Pre-Tour Ramblings

With a certain race starting just 5 days from now in the streets of London, stories focusing on professional cycling, doping, and the Tour de France seem to be popping up in all the familiar places.

David Walsh released his latest attack on Sir Lance of Armstrong with the publication of his book “From Lance To Landis.” Apparently, he believes that this version is lawsuit-proof, having published it in the UK, as well as the United States. (Under British law, it’s easier for someone to sue for libel or slander and win — especially when that someone is a public figure.)

Over the weekend, the New York Times print edition (online version here) ran an Associated Press story about the current state of affairs with the headline reading “Hoping the Wheels Don’t Come Off in the Tour de France.” What you miss by reading the online version, though, is the call-out quote of the print version, which said:

Another doping scandal could do irreparable damage to cycling.

No!! Really?? The world of professional cycling needs another scandal like the Tour riders need a road full of tacks and glass shards on a flying descent in the mountains a few weeks from now. The destruction from either event, as far as professional cycling goes, would be of epic proportions.

What seems to be lost in almost all the stories about doping in cycling is this: Even if doping in cycling is endemic (doubtful, but let’s say so for the sake of argument), there’s more to the story than the cyclists. Somebody is helping them, cajoling them, or pressuring them into doping. And yet, the enforcement efforts and the “innovations” by the UCI focus solely on the athletes.

There are lots of others in this story who need to be held accountable, if doping in cycling is as bad as everyone says. Team owners, directeurs sportif, team doctors, and a host of others who either enable (or even run) the doping programs. Why should the cyclists pledge a year’s salary if they get caught, when no one else is has to do the same? Shouldn’t a team owner have to give up a year of his income if he’s found to be running a doping program? Shouldn’t a sports official have to give up a year’s salary for violating rules on confidentiality? Shouldn’t a lab official have to give up a year’s salary for leaking a story to the media?

As one person I was speaking to at a race this weekend observed, it’s because pro cyclists don’t have a strong union that they get walked over by the rest of the cycling establishment. Do you honestly think that the players in the World Cup finals would sign such an agreement as the UCI is foisting on pro cyclists? Or NFL players playing in the Super Bowl? Or any other big-time sport? Of course not. Why? Because they have strong representation.

But when labs release information inappropriately, or various officials spew forth about things the rules say they shouldn’t, there’s no accountability. And therein lies part of the problem. These scandals are, in part, due not just to those who cheat, but to those who violate their own rules and pronounce individuals guilty before the accused has even seen the charges against him or her.

(Don’t believe that someone can be found guilty in the court of public opinion before he has received the documentation about the charges against him? Go back and study the Floyd Landis case. He didn’t receive the lab’s documentation until 6 weeks or so after the initial results were reported in the media — long after trial by media had already convicted him, and months before the relative strengths/weaknesses of his case became known to the world.)

People who have not spoken until now, like Jamaica’s David Weller, who was a bronze medalist at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow, are offering up their own advice as to what Landis should do:

“Now, after all this, the best thing for him to do is drop it, just go away and be quiet.”

Weller benefited in Moscow from a certain boycott by various countries, who were incensed over the USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan. Had all the teams from all the countries shown up, Weller may not have become an Olympic medalist at all. And very curiously, of all the Olympics since 1968 — when the IOC instituted drug testing — only one has had no positive results reported. Care to guess which one? Moscow, of course.

Which is odd, when you think about it, given how many East Bloc countries had doping programs. I suppose there’s a perfectly rational explanation for it. But the only explanations I can think of are these:

• Either the Eastern Bloc countries managed to find ways to successfully avoid detection, or
• The fix was in

Hmm. Then again, maybe it’s not so strange. The fox really was guarding the hen-house that year.

Getting back to the Landis case, however, Weller’s advice is pretty much, “Shut up and go away.” If Landis is innocent, as he claims (and as the overwhelming amount of evidence backs up), then shutting up and going away would be the wrong thing to do.

And, of course, what run-up to the Tour would be complete without an interview with Greg LeMond, whose story about why he retired from racing in 1994 has changed over the last 13 years. An interview with Paul Kimmage in The Times (UK) focuses on a great deal on the LeMond Incident at the Landis hearings and all that entailed. LeMond and his wife, Kathy, come off as angry, bitter people in describing their feelings about Floyd Landis and what happened at the hearings.

Certainly, the momentary lapse in judgment that led to the call traumatized Greg LeMond a great deal. For what happened to him as a youngster, he has my sympathy.
In deciding to testify against Landis, LeMond surely knew he would be facing some questioning that would be uncomfortable, to say the least. (Why else would he bring his attorney?) Even if the abuse story he told Landis never came up.

But having told Landis that story, there was a good chance that it would, depending on what questions USADA’s lawyers were planning on asking LeMond about the conversation between Landis and him. Landis, himself, might have been asked about the conversation in which LeMond’s revelation took place. Going in, Greg LeMond should have been concerned his secret would come out — even without having received that fateful phone call the night before.

Simply put, there was no upside to Greg LeMond participating in those hearings, and there was plenty of downside.

Apparently Greg and his wife think Floyd Landis owes them some sort of apology. Landis wasn’t the one who made The Call, however. And the person who did actually tried to apologize to LeMond. But LeMond, for whatever reason he chose, brushed aside that apology when it came. What more does he want or expect? Apparently, criminal prosecution:

I just hope the DA goes after him [referring to Landis].

It’s been a long, sad spectacle over the last year since Operacion Puerto reared its ugly head and caused 9 riders to be booted from the 2006 Tour before it even started. The year gone by has certainly been filled with more than its share of doping stories.

Perhaps the 2007 Tour will be the beginning of a much-needed turnaround for professional cycling. But for the scandals to stop coming, the officials who head the sport will need to focus not just on cheating riders, but others who help them cheat. And they’ll need to focus on those on the inside of the anti-doping system who cheat, too, by breaking their own rules and who are not held to account.

Just as doping makes a mockery of fair competition, so too do people who flout their own rules, or who selectively apply the rules. There are a number of clean riders competing. Perhaps even the majority. Let’s hope that at this Tour, another clean rider doesn’t wind up being falsely accused. The Amaury Sports Organization and the UCI should take note of other events that have been switching their anti-doping tests to other labs.

For the integrity of the sport, and for the integrity of the Tour, these test results need to be beyond reproach. Continuing to use LNDD only ensures future controversy. Sending the tests elsewhere would do a lot to boost the confidence of all sports fans that the results — when properly disclosed — are trustworthy.