Le Sour de France: Pissing Away the Championship

It is now up to the UCI to formally strip Landis of his Tour title, which would then go to runner-up Oscar Pereiro. Floyd has not yet been officially stripped of his title. If he is disrobed, he can still appeal the decision, but it will be long and arduous, and regardless of the outcome, his reputation will never be the same. Or will it?

Hello Richard Virenque. Completely defamed in the 1998 Festina scandal, Virenque was back just a couple of years later as the hero of France, winning the King of the Mountains competition in the Tour de France in 2003 and 2004. In fact, many of the riders banned from the Tour de France this year, have been "cleared" and are once again racing. Turns out that Basso, Ulrich, and Vinokourov missed the 2006 Tour based solely on allegations. Unfortunately for Landis, it's not just allegations that are pointing at him, it's, apparently, the naked truth of physical evidence.

But hold the Phonak just a minute.

Floyd is alleging a nebulous Franconspiracy, and for those that suspect the neocons had a hand in 9/11, there is enough circumstantial evidence in Floyd's favor to get your Oliver Stone going.

One, testosterone is not an instant performance-enhancing substance -- taking a test boost the night after his massive crack in Stage 16 would have had no impact on his ride the following day. Same for steroids. Blood doping yes, testosterone no -- depending on who you ask. According to Dr. Kurt Moosburger, "You put a standard testosterone patch that is used for male hormone-replacement therapy on your scrotum and leave it there for about six hours. The small dose is not sufficient to produce a positive urine result in the doping test, but the body actually recovers faster." Not to mention that warm tingly on your saddle sores. But Dr. Mike PhD sees the empirical evidence as "bogus" -- and he shows his work.

Two, Floyd was tested eight times at the Tour de France, four times before that stage and three times after, including three blood tests. The tests from Stage 17 were the only ones to come up positive. Cue the X-Files theme.

Three, the Chatenay-Malabry lab, the facility conducting the test, is no stranger to controversy. And Floyd smells a rat.

Not helping his case, Landis appears to have an OJ-like bottomless pit of potential explanations. He's naturally high producing, it's because he had beer and whiskey the night before, because of cortisone shots for his hip, because of a thyroid condition, dehydration, or maybe even because someone slipped him a testy in one of his post Stage 16 drinks. Let's see, he forgot stupidity.

In the meantime, Landis is likely to lose millions in endorsements, his right to ride competitively for up to four years, and his reputation. In the short term, he has already been fired by Phonak, he's missed several lucrative events, and he's about to get the yellow jersey pried out of his cold, dead man-hands.

Here's one for you: What do Roberto Heras, Tyler Hamilton, and Floyd Landis all have in common? They each won major events -- Vuelta de Espana (Heras), Olympic Gold Medal (Hamilton), and the Tour de France (Landis) -- and all tested positive for banned substances. Oh yeah, all were teammates of Lance Armstrong. Guess they learned everything from Lance except how not to get caught.

Lance has not seemed particularly motivated to speak out in favor of his former teammate. In fact, compared to the way he commented about allegations leveled against him, Lance seemed oddly detached about the Floyd Flap. Is Lance happy to have Floyd diverting attention away from his own allegations?

Or maybe the Phonak team physician should be the one getting the hook. Hamilton was on the Phonak team. Sascha Urweider was on the Phonak team until this June, when he was suspended for two years for . . . (wait for it) . . . testing positive for high levels of testosterone. And there were more, lots more Phonak casualties.

It's hard to believe that Phonak is the only team out there systematically doping up its riders. It's hard to believe that only a few riders are doing it. But somehow it seemed that Floyd was above cheating -- we just don't want to believe that his inspiring comeback and Tour win were ill-gotten.

Say it ain't so, Floyd, say it ain't so.