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Doping in Athletics – Letter to Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis

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If you follow athletics (running and cycling) you will have certainly heard about some of the following stories.

Marion Jones – Denied any involvement in doping for years, threatened to sue anyone who accused her of doping, and of course, always maintained she never tested positive as her main defense for not doping.

Needless to say, she didn’t account for or explain her involvement with CJ Hunter, or Trevor Graham.

In fact, it wasn’t until the BALCO scandal broke that Marion Jones was caught up in the BALCO scandal (no positive test mind you) that she fell from grace and spent time in prison for perjury.
Now, we won’t go too far into the doping scandals, we’ll cover some of those later. This is important as we look at the Floyd Landis/Lance Armstrong situation. For those of you who don’t know, Landis won the Tour de France in 2006, and was stripped of his title after a skewed testosterone/epitestosterone ratio. Keep in mind, prior to Landis’ positive test, he did not admit to doping. As a matter of fact, it wasn’t until 2010 that Landis admitted to doping.

Keep in mind that Floyd Landis was a team mate of Lance Armstrong on the USPS team.

Now, go back 1 week, to the May 2010 Tour of California, and you’ll see that Landis suddenly changed his story about his 2006 positive test, admits to doping and then “throws everyone under the bus” as we call it. Subsequently, Landis stated that Armstrong was doping, and implicates others in cycling.

In typical knee jerk fashion, Lance Armstrong issues a public denial. In addition, Team Radio Shack publishes a bizarre string of emails sent from Landis to Tour of California leadership as well as Landis’ personal physician.

Emails here.

Questions:

1. What do these emails have to do with whether Lance Armstrong used Performancing Drugs (PEDs)?

2. Why would Team Radioshack publish these emails? This a team who looks to a sponsor, and they are publishing emails referencing very non professional issues.

3. Does publishing these emails further the stated goal of Livestrong? (Livestrong is in the domain name (livestrong.com/teamradioshack)

4. Does publishing these emails further the stated goal of Radioshack’s corporate mission?

5. Do these emails address whether Lance Armstrong used Performance Enhancing drugs? (We say no).

Another weak argument used by Armstrong/Bruyneel is that Landis’ doping allegations have no merit because he previously denied ever doping, despite his 2006 positive test. So using this logic, are you telling me that the only people who are credible are those who have never told a lie?

Now, Armstrong constantly refers to his innocence as being supported by the fact that he has no positive tests. Wait….So if you have never tested positive for a drug, you’ve never used it? Wow, this is fantastic. I suppose everyone who ventures into a bar has never had a beer unless they tested positive for alcohol?

Certainly this article is not meant to be any sort of indictment that Armstrong has used performance enhancing drugs. It’s more of a message to cycling and Armstrong that you have to be kidding us if you think that these weak explanations hold any water.

Let’s look at the facts:

1. Armstrong was on the same team as Floyd Landis who tested positive.

2. Armstrong was on the same team as Tyler Hamilton who tested positive.

3. Armstrong was associated with Michele Ferrari who worked with Armstrong and the USPS team. Ferrari is quoted as saying “EPO is not dangerous, it’s the abuse that is. It’s also dangerous to drink ten liters of orange juice.”

Various sources on cycling doping (Erwann Menthéour etc.) claim that Michele Ferrari was one of the best doping doctors, with unparalleled expertise at avoiding detection. They quote an amusing comparison – that Eric Rijkaert, the doctor of the Festina team, was nicknamed “Punto” (a small model of Fiat automobile) for his carefulness compared to the high performances yielded by Ferrari. His public statements reveal a pragmatist whose aims was to get the best results without getting caught.

“If it doesn’t show up in the drug controls, then it’s not doping,” Michele Ferrari

On a related note, Floyd, you make these allegations about Lance Armstrong and many others at the Tour of California, and then 4 days later, you show up to the TT event in Los Angeles? Wow.

Lance, the only other thing I would ask is why don’t you think that your “Tweets” are the same as your public statements to the media. Last year, you went public with your dislike of Contador on twitter, yet you publish books titled “It’s not about the bike”. Decide what you want to be. Are you trying to be a narcissistic hyper competitive cyclist who can’t control his impulses on twitter, get in arguments with team members over your unwillingness to support a better athlete, or are you an ambassador for cancer survivors.

Whatever the answer is, Lance, I suggest you look at the consistency of your messaging, because it doesn’t line up.

In summary, cycling (and running) has a long history of performance enhancing drugs. To say that one never used drugs because there were no confirmed positive tests is ridiculous.

Lance if it’s really “not about the bike”, think about your tweets and the message you send.

List of doping cases in cycling.