For everyone who knows about my love of professional cycling...well all readers should know after my first-day-of-the-Tour post...perhaps you are wondering about my thoughts on the Floyd Landis situation. Well, I will tell you. I firmly believe that he is innocent. You all may think that I am terribly naive, especially after the results of the tests, but I am sticking to my guns. Something is terribly fishy, but yet the press wants to make a villian of him.

True, he hasn't really represented himself like smooth, suave Lance Armstrong. Lance has had seven years of defending himself in the public eye so he is very well-versed in what the media should hear, and I imagine he has a stellar PR team. Floyd, on the other hand, probably didn't think he would need any PR training, so now he is shooting himself in the foot everytime he opens his mouth. If I were his publicist I would tell him to say less, and I would tell his expert friends to quit giving excuses because the press is having a field day making fun of every new idea.

So why do I think he is innocent? He only had one positive test. Sure, it happened to fall at a very important day, but if he wanted to guarantee victory by was of artificial enhancements he would have doped up for the time trial as well. That was the day that sealed his victory. No one dopes just once. He is a hard worker. He proved that early in the season with three wins--and zero positive drug tests.

So now all you CSI fans are shouting, "But what about the tests?" Well that is a question for the UCI, cycling's governing body, and the World Anti-Doping Association. Their tests are flawed! The first flaw is that the UCI uses a testing facility that is notorious for leaking information to the press. (ie Lance Armstrong) They are not supposed to know anything about the athletes they test, but still they manage to be able to tell L'Equipe the nationality of the testee. If the results are supposed to be valid, the facility cannot know anything that could bias their results. Floyd's name should have never (according to the UCI's OWN rules) been out in the public until after the B-sample was tested. But, as the UCI stated, they had to make the announcement before the testing facility told the press. I see red flags here!

Second flaw: Operacion Puerto (OP) has already proved that science does not always work. Several athletes, ie Ivan and Jan, are in trouble for somehow being involved in a doping scandal, yet when they were recently tested after their wins, the tests found nothing. This either means that A) They are totally innocent or B) THEY DON'T WORK. I think Ivan is innocent, however.

Lastly, this whole doping thing has become nothing more than a McCarthy-esque witch hunt. Dennis McQuaid of the UCI spends most of his time bad-mouthing suspected cyclists and won't even help them claim their innocence. For example, I read in Velo News that Spanish authorities have asked the UCI for Jan's blood samples to see if they match the frozen ones from OP. The UCI refused, saying they needed to have them for their research. Wouldn't be horrible if Jan lost everything because the UCI won't help him? McQuaid has even said that if the Italain Olympic committee finds Ivan innocent, the UCI will still sanction him--and they have NO right to do that according to their own laws. Which we have seen they can't even follow in the first place.

Many people blame the drugged up cyclists for ruining the sport. I say that it is the UCI who is ruining it by dragging innocent people through the mud. GO FLOYD!!!

PS Greg LeMond needs to shut the #*$&% up. If the testing procedure was as crazy then as it is now, chances are he would have tested positive for something besides being a major naughty word that my grandmother taught me.