The Wheels Have Come Off At The Floyd Landis Hearing

The Floyd Landis arbitration hearing has been going on for a few days, and for the most part it's been fairly mundane. That was until yesterday.

On Thursday, Greg LeMond took the stand to testify that during a phone conversation the two had Landis had hinted to him that he had used performance enhancing drugs. As if that wasn't interesting enough, he also dropped a bombshell about how he had told Landis a secret of sexual abuse by an uncle that he had never made public before, and how Landis' manager called him the night before he was to testify pretending to be his uncle and trying to intimidate him.

Seriously, you can't make up stuff this crazy.

Here's how LeMond recounted the creepy phone call from Landis' manager, Will Geoghegan:

"The drama escalated when USADA attorney Matt Barnett asked LeMond about a phone call Wednesday, which LeMond said he answered on speakerphone with his wife, Kathy, next to him.

The caller identified himself as “Uncle Ron” and said, “This is your uncle and I’m going to be there tomorrow,” in addition to graphic remarks describing sexual abuse, LeMond said.

After the caller hung up, LeMond said he immediately returned the phone call and got a voicemail message for someone named “Will.”

Barnett displayed the call log of LeMond’s BlackBerry with Geoghegan’s number."

It will be interesting to see how far Landis distances himself from Geoghegan, a former teammate of his from Landis' Chevy Truck mountain-bike days. The most frustrating thing for the Landis team is that LeMond's testimony about his phone call with Landis regarding steroid use wasn't all that damaging by itself, but coupled with the call from Geoghegan it casts an air of suspicion upon Landis and anyone associated with him.

The Steroid Nation has pretty coverage on this as well, and goes into a little more detail regarding the other graphic remarks.

It's Like Climbing The Col du Tourmalet, Only In A Courtroom

Yesterday, the Floyd Landis arbitration hearing got underway in California, and by most accounts it was slow and tedious.

The first bit of trouble came when lead arbitrator Patrice Brunet, who speaks French, noticed that the courtroom translator wasn't translating accurately. At one point translating the French version of "a day and a half" into "an hour and a half" in English. There wasn't any word on whether "beer" and whiskey" had to be translated.

One problem that Landis faces is that more than one sample showed signs of "abnormal testoserone levels". One of his eight samples collected during the Tour tested positive for elevated testosterone levels, and contained a type of synthetic testosterone. Four of the remaining seven samples produced "abnormal" results after undergoing carbon-isotope tests.

Another hurdle is the USADA's record in cases that head to arbitration. Currently, they are 34-0 in cases that make it to the arbitration stage. Obviously they know when to take a case to arbitration, and what to do with it once they're there. Though, that won't stop the Landis team from trying to prove that the machines and tests were manipulated in a way to make them return "positive" results.

To me, there are two ways that you could look at the idea that Landis was somehow "framed".

The first is that the French had become so upset with Lance Armstrong dominating the Tour for seven consecutive years that they were determined not to let it happen again. Whether or not it was a huge conspiracy or just confined to the French lab doesn't matter in this theory. What matters is that someone was angry enough to somehow "doctor" the results.

The second is that the French had wanted to set up Armstrong, but knew his popularity would ensure a huge storm of media coverage and scrutiny. They ultimately decided against starting a controversy of that magnitude, though they may have had something to do with the numerous doping allegations that surrounded Armstrong, especially towards the end of his participation in the Tour.

About a week ago, Landis made it known publicly that his lawyer had been approached by the USADA's head attorney, Travis Tygart, who offered Landis “the shortest suspension they’d ever given an athlete” if he gave them information about Armstrong doping. Obviously that doesn't directly tie in with the French lab or authorities because the USADA is an American agency, but it does illustrate the desire that some people may have for portraying Armstrong(and maybe even Landis) as a cheater. And if the USADA is so zealous in their pursuit of Armstrong, who's not to say that the French were the same when it came to ensuring that an American didn't win their Tour de France for an eighth consecutive time?