Chad's spot for various thoughts, musings, poetry, ideas and whatnot

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Well, we now have clear and irrefutable proof that the system that is supposed to ensure fair and impartial testing of athletes in olympic sports and the world and national level is broken.

A little background.

Last year Floyd Landis tested postive at the Tour de France (which he won) for an elevated testosterone to epitestosterone level in one of his urine samples. In a cross check, the lab that ran the test said it found traces of synthetic testosterone int he urine and Landis was suspended. Landis appealed showing clear evidence that the lab may have mishandled his samples and definitely did not follow protocol in dealing with the samples and in releasing the results. His claim is that the lab can't establish a cler chain of custody nor can it say the sample was even his due to mislabaling errors. From what I've been able to determine, the lab also violated protocol by having the same technician analyze both the initial sample and the cross check sample.

From what I can tell, Landis has a case and his appeal is a worthy one. The problem that became clear fairly quickly is that the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and its American counterpart (USADA) weren't really interested in looking at the evidence that Landis' legal team presented. It seemed that he was guilty and all the rest was legal speak. After a lot of fighting Landis got certain evidence admitted that was pretty damning for the French lab involved. At an arbitration trial however, it was decided to test all of his other samples for synthetic testosterone. This is a clear violation of an athlete's rights as it is only permissable to retest if the first test came back positive. The arbitration panel didn't say whether the results would be admissible at the appeal hearing, leaving that legal sticky wicket for another day. Landis' team said that if such tests were to be performed that they should be performed at a different lab than the French one that first did the tests due to conflict of interest. They recommended a lab in Los Angeles which has a proven track record of being the best at this particular test. For a variety of reasons WADA refused to do this.

Well, the results became public today. The bad part is that they weren't supposed to. The results were supposed to be confidential but someone leaked them to L'Equippe, a French sporting newspaper with strong ties to the Tour and WADA. No one knows exactly who did the leaking but it doesn't matter. In addition, one of the conditions of the test is that Landis' own experts were to be on hand to supervise the testing of the samples to make sure that protocols were fallowed along with representatives of the lab and USADA. Landis' experts were barred from parts of the testing procedures in clear violation with the arbitration panel's decision. So know one on Landis' side of the case knows exactly how the tests were done and they have only the lab's and USADA's word that the tests were done correctly. The worst part is that the urine is destroyed by the tests so now Landis can't have any independant testing done.

What does this say to me as a cyclist? Things are rotten in France and in WADA and in USADA. Why should you care? These are the organizations that test all athletes in all sports to see if they're clean. I'm a strong supporter to strong drug policies but I don't trust any of these organizations anymore. Floyd Landis may or may not have drugged. The problem is that the lab and WADA through their incompetence has made that impossible to determine. Who says there isn't some anti-American bias among lab techs in the French lab. The anti-Armstrong bias in the French lab was well documented and the animus towards American riders surely carried over. I'm certain that the French were tired of seeing American riders take home all their best trophies. That year along LAndis won the prestigious Paris-Nice, Levi Leipheimer won the third more important stage race in France, the Dauphine, and Landis won the Tour.

It's time for Landis and all cyclists to sue the hell out of WADA and the French lab in a court of the European Union. Of course, I'm not sure it will do any good as the Europeans seem to have their own concept of justice.

Thanks for Reading

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