I do not believe that Floyd is a cheat

See my previous post for background to this post.

The French, the same lab that conducted the witch hunt on Lance last year, is the lab that is claiming Floyd Landis had increased levels of testosterone and that he was obviously doping. Now first you have to ask yourself, why would the Tour de France use the same lab that illegally released bogus test results of 8 year old samples of Lance's whiz in order to smear his name last year to analyze samples for this year's TDF. What happened to chain of custody, secrecy and scientific integrity? I would not use that lab to examine my turds for seeds after finishing sesame chicken. What a bunch of crap. The TDF, in it's arrogance and sick psychological need to hate and smear America, is now going after Floyd and the lab is in cahoots. I mean sure, the TDF has had it's share of scandals and many bikers are cheats, but to presume guilt like they do is not only wrong in so many ways, but in my mind it is just damn un-American, and what else would we expect from certain French people.

I have been reading all the articles from the various papers around the world, including the London Times and L'Equipe (the scummiest paper in sports, just as bad as anything from Fox News) and they have already judged, convicted and sentenced Landis to biking death. What is wrong with people who, in the absence of evidence, are so willing to vehemently convict a man and ruin his reputation and career. Floyd is now screwed, even if he can prove his is clean because he will always be assumed to have beaten the system.

I was glad to see him come out swinging today to not only proclaim his innocence but vow to fight to prove it. This is counsel he got from Lance and good for him. Look, I do not believe he is guilty. If he had been using steroids, it would have been detected in one of the earlier 6 tests he took during the tour or one of the other of dozens of test he took this year while winning stages and bike races across the US and Europe. Steroids are used to help people build body mass and recover after hard workouts. They do not work, at least not appreciably, as a short term repair for the body. Check it out and see what the doctors have to say about it. So testosterone (steroids, like in baseball) would only have been used if it was a full blown program to cheat and he certainly would have done it in the off-season and been caught before his hard ride in the TDF.

It just makes no sense that he would use steroids or testosterone. Blood doping, okay, EPO, maybe, but testosterone during the middle of a race makes no sense. It may be that his ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone was off because of his natural body chemistry and the great strain those three days had put on his body. This is my guess. As far as his amazing recovery, such things are not at all unheard of in bicycling because the incredible conditioning of the athletes and the physical care they get during the tour to help them recover. After bonking in 2000 and 2003, Lance went on to win stages and each tour. Floyd was the best cyclist before his bad day and I think he was just careless on that day. He forgot to eat and drink properly just like Lance did back in '00. On the day in question, the tactics of the field allowed him get 7 minutes back that day. Sure, he rode well that day, but the once the peleton and leaders realized they needed to chase Floyd, his lead stayed pretty much the same. The roads on that stage, because of their narrow, winding nature, ruined the peleton's ability to use aerodynamics to catch Floyd once they put their mind to it. They just did not analyze the stage properly and Floyd, once he got the lead by riding hard when everyone else was on cruise, was able to ride at the same pace as the chasers who were really pretty much all riding as individuals, not as a peleton or team. In fact, I think Sastre even pulled back a couple of seconds on Floyd during the final descent, although Periero, who is not a good descender, actually lost a few more seconds to Floyd on the descent. Do not forget he is literally one of the best descenders, certainly among today's riders, because of his mountain biking background. Plus he obviously took desperate, but reasonable chances during the descent to maintain his advantage. I watched the stage and actually saw him get squirrelly once or twice during the final descent.

So I think this is a witch hunt and the only question is whether or not Floyd gets the court of public opinion behind him because there is no way those scumbags running the TDF and their worthless lab are ever going to admit they fucked up. He is screwed, but I believe him and you should too.