American Tour de France Winner May Be Innocent

Last summer, American Floyd Landis won the Tour de France bicycle race in a marvelous come-back performance. That made it 8 years in a row that an American had won the Tour. The prior seven wins were done by Texas cyclist Lance Armstrong.

But a few weeks after his win, a French lab accused Landis of taking synthetic testosterone, even though he had tested clean in six prior tests taken earlier in the Tour. Many people immediately condemned Landis even though he has always claimed he was innocent. He was kicked off his cycling team and his Tour win was taken from him.

Now it looks like he may really have been innocent. Landis' attorney's have uncovered several "mistakes" made by the French lab which could have resulted in his being falsely accused of doping. It is not known whether these mistakes were intentional or not.

What is known is that the French have been embarrassed for years now that "their" sport is currently dominated by Americans. This same lab tried for years to find Lance Armstrong dirty and have accused him of doping in the past. But they could never prove anything or back up their accusations.

I think they thought a European, possibly even a Frenchman, would win the Tour when Lance Armstrong retired. They simply could not take it when a virtually unknown American, Floyd Landis, stepped up and won last year's Tour. Landis did not have the established reputation of Lance Armstrong, and they were able to make the charges stick - at least until now.

The Los Angeles Times is now reporting that the French lab made several critical errors. They say the lab allowed two lab techs to participate in the testing of both the "A" and the "B" samples of Landis' urine. This is a violation of international standards, which prohibits lab techs from participating in both tests to avoid techs from confirming their own results.

Also, someone altered a lab document after Landis questioned its accuracy, and then the altered version was certified as "original". It is not known at this time whether the lab or other doping officials altered the document, but it was altered.

The lab also seems to have operated a critical piece of testing equipment under conditions that violated manufacturer specifications. It seems the lab didn't know what the manufacturer specs were because they didn't even have an owner's manual.

The Times further reports that software used "was 10 years old, based on an operating system no longer in use and was designed for a different piece of equipment." Should this kind of equipment be used to destroy a man's future and livelihood?

But perhaps most damning of all, the lab was in possession of documents that clearly linked the samples to Landis. This is a clear violation of anti-doping standards which require that samples be tested anonymously.

I believe Floyd Landis is innocent of the doping charges. I don't know whether the lab just performed some incredibly shoddy work or whether they conspired against Landis, but their results can no longer be trusted. I think a lot of people owe Floyd Landis an apology.