The news of the Floyd Landis decision began to filter out sometime Wednesday night, but I didn't hear about it until Thursday evening.My initial reaction, baffled.
Although the results for the recent Crankset poll are in line with the actual verdict, I'm still quite baffled. In response to T-o-03's post, I actually did expect otherwise. Consider me naive.
The scientific process, or lack thereof, in this case was in Landis' favor. What turned the tide for the majority? The analysis of Landis' remaining samples in the Spring [by the same incompetent lab]. Huh?
Yes, that is the crux of the majority decision. The original analysis, which was done sloppily and against protocol, but turned up a positive analysis was buttressed by a secondary set of analyses of Landis' remaining samples; ones which were originally analysed as "clean," but were [6-8 months] later shown to have remnants of exogenous testosterone.
I just don't get that? Did I miss something?
It may be a case where the scientific analysis finally made up the lag to catch previously untestable performance enhancments [the sad case of all sports, as new ways to cheat are light years ahead of the ability to test for it], but this decision reeks more of politics rather than of logic.
Landis options from here on out are as they say, slim to none [and slim just left]. He is suspended until January 2009 [another political move, as previous sentences have at least given the athlete time already spent]. He has the opportunity to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), but that doesn't seem likely.
USADA has NEVER lost a case on an appeal. The pendulum of the court of public opinion has now swun indefinitely against him. And, given the mental state of Landis portrayed in the New York Times piece The Outcast, it may be better [wiser] for Floyd to be Falstaffian in his next move [discretion being the better part of valor].
As has been the case of the entirety of the Landis ordeal, all the recent news has remarkably been captured by Trust But Verify.
ALSO: Triple Crankset Coverage/Reaction during the Landis Case
-- Railroaded
-- 7 Days in May
-- The Ballad of Nell
-- Day 1: The Floyd Landis Hearing
-- Hear Ye, Hear Ye
-- Ranting His Head Off
-- With Friends Like...
-- Worth His Weight In...
-- Bad Boy Floyd Could Testify Saturday
-- Landis: 'It wouldn't serve any purpose for me to cheat and win the Tour, because I wouldn't be proud of it.
-- Hero
-- Goat?
-- Day 7: The Floyd Landis Hearing
-- Day 8: The Floyd Landis Hearing
Thoughts Aside
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5 comments:
Roid Floyd the steroid abuser got busted and banned.
Big deal. Roid had no Nike contract nor media friends---like Lance Pharmstrong has.
Just be happy that another doper/liar/cheat has been caught. Very few ever are.
The TDF is a life science freak show about media advertising money. It really ought to be cancelled along with the NFL, dog fighting and extreme cage figfhting.
LIVE WRONG! Lance & Nike still do.
No surprise for me, though we are all entitled to opinions. Still, sadly, it doesn't matter much. The sport has much to do to clean up its act. This year's Tour was no window of hope. (Yet, the Vuelta has given no bad news, yet, but does anybody care?)
its frankly been so long since the actual hearing that it defused the weight of the verdict in many people's eyes...
Well Alberto, if you wanted to know if anyone cares, I think the recent comments suggest as much.
And also to Alberto's point, how can any of us ever take the pros seriously until sweeping changes are made? A long road to grind for sure.
To3 makes great points about the "justice" of it all. How can we convict Lance when the man has passed every test clean and has no concrete evidence whatsoever suggesting that he in fact doped? It IS proven however that he is indeed a genetic freak that can climb, TT and occasionally sprint.
To that end of course, Floyd HAS been found guilty and with more than circumstantial evidence. As stated by a friend of mine in the WADA world, you can't beat or cheat the carbon isotope test, period. Therefore, due process has spoken and done it's job. Floyd had every opportunity to present his case and he lost. End of story.
Now if you don't mind, I'm going to get on my rig now as it's a beautiful day. Because in the end, like Alberto, I don't care whose doping and whose not to enjoy MY sport.
Keep spinning, it's a perfect circle.
i hear you on your friend's point 53rd, but here's where i disagree to an extent...if memory serves correctly, the lab knew that those second set of samples were floyd's, CIR or not, those peaks can be adjusted as we saw with the first batch of testing...
and also, its the same thing WADA tried with LA...remember all the 1999 B samples that tested positive for EPO...its the same unethical process. all were orignally negative, and then proved positive years later.
it may seem like an apples to oranges comparison, but really its not.
science is at a distinct advantage in the doping game, but its gotta be sound too.
i'd have less of an argument and so would many if they had those samples tested at another accredited lab and the testers were blinded to the identity of those samples.
what was USADA and WADA afraid of by sending out those samples to one of their better labs? that the LNDD is incompetent? that floyd is really innocent?
they should have done it so that this would truly be an open and shut case, not one reeking with "bad" science.
but like arlene landis said, its time to let it go as her son proved his point, but it didn't make any difference.
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