A Chicago Tribune Sports Weblog by Philip Hersh
May 20, 2007
Floyd can't escape his Bonds
Floyd Landis already has lost.
Big time.
Landis' attorneys may convince a U.S. arbitration panel that his
positive doping test should be thrown out because the French lab's
testing was sloppy or scientifically flawed. That argument may fly
again when the international Court of Arbitration for Sport hears what
is certain to be an appeal of a decision exonerating Landis.
Landis can appeal as well if the U.S. panel finds him guilty as
charged in a hearing that resumes Monday.
Makes no difference.
Landis has assassinated his own character, which he insists is so
beyond reproach no one could possibly question his denials of doping.
He may keep his 2006 Tour de France title but he has lost the
moral authority that made his triumph resonate as more than that of
just another good athlete.
Landis was the polite young man with the Mennonite upbringing. He
was the son who found a way to reconcile his sport with respect for
his parents and their faith even after abandoning its precepts to
become the cyclist who won the Tour -- with a bum hip.
Until last week.
Now Landis is about to win what he called ``a race to the bottom''
-- a place where moral turns into venal, where proclamations of
absolute innocence disappear into the abyss of ethical equivocation.
His descent began in an Internet posting that threatened three-
time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond. It took him over the
precipice when Landis testified to having all but ignored his former
business manager's threatening phone call to LeMond the night before
he was to testify in the hearing.
LeMond's testimony may be thrown out on an appeal by Landis'
attorney Howard Jacobs. He appealed after trying to question LeMond
about areas that might show he had a motive to testify against Landis,
but LeMond declined to answer on advice of his attorney.
LeMond's testimony isn't relevant or really damaging to the crux
of Landis' defense, anyway. LeMond's assertion that Landis admitted
having taken drugs in a phone conversation between the two soon
(Landis called LeMond) after his positive test became public isn't of
much value either. The conversation apparently wasn't recorded, and
Landis testified Saturday that he had neither made such an admission
nor taken banned substances.
Doesn't matter. In the court of public opinion, the testimony
will carry enormous weight.
``Why should this arbitration panel believe you?'' Jacobs asked
Landis on the stand.
``People are defined by their principles and how they make their
decisions,'' Landis answered.
*First defining moment, from LeMond's testimony:
LeMond tells Landis in the phone conversation if he had taken
drugs, he should fess up for the good of the sport and for his own
mental health. LeMond illustrates his reasons by sharing an intensely
personal story that remains private until LeMond retells it at the
hearing: he could not get beyond having been sexually abused as a
child until admitting to loved ones several years later that it had
happened. LeMond says keeping the secret preyed on his mind for all
those years.
LeMond's testimony echoes what he told me in an interview the day
Landis' team announced the positive test, although he did not mention
sexual abuse, saying only that it was a significant personal problem.
As I quoted LeMond in the July 28, 2006 Tribune: ``I hope like heck
(the B sample test) comes out negative. If not, I hope Floyd has the
courage and integrity to come clean, for his own well-being and for
the sport. I believe human beings are capable of empathy and
forgiveness.''
Empathy? Forgiveness? This is what Landis -- apparently angered by
what LeMond was saying to the media -- posted on the Internet after
his phone conversation with LeMond:
``...if (LeMond) ever opens his mouth again and the word Floyd comes
out, I will tell you all some things you wish you didn't know and
unfortunately I will have entered the race to the bottom which is now
in progress.''
I guess you don't have to dope to be a dope.
*Second defining moment, from testimony of both LeMond and Landis.
Landis' former business manager, Will Geoghegan, tries to pass himself
as LeMond's uncle while calling him to threaten revelation of the
abuse secret if LeMond testifies. Two days later, Landis admits he
was in the room when Geoghegan called, later hears Geoghegan deny he
was the caller to LeMond, then does nothing about it.
That's right. Nothing.
Clearly doesn't tell his own attorneys, who learn of the incident when
LeMond testifies to it the next day. (The attorneys look silly as
they announce a few minutes later that Geoghegan is fired.) Doesn't
tell the police. Doesn't tell anyone.
That's wrong.
Of course, Landis obviously had told Geoghegan about LeMond's sexual
abuse story. Some secrets, Landis apparently can't keep.
Which is fine, because now the secret is out about Floyd Landis'
principles.
We know who he is now.
Barry Bonds on a bicycle.
(END)
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May 10, 2007
Lance in the shadows
The Tour of Italy begins Saturday without both its defending champion,
Ivan Basso, and its 2002 runner-up, Tyler Hamilton.
Floyd Landis begins the race for his cycling life Monday in a Malibu,
Calif., hearing room.
The link among them? Doping -- and Lance Armstrong.
The circumstances that put each of these three riders where they are
-- or aren't -- lengthen the shadows over Armstrong's reputation as
one of the greatest champions in an increasingly infamous sport.
Guilt by association? True of almost everyone in cycling's elite,
perhaps a little more for Armstrong, who maintains he never took
banned performance-enhancing drugs yet utterly dominated the Tour de
France when it was full of dopers.
I'll begin with the necessary disclaimer: Armstrong never has been
sanctioned for doping and officially has tested positive just once --
that was traces of a banned corticosteroid in a skin cream for saddle
sores that he had a therapeutic exemption to use. The exemption, it
has been reported, was conveniently post-dated, an apparently routine
practice in cycling.
The French newspaper L'Equipe reported in 2005 that retroactive
retesting of frozen urine samples from Armstrong's first Tour de
France triumph year, 1999, found him positive six times for EPO, the
banned blood-booster cycling did not test for until 2001. But
Armstrong thinks L'Equipe is nothing more than a shill for the Tour
management that belongs to the same parent company. Why that
management would want disgrace cast on its race is hard to understand.
Suspicious? Sure. Indisputable proof? Hardly.
But Lance's riding buddies face more than suspicions.
Hamilton? Support rider for Armstrong in three of his seven Tour de
France victories. Returned to competition this season after serving
two-year suspension for blood doping. Suspended Wednesday from
competing in the Tour of Italy by his new team, Tinkoff Credit
Systems. Why? Hamilton's name has been linked to the Spanish doctor at
the center of Operation Puerto, the biggest scandal to hit a sport
that has known little but scandal for a decade.
Landis? Support rider for Armstrong in three of his Tour de France
victories. Tested positive for anabolic steroid testosterone after he
went from a beaten rider to Tour de France winner during the dramatic
17th stage of the 2006 race. Like Hamilton, maintains his innocence.
Landis' defense team will argue at the hearing that bad science, bad
bookkeeping and what they call a suspect lab all contributed to an
unfair conclusion that Landis had doped.
Basso? Would be riding for Armstrong's old Discovery Channel team, of
which Armstrong is a co-owner, were he not caught up in Operation
Puerto. Basso quit the team last month, six days after it suspended
him, but you'll still find his picture and bio on the Discovery
cycling Web site, not far from the link to the Lance Armstrong
Foundation.
(By the way, Discovery Communications has given up sponsorship of the
cycling team after this season. They're no dopes.)
The Basso situation is, in some ways, the most damning to Armstrong.
The Discovery Channel team, which means Armstrong, gave the proverbial
finger to the cycling world when it signed the Italian last fall,
after he had been banned from the 2006 Tour de France because of his
implication in Operation Puerto.
Tuesday, after fessing up his actual involvement in Operation Puerto
to Italian Olympic Committee investigators, Basso told a news
conference he was guilty only of "attempted doping" in a "moment of
weakness." He said he had never taken a doping substance or engaged in
blood doping.
Such a lovely turn of phrase: attempted doping. Isn't that like an
attempted robbery that doesn't get carried out because the police show
up and catch you hiding in the shadows?
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