Tour de France winner admits doping

Today 2006 Tour de France winner Floyd Landis has finally admitted to doping. Not only has he admitted to a single incident of doping, but he has admitted to doping in numerous forms for lengthy periods beginning with his time with the US Postal team.

Landis was sensationally stripped of his 2006 Tour victory whilst riding for the Phonak team shortly after tests revealed that he had taken more amounts of testosterone than a Chinese female swimmer. It is the only time that a Tour winner has been stripped of the title.

This positive test was no surprise to many as he had crumbled dramatically in stage 16 of the 2006 Tour only to explode in stage 17 effectively riding a 125km time trial to win the stage and surge from 11th position in the general classification to 2nd place, only 30 seconds behind yellow jersey wearer Oscar Pereiro. Landis then rode on to gain the yellow jersey and hold it coming into Paris securing an unimaginable victory.

The media at the time hailed Landis as a modern day hero after a herculean effort. Secretly, however, there were rumblings in the cycling fraternity that his feats were not natural. His tests later revealed these rumblings were true.

The most ridiculous aspect to Landis' admission was that he spent approximately $2 million in legal fees arguing that he had not used performance enhancing drugs when all along he knew that he had. Who knows the reason behind his seemingly pointless and financially ridiculous argument, but it is clear that Landis went to the same school of honesty as sprinter Marion Jones. Whatever his reasoning, to the outsider he must be a dead certainty for a Darwin award.

The story, however, does not end there. Not satisfied with having wasted approximately $2 million in legal fees fighting to 'clear his name' Landis starting throwing mud in all directions and most obviously at former US Postal teammates Lance Armstrong and George Hincapie. These two have dismissed the claims saying Landis has no credibility and after having fought his legal fight dishonestly, you tend to agree with them. What's for sure is that after Landis' comments this years Tour will not necessarily be about the riding but more about who's clean and who's not.