Memory is a tricky thing. There are things we remember, like details of conversations, that often didn’t happen the way we think they did. I’ve had this illustrated to me more than once, when talking with old friends about the past. On more than one occasion, I either had no memory of something they were talking about (even though I was clearly present at the time), or had long since forgotten the event and its details. And there are events where I remember one thing, and someone else remembers it happening an entirely different way.
So when you get into testimony in a court case, which involves remembering details of a conversation, it’s no surprise that one person claims to have heard X when the other person says he said Y. Happens all the time. The question is who to believe. If one person is Greg LeMond and the other is Floyd Landis, and the subject is whether or not Landis implied that he had doped on the way to his 2006 Tour victory, then the stakes are high, to say the least.
Shifting gears a bit, a reporter for the Lancaster New Era (article at Lancaster Online), ran a story yesterday that included a passage about who might have been in the room when Will Geoghegan made his fateful phone call to Greg LeMond. Problem is, the reporter got it wrong, according to Darlene Umble, one of the people mentioned in yesterday’s story. Umble is quoted at TBV as saying,
Boy, am I learning about the power of the press and how misinformation sure can spread. This has to do with the article yesterday in the Lancaster Newspaper. I’m in Ohio right now so I read the article online. I immediately sent an email to the reporter to let him know that he had made a mistake. However, since that article was linked on TBV the information was spread to DPF where they are now questioning Floyd’s testimony.
I never told the reporter that we were in the same room as Floyd and Will when the phone call was made. I told him that we often went to the hotel and ate dinner with everyone there. I also said that we had dinner that night and that Floyd was sitting across from us. But I said that we had probably left before Will made the call because we didn’t know anything about it. I know the Garretts were still there so I don’t know when they left or what Mr. Garrett told the reporter. According to the article it seemed to indicate that Paul and Arlene had left. However, Paul and Arlene traveled with us so if they had left, we were not there also.
What I feel badly about is that according to Floyd’s testimony he had indicated that it was only Floyd and Will in the room. Now the article indicates that there were lots of other people in the room which contradicts Floyd’s testimony. All I know is that we had dinner at the hotel that night. Floyd and Will and others were still there when we left. I knew nothing about a phone call until I heard about it in the courtroom.
Unless you check your facts before running a story, it’s easy for mistakes to make it into print. And these days, with the Internet, those mistakes can spread around the world in an instant. Once the wrong information is out in the wild, it’s darn-near impossible for a correction to get to everyone who might have seen the original story.
I don’t know the reporter who wrote the story, or how he took notes about who told him what, and exactly who was where when what happened. But if he was relying on memory, and not solid notes, and if he didn’t check his facts before running the story, then shame on him. With any story, you owe it to the people mentioned to get the facts right. Especially with a story that will gain world-wide attention.
Exactly who was present when Will made that phone call is unknown, even to those who were present. Perhaps Will and Floyd were the only people in the room, perhaps not. I doubt we’ll ever know for certain who was or wasn’t there. But none of that takes away from how stupid Will’s phone call was, or the damage it did in the court of public opinion. Even if others were there, if they didn’t hear him they couldn’t have put a stop to it.
Anyway, on to better things.
A long, long time ago (OK, it was 1971) — even before John Denver discovered the meaning of the phrase “Rocky Mountain High” — my family traveled to a certain ski resort in Colorado for a conference/vacation. My dad would spend time at the Aspen Center for Physics during the days, and the rest of us would go hiking, fishing, or enjoy the mountains in that part of the world. For me, it was like discovering my one, true home. If I could like and work anywhere, it would be in the Rockies.
Driving west from Denver, we passed a sign for a relatively new ski resort called Vail. It was so small then that there were no buildings or signs of life for the mile or more traveling west on I-70 between the sign for Vail and the actual exit. The last time I drove out that way, things were different. Many more houses, condos, businesses had grown up in the intervening years. But the countryside is just as beautiful — even if it’s been a bit obscured by all the development. And you can get out into the wilds of nature pretty quickly, still. Though, instead of being 5 minutes from the wilderness, you might be 15 or 20. Or maybe half an hour. I haven’t been through there in a while, however.
Like I said, Vail has gotten a bit bigger than it was back in 1971, the first time we drove past. Back then, you had to drive over Loveland Pass to go west from Denver. Now there’s a tunnel that cuts down the drive, but loses the scenery. Given the choice, I’d rather drive up and over Loveland Pass, even if it adds more time to my travels.
Saturday and Sunday, a certain reigning Tour de France champion will be in Vail, competing on both mountain and road bikes as part of the Teva Games. Landis is part of a team that includes world-class kayaker Tao Berman and trail runner Simon Gutierrez. The three are competing as Team Athletes for a Cure, raising money for prostate cancer research. For those who know mountain biking, among Landis’ competition will be Ned “Deadly Nedly” Overend, pretty much the dominant mountain biker of the late 80s and early 90s. Overend is still a fierce competitor at just a couple years past the half century mark.
Landis will compete in a 21-mile mountain bike race on Saturday, and a 9-mile hill climb time trial (on his road bike) up Vail Pass on Sunday. The hill climb follows the same route as during the Coors Classic back in the 1980s, when another TdF-winning American, as well as five-time TdF champion Bernard Hinault, competed in what was then the US’s premier road cycling event.
Andy Hampsten, the first American to win the L’Alpe d’Huez stage in the Tour de France set the record for this climb back in 1987, clocking in at 26:33.43. Can Landis best Hampsten’s mark? That would be a true feat, given his time off from competition.
It would be exciting to watch, if I could be there. If you’re in the Vail area this weekend, go check it out. If not, go make a donation for prostate cancer research.
The next chance you’ll get to see Floyd Landis competing on a bike will be the Leadville 100 in August. With any luck, we’ll get to see Landis participating in more races in the coming years.
