these charges with the same determination and intensity that I bring to my training and racing. It is now my goal to clear my name and restore what I worked so hard to achieve."

The results of the second test come nearly two weeks after he stood atop the winner's podium on the Champs-Elysees in the champion's yellow jersey.

Landis' positive tests set off what could now be months of appeals and arguments by the American, who says the positive finding was due to naturally high testosterone levels. He has repeatedly declared his innocence.

Testosterone, a male sex hormone, helps build muscle and improve stamina. The urine tests were done July 20 after Landis' Stage 17 victory during a grueling Alpine leg, when he regained nearly eight minutes against then-leader Pereiro -- and went on to win the three-week race.

The tests turned up a testosterone/epitestosterone ratio of 11:1 -- far in excess of the 4:1 limit.

"It's incredibly disappointing," three-time Tour winner Greg LeMond said by phone from the starting line at the Pan Mass Challenge in Sturbridge, Mass. "I don't think he has much chance at all to try to prove his innocence."

The case is expected to go to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency; the process could take months, possibly with appeals to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

"It doesn't end here," said Landis' Spanish lawyer, Jose Maria Buxeda. "What matters is the concept. A prohibited substance has been found in the samples, but no immediate sanction comes into effect yet. The rider will defend himself."

Landis, a 30-year-old former mountain biker, says he was tested eight other times during the three-week tour and those results came back negative.

Landis has hired high-profile American lawyer Howard Jacobs, who has represented several athletes in doping cases.

Jacobs plans to go after the UCI for allegedly leaking information regarding the sample testing.

Earlier this week, a New York Times report cited a source from the UCI saying that a second analysis of Landis' "A" sample by carbon isotope ratio testing had detected synthetic testosterone -- meaning it was ingested.

Since the Phonak team was informed of the positive test on July 27, Landis and his defense team have offered varying explanations for the high testosterone reading -- including cortisone shots taken for pain in Landis' degenerating hip; drinking beer and whiskey the night before; thyroid medication; and his natural metabolism.

Another theory -- dehydration -- was rebuffed by anti-doping experts.

"When I heard it was synthetic hormone, it is almost impossible to be caused by natural events. It's kind of a downer," said LeMond, the first American to win the Tour. "I feel for Floyd's family. I hope Floyd will come clean on it and help the sport. We need to figure out how to clean the sport up, and we need the help of Floyd."

[Serpico]

http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sports/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-cyc-landis-synthetic-testosterone,1,5317856.story?coll=sns-ap-sports-headlines


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Landis Had Synthetic Testosterone


August 5, 2006

Floyd Landis' doping samples contained synthetic testosterone, indicating the Tour de France champion's elevated levels were not produced naturally, the head of France's anti-doping commission said Saturday.

Pierre Bordry, who heads the French anti-doping council, said the lab found that testosterone in Landis' urine samples came from an outside source.

"I have received a text message from Chatenay-Malabry lab that indicates the 'B' sample of Floyd Landis' urine confirms testosterone was taken in an exogenous way," Bordry told The Associated Press.

The revelation could damage Landis' defense prospects. He has claimed the testosterone in his body was "natural and produced by my own organism."

The American cyclist's backup "B" sample came back positive Saturday, confirming the original "A" test.

Landis could be stripped of the Tour title and banned for two years.

Testosterone, a male sex hormone, helps build muscle and improve stamina. The urine tests carried out on Landis after his victory in the Tour's 17 stage turned up a testosterone/epitestosterone ratio of 11:1 -- far in excess of the 4:1 limit.

A report this week in the New York Times cited an unidentified source from the UCI as saying an analysis of Landis' first sample by carbon isotope ratio testing had detected synthetic testosterone, which indicated it had been ingested.

Jacques De Ceaurriz, the head of the Chatenay-Malabray lab, said the isotope testing procedure involving a mass spectrometer is totally reliable.

"It's foolproof. This analysis tells the difference between endogenous and exogenous," he told the AP. "No error is possible in isotopic readings."

Landis spokesman Michael Henson disputed that.

"There is no conclusive evidence that shows that this test can show definitively the presence of exogenous testosterone," Henson said.

[atmo]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/more/08/05/landis.positive.ap/?cnn=yes



Landis had claimed the testosterone was "natural and produced by my own organism."


on a weekday?
my hero atmo.

[Serpico]

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Landis maintains his innocence despite second positive sample


August 5, 2006

Tour de France winner Floyd Landis says he has not committed any doping offence despite a positive test for excessive amounts of the male sex hormone testosterone.

The International Cycling Union confirmed last night that a second sample taken from the American had tested positive.

"I have never taken any banned substance, including testosterone," Landis said on his website. "I was the strongest man in the Tour de France, and that is why I am the champion. "I will fight these charges with the same determination and intensity that I bring to my training and racing."

The Phonak rider is likely to be stripped of his title and faces a two-year ban from the sport. He would also lose his €450,000 ($575,700) prizemoney.

Spain's Oscar Pereiro Sio, who finished second in the overall standings, would be declared the race winner.

It would be the first time in the history of cycling's biggest event that a tour winner has been disqualified for doping.

Landis, 30, tested positive after an astounding comeback in the last mountain stage of the race just a day after a poor performance which all but knocked him out of contention.

He denied any wrongdoing and said his body had naturally produced high levels of testosterone.

Landis now has 10 days to appeal under US Anti-Doping Agency rules.

An appeal panel would then make a decision if there was a case to answer. Based on that decision, USADA would then decide whether to charge Landis.

He would get an opportunity to contest any charge and sanction before a US panel of judges. Landis's lawyers could then take the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and a long procedure would begin.

Meanwhile, former Olympic champion Jan Ullrich was supplied with a cocktail of performance-enhancing drugs by the Spanish doctor accused of running a doping ring, an anti-drugs campaigner said.

Werner Franke said Ullrich, who was barred from competing in this year's Tour , was given EPO, steroids and human growth hormone by Eufemiano Fuentes.

[Serpico]

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Landis set to lose title after test result


August 5, 2006

American cyclist Floyd Landis has been sacked by his team and is likely to be stripped of his Tour de France title after the International Cycling Union confirmed he had tested positive for testosterone.

The result of the B sample confirms the American's initial positive drugs test given after his victory on the 17th stage of the tour on July 20. Landis went on to win the tour three days later.

"The UCI communicates that the analysis of the sample B of Floyd Landis' urine has confirmed the result of an adverse analytical finding notified by the anti-doping laboratory of Paris on 26th July, following the analysis of the sample A," UCI said.

"In accordance to the anti-doping rules, the Anti-Doping Commission of the UCI will request that the USA Cycling Federation open a disciplinary procedure against the rider."

Landis can expect to be stripped of his Tour de France title, lose his $760,000 prizemoney and face a two-year ban. His team, Phonak, immediately distanced itself from him.

"Landis will be dismissed without notice for violating the team's internal code of ethics," Phonak said in a statement.

"Landis will continue to have legal options to contest the findings. However, this will be his personal affair and the Phonak team will no longer be involved in that."

Oscar Pereiro Sio, who finished 57 seconds adrift of Landis in the overall standings, would then be declared winner of the race, the first Spaniard to win the tour since Miguel Indurain's win in 1995.

It would also elevate Australia's Cadel Evans to fourth place, the best finish by an Australian in the race.

It would be the first time in the history of the event that a tour winner was disqualified for doping.

Landis, 30, tested positive for testosterone after an astounding comeback in the last mountain stage of the tour, a day after a poor performance which all but knocked him out of contention. The American has denied any wrongdoing and said his body naturally produced high levels of testosterone.

Landis has 10 days to respond to the documents according to US Anti-Doping Authority rules.

■German cyclist Jan Ullrich was supplied with a potent cocktail of performance-enhancing drugs by the Spanish doctor accused of running a doping ring that has left the sport in crisis, it was reported in Berlin.

Former Olympic champion Ullrich, who was barred from competing in this year's Tour de France after being implicated in the scandal, was given EPO, steroids and human growth hormone by Madrid physician Eufemiano Fuentes.

The allegations were made by anti-doping campaigner Werner Franke in an interview in the Hamburg Morning Post.

Ullrich and other incriminated cyclists had used "EPO, four different anabolic steroids, human growth hormone, and different anti-inflammatories," Franke told the paper. Franke said earlier this week Ullrich paid $59,040 over 12 months to Fuentes.

Ullrich, the 1997 Tour winner, protests his innocence and denies taking drugs.

■Patrick Arnold, the Illinois chemist who devised a steroid at the centre of the BALCO sports doping scandal, was sentenced to three months' prison yesterday.

[Serpico]

http://sport.guardian.co.uk/breakingnews/feedstory/0,,-5995670,00.html


http://i.today.reuters.com/images/logo.gif


Pereiro expects long wait before collecting Tour title


August 5, 2006

Spanish rider Oscar Pereiro said on Saturday there was still a long way to go before he knew whether he will be proclaimed winner of this year's Tour de France.

Race victor Floyd Landis of the United States is likely to lose the title after the International Cycling Union (UCI) announced on Saturday a second drugs sample had confirmed a positive test for excessive amounts of the male sex hormone testosterone.

"Today is another step forward but I don't know what the UCI's decision is yet, or what Floyd's defence is going to be," Pereiro told Spanish state television.

"Much though we would like it I am not yet the winner of the Tour and I imagine it will be another couple of months before I know."
Pereiro, who finished 57 seconds behind Landis in the overall standings, would become the first Spaniard to win the Tour since Miguel Indurain's last victory in 1995.

He is due to give a news conference in Vigo at 1600 GMT.

[Serpico]

http://www.eurosport.com/cycling/sport_sto938613.shtml


http://nicolasdessum.free.fr/pages/images/logos/liens/l_eurosport.gif


Prudhomme: "Landis no longer winner"


August 5, 2006

Though the fate of Floyd Landis' yellow jersey rests with the UCI, Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme said the American was no longer the race's champion. The Frenchman said that he can't imagine a situation in which Oscar Pereiro does not take over this year's Tour title.

"It goes without saying that for us Floyd Landis is no longer the winner of the 2006 Tour de France," Prudhomme told The Associated Press after Landis' B sample test from his stage 17 victory came back positive for testosterone on Saturday.

"Our determination is even stronger now to fight against doping and to defend this magnificent sport."

Prudhomme said Spain's Oscar Pereiro, who finished in second-place 57 seconds behind Landis in the general classification, would become the new champion.

"We can't imagine a different outcome," he said.

After a race that began amidst a massive doping scandal when the race's two favourites were suspended with a group of riders implicated in a Spanish doping investigation, Landis would be the first rider in the 103-year history of the Tour to lose his title for doping charges.

But the UCI will wait until after American disciplinary hearings before deciding on whether to strip Landis of the Tour crown, UCI lawyer Philippe Verbiest said.

"Until he is found guilty or admits guilt, he will keep the yellow jersey," Verbiest said. "This is normal. You are not sanctioned before you are found guilty."

Whatever the outcome of the USADA's tribunal, Prudhomme's statements certainly mean a final severing of relations between the race and the American Landis.

Though race organisers had been overtly critical of Landis since his first sample tested positive for excessive levels of testosterone a week ago, as of Saturday the lead headline on the official Tour de France website was "Landis: A Leader For A New Generation."

Looking at a possible two-year suspension and a planned hip surgery, the 30-year-old Landis’ future hopes of restoring his credibility with the world’s greatest cycling race are now slim-to-nil.

[rpm]

Thoughtful, if depressing, observations from an LA Times columnist:

Meghan Daum:
Bigger Breasts, More Testosterone
Is it possible to compete in any arena without an artificial boost?
August 5, 2006


HOW COULD Floyd Landis do this? Just a week after his victory in the Tour de France — with a damaged hip, no less — he was found to have had abnormally high levels of testosterone in his bloodstream. These levels coincided with his astonishing — some might say improbable — move from 11th to third place in the 17th stage, an advancement that was instrumental in clinching the yellow jersey. As I write this, the jury is still out — results from a secondary test are due back today — but the reputation of cycling, already haunted by the specter of doping, seems more ghoulish than ever.

Should we really be surprised? The Tour de France requires a level of stamina that's been compared to running a marathon almost every day for three weeks on end. Retired Penn State professor Charles Yesalis, an expert on performance-enhancing drugs, has been quoted in many newspapers: "You cannot win the Tour de France without drugs." This year, nine riders, including three favorites, were disqualified before the race because they were linked to a blood-doping scandal. Landis shouldn't be convicted prematurely, but the doubts cast on him, the history of drug use in the sport, and even lingering suspicions about seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong have to make you wonder whether the race has become as much about science as it is about talent.

On the other hand, what isn't a triumph of science over nature these days? Whether we're talking about lifespan, beauty standards, sexual vitality, concentration levels or athletics, there's no ignoring the fact that the bar is constantly being raised and we're constantly finding we need help to meet it. A few days after the Landis scandal broke, it was reported that Olympic gold medal sprinter Justin Gatlin, who shares the current world record in the 100-meter race, tested positive for elevated levels of testosterone last April, a few weeks before he clocked that record time.

Though Landis is the bigger story, a brief history of the 100-meter dash raises some interesting questions about the whole state of affairs. In 1936, Jesse Owens broke the 100-meter record with a time of 10.2 seconds. That record held for 20 years, until it was broken by a tenth of a second, and it took another 12 years for a runner to go below 10 seconds. Times improved incrementally and predictably until 1991, when Carl Lewis ran it in 9.86 seconds. Since then, however, something remarkable has been happening: The record has been broken every few years, including three times in the last 13 months.

So what is an athlete — or anyone in a competitive situation — to do? In a world where so many people appear to be using artificial means to get ahead, does playing by the rules constitute an act of self-sabotage?

As cynical as that sounds, I think that may be the case. That's because average isn't as average as it used to be. Take the Miss America pageant. Even though a spokeswoman said the pageant neither encourages cosmetic surgery nor keeps records on average sizes of contestants, various observers think that Miss America's weight has gone down but her bra size has increased.

Forty years ago, according to one news report, the average Miss America was a size 10. Today, she's a size 2. And according to Carolyn Latteier, author of "Breasts: The Women's Perspective on an American Obsession" (no, I am not providing the Amazon link here), in the 1920s, the average Miss America contestant had a 32-inch bust. Today, the norm is 36 inches. So we could be talking about C and D cups on size 2 bodies, an occurrence in nature somewhat akin to a four-leaf clover.

But these days, we seem to be under some kind of cultural mandate to make ourselves into four-leaf clovers. Even if we're not competing for Miss America or trying to win the Tour de France, most of us view our raw material as tragically sub-par. And because the technology to fix ourselves is readily available (and increasingly affordable), many feel entitled, even morally obliged, to do just that.

What's striking is that most of us aren't taking these measures in order to look spectacular; we're just trying get in the range of acceptability. When manicures can be had for $6 and teeth can be whitened overnight, there's simply no excuse for neglecting the details. Blame it on the flip-flop craze, but even going around without painted toenails is considered questionable.

Going around with synthetic testosterone in your body also is questionable, especially if you're headed for the finish line of the Tour de France. Ethically speaking, if Floyd Landis is found guilty of doping, he will have no excuse for his actions. He'll have to cede his title to the second-place finisher, and let's just hope that guy didn't cheat. Even so, the larger issue is this: Is it possible to compete in any arena, let alone win a race, without getting a little help from science?

As we crack down on athletes for using performance-enhancing drugs, we'd do well to consider where many of us would be without our own artificial enhancements. Given the amount of effort it takes these days to be ordinary, how can we expect the extraordinary from mere unmedicated mortals?

[Serpico]

http://cbs3.com/topstories/local_story_217114405.html


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Local Cyclists React To Landis Controversy


August 5, 2006

Local biking enthusiasts patrolling Kelly Drive Saturday morning didn’t feel much sympathy for Floyd Landis as the news broke that his backup doping sample tested positive.

“I think it’s a disgrace,” said Bensalem’s Tim Holt who is passionate about riding and loves the sport.

“His mind wasn’t as strong as his body,” notes Holt as he suggests that the pressure of the Tour De France could have been too much for Landis to handle.

Lancaster County’s Landis rode a grueling race to win the Tour De France and became America’s newest cycling hero until a urine sample, taken shortly after the win, turned up positive.

The tests results revealed that Landis’ body contained excessive testosterone, but Landis claims he has never taken any substances and that his body has a naturally high testosterone level.

Landis’ backup test revealed the same results as the original leaving many local biking enthusiasts without remorse.

“For me it’s hard to believe that he would do that knowing that he would be tested as the winner of the tour,” said biker Kresimir Stearcevic of Northeast Philadelphia.

So who’s to blame: The one possible abuser or a bigger force?

“I think if the cycling organization’s wanted to clean up the sport they probably could if they really wanted to, but I don’t know if its like baseball where maybe they don’t want to really clean it up because they like the epic rise that these riders do or the home run races, “noted Rich Cardero of the Guys Racing Club.

The consensus of the local riders was that a two year banishment from the sport was ample punishment for what Landis has been accused of.

Not one of the cyclist questioned felt that Landis should be banned for life.

[Serpico]

http://local.lancasteronline.com/4/24534


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Our Floyd funk
Experts discuss why some of us struggle to believe champ might have cheated.


August 5, 2006

For many of us, the news that bicyclist Floyd Landis could be involved in a doping scandal has sparked two reactions.

Disbelief.

Then gloom.

In conversations around our dinner tables, with neighbors and at work, we can’t and won’t accept the fact that this man who was our hometown hero may have taken testosterone to boost his performance and win the Tour de France.

The story is still being written on Landis. The results from a second test on a urine sample taken from him during the tour — the first one showed questionably high levels of testosterone — are expected to be released Saturday. But his own family expects him to be stripped of his title, and everyone is bracing for a long fight over what happens next.

In the meantime, we are left to stew over how a tale that initially looked so thrilling and upbeat now has turned into something else altogether.

Our funk is kindled by two elements: both our perceptions of Plain culture and the qualities that outsiders hold dear about them, as well as our long-held belief in the American dream, experts say.

The media coverage of the race, both locally and nationally, has focused on Landis’ beginnings in the Mennonite community and the small town of Farmersville.

We have read how his family does not have a television set. We have seen the footage of his parents and siblings in their Plain dress.

Though he left that community 10 years ago, Landis has been built up as a Plain Superman, an uber Mennonite, a man who learned early in life the Plain credos of hard work and discipline and succeeded because of them.

Of course, the real picture is a bit more complex than that.

“It’s those that assign that iconic status to a group of people, those who are not part of the community itself, they have that sense of it being pristine and untouched,” says Brinton Rutherford of the Lancaster Mennonite Conference. “That’s always a danger, no matter what group you may be thinking of.”

And the local community might have even deeper feelings about that, says Jack Heller, a psychology professor at Franklin & Marshall College.

“Nationally, it’s more of, ‘Isn’t this archaic? Isn’t this an interesting fact?’ ... I talked to my family on the West Coast and to them, Mennonites are people who wear plain clothes,” he says. “I don’t think they have a rich understanding of the kind of moral tradition that runs through that culture.”

But people must remember that Landis left that community and adopted another lifestyle, says Urbane Peachey, a retired Mennonite minister.

“This is happening all the time in society,” he says. “People pursue a lifestyle in a way that is different than the way they were raised. I think it’s unrealistic to expect that Floyd Landis should reflect the values and lifestyles of the culture in which he grew up.

“He probably did, but maybe, maybe not in all the ways people expected.”

In a book about Lance Armstrong, writer Dan Coyle observes that a former teammate of Landis once noted that when the former Farmersville man moved into the cycling world it was as if “Landis had just been defrosted from some distant past and needed to figure out everything anew. His life was nothing so much as an experiment, one that might have been titled ‘Reactions That Occur When an Unfrozen Mennonite is Mixed with America.’ ”

More recently, Sunday Times writer Paul Kimmage observes, the experiment might be more aptly titled, “Reactions That Occur When an Unfrozen Mennonite Becomes a Professional Cyclist.”

“If the analysis of the B sample supports the initial findings of unusual amounts of testosterone, then that will be a massive disappointment,” Kimmage writes, “all those qualities we admired that made him different; all the hope we invested that Floyd would buck the trend.”

If tests do show that Landis was doping, Rutherford says another lesson can be learned.

“It speaks to the fact that Plain people are human people too,” he says. “It’s tough to escape that humanity.

“Inside the Plain culture, there may not be quite so much shock or disbelief. Plain folks themselves would recognize their humanity.”

Landis’ story also cuts away at our stubborn belief in the American dream, that anyone can succeed through hard work and determination.

It’s a belief that is being worn down more and more.

Says Rutherford, “Just look at the sports scandals that have rocked baseball and football and all those icons going down, or President Clinton with some of his moral shortcomings and the disappointment there.”

Heller says, “In the context of how poorly things seem to be going in the world, a lot of people’s reactions that I’ve heard have been, ‘OK, it’s just one more thing. ... It’s one more thing that isn’t the way I’d really like it to be.’ ”

Europeans would take a different view of all of this, Heller notes.

“You know, they look at Americans as naive. I value that naiveté,” he says, “but I think from their perspective, a European perspective, they’d say, ‘But, of course.’ ”

For now, some are holding onto their hope that the story about Landis will have a happy ending, and that he will uphold all the ideals and dreams that have been placed upon his 150-pound frame.

“My impression is that people are adopting the position of let’s wait and see,” Peachey says.

Says Heller, “I’m sort of on hold. I still see a lot of gray in this.”

[Serpico]

http://www.sportsline.com/cycling/story/9587295


http://www.trymedia.com/images/corporate/press/associated_press_logo.gif


Friends, neighbors back Landis despite test results


August 5, 2006

Floyd Landis' parents planted a "God Bless, Went Camping" sign in their front yard Saturday, leaving it to friends and neighbors to defend their son against the doping scandal that threatens his Tour de France title.

Tammy Martin, one of the Landis' neighbors and closest friends, said Landis has proven his "outstanding skill" as a cyclist and that he ultimately will be exonerated.

"All he has accomplished, he has attained through his hard work and discipline," she said at her home in Farmersville, a rural crossroads just outside the borough of Ephrata in eastern Pennsylvania.

Saturday, Landis' second doping sample tested positive for higher-than-allowable levels of testosterone, and Pierre Bordry, who leads the French anti-doping council, said the samples contained synthetic testosterone, indicating that it came from an outside source.

Paul and Arlene Landis, devout Mennonites, always have defended their son -- insisting he's clean -- against the doping accusations. Martin said the Landis' camping trip was previously scheduled.

At Green Mountain Cyclery, the Ephrata bike shop where Landis bought his first mountain bike, owner Mike Farrington said Saturday he doesn't believe Landis did anything wrong.

"My opinion and personal beliefs in Floyd have not changed in the last 15 years, and they are not about to start changing now. There's absolutely no way he's ever done anything wrong," said Farrington, wearing a yellow T-shirt that said, "Hometown Hero, Floyd Landis, 2006 Tour de France Champion."

Farrington said he spoke by telephone to Landis on Friday night and that Landis remained upbeat and in a "great mood."

"He's obviously fired up," Farrington said. "He's ready to take on whatever he needs to take on."

Dave Kantner, a cyclist from Lancaster County who rode past the Landis house Saturday, said he believes Landis' doping test might have been in error and that the French were after Landis because he is an American.

"It's just very hard to believe he would intentionally do anything," he said. "Let's not find him guilty before he has a chance to defend himself."

[yeehawfactor]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2006/aug06/aug14news3

this has been amazing to watch. why is there such outcry over floyd while the operation puerto deal is not really being talked about? shouldn't they both atleast be on the same level? this makes me believe floyd a bit more. not that he has never doped, but that he didn't take testosterone before the stage.

[JohnS]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2006/aug06/aug14news3

this has been amazing to watch. why is there such outcry over floyd while the operation puerto deal is not really being talked about? shouldn't they both atleast be on the same level? this makes me believe floyd a bit more. not that he has never doped, but that he didn't take testosterone before the stage.
Because they didn't involve an American that won the TdF.

[atmo]

Because they didn't involve an American that won the TdF.
americans don't care about frecnh sportsmen as much atmo.