Ranting A Year Away

Today marks one year since the first post appeared on these pages, a little epistle about the failure of the media to make any real sense of the scientific background to the allegations that Floyd Landis had doped on his way to winning the 17th Stage of the 2006 Tour de France.

Who’d have thought that a year later the Landis case still wouldn’t be settled? Or even that the first round of arbitration wouldn’t have produced a ruling? To be fair, the time it’s taking the arbitrators to make their decision at least gives the appearance that they may be considering all the evidence.

I’m hoping so, anyway.

What else has happened over the last year? Too much to enumerate, in some ways. The Operacion Puerto scandal seems to roll on forever. It’s latest victim (maybe): Alberto Contador. A year ago, who had even heard of Contador, other than the truly die-hard cycling fans. Anyone?

And now, he’s the winner of the Tourus Horribilis. There’s another thing I wouldn’t have guessed. The Landis scandal was bad enough. Three riders tainted by doping scandals? (Vino, Mayo and Moreni — the Sinkewitz scandal broke during the Tour, but he was already out of the race.) The yellow jersey being booted by his own team from the Tour, allegedly for lying about where he’d been training? And now, the winner being accused by a German anti-doping crusader of having actually been a part of Operacion Puerto? Could anyone have really predicted how wild and woolly this year’s Tour would turn out to be? Not me.

Who would have imagined that the powerhouse Discovery Channel Team (who had both the first and third place riders in this year’s Tour) would disband? As a New York Times article quotes Lance Armstrong:

“It’s sad for cycling, and it’s certainly sad for American cycling,” Armstrong said. He added that while he believes the sport will go on and eventually will right itself, “I’m not confident that will happen in the next 12 months.”

Yes, cycling is in a sad state right now. In between the lines of Armstrong’s comment, is he saying things will get better in a couple of years? I hope it does, but much sooner than that. The realist in me has the sense it’s going to be a while, however, before all of this mess gets cleaned up.

A year ago I figured that by now the Landis case would be completely settled, another Tour would have come and gone, and the occasional doping story would surface in the media. Maybe some of the stories would be true. Some would be mere innuendo and hearsay. And most of the sportswriters would go on their merry way, having dished the general public the occasional serving of salacious sensation.

Well, the Landis case is far from over (we haven’t even seen what the arbitrators will say, much less whether it will be appealed), doping stories are a dime a dozen, and those who traffic in sensation are reaping a bumper crop of the stuff.

The one thing that keeps nagging at me about all these doping stories is this: I get the feeling that just like politicians will throw out a red herring here or there to distract us from what’s really going on, the leaks of various riders’ results is being done on purpose, to distract us from something else. And I think that something else is the massive power struggle between the UCI, WADA and the ASO (and other race promoters).

All three are willing to use the riders as pawns in order to gain the upper hand on each other. When leaked results hit the news, I’m beginning to think, perhaps only part of the information comes from that lab so many love to hate (LNDD). But the lab shouldn’t be able to tell reporters like Damien Ressiot of L’Equipe who tested positive. They can (in theory, anyway) only tell him that someone tested positive. The UCI, on the other hand, would know which sample number matches up to which rider. Is someone in Pat McQuaid’s domain leaking stuff he or she shouldn’t?

And then there’s WADA, carrying on with Operacion Puerto. Are they really fighting for truth, justice and the Poundian way? Or is an investigation of Alberto Contador (and perhaps others, too, with the help of Jörg Jaschke) merely a way to get in a few digs at the UCI, and perhaps others, too?

Yes, Virginia, there are some cyclists who dope. But are we being spoon-fed a diet of accusations as the powers that be maneuver for advantage, while damaging or destroying their rivals? And if someone wins, what will be the collateral damage to the sport of cycling? Plenty, is my guess, although most of it has probably already happened.

For that matter, could Machiavelli have even conceived of or written a story like the one that’s being played out in pro cycling today?

At some point things will begin to settle down and the world of pro cycling will return to some semblance of normalcy. With all that’s been going on over the last few months, I wonder: Can it get any worse? (Don’t answer that. I know. It can.)

Perhaps the story in the midst of everything around us is that pro cycling is actually turning the corner. Perhaps a year from now, all of what’s transpired in the last 12 months will seem like a dream. A bad one, but a dream nonetheless.

The twists and turns of the Landis case have been something I wouldn’t even believe if I were reading it in a work of fiction. The long, drawn-out battle just to get to the hearings. The unexpected drama in Malibu (a/k/a the LeMond Incident). The lengthy deliberation period. I could have believed it would be messy. I didn’t believe it would have gotten this messy, however.

But one thing I did believe a year ago is that today, somewhere, Floyd Landis might be competing on his bike.

And today, he is. But instead of racing in Europe, he’s racing the Leadville Trail 100. And from what I hear, he’s been getting in some pretty good training up Colorado way. I’m not predicting how he’ll place (though I think he’ll have a better day than the cross-country race he did up at Vail in June), nor am I going to predict what the next year will bring. Except to say this: I hope that a year from now the doping hysteria will have died down, the Landis case will be decided, and that instead of reading stories about teams like Discovery disbanding, we’ll be reading stories about cyclists doing what it is they’re supposed to do: Ride.

A year ago, there were fewer than 20 hits on this site in the course of a day. Today, there are more like 700 hits a day. Never would have thought so many people would come here and read what I have to say. To all of you, I say: Thanks. Thanks for stopping by and thanks for sharing your ideas. And keep on coming back. There’s more rants to come.

So with that, I’m going out for a ride.