Landis More Than a Snitch

Update: The Internatinal Cycling Union (UCI) has requested that four countries open investigations into the allegations made by Landis. Johan Bruyneel, a longtime associate of Lance Armstrong, is among those to be investigated.

On Wednesday, cyclist Floyd Landis wanted to clear his conscience. What he did was more than that.

While conducting a telephone interview with ESPN's Bonnie Ford, Landis finally confessed to what many of us had though for almost four years...Landis admitted to using performance enhancing drugs. But the 2006 Tour de France champ who was later stripped of his title after failing a doping test dropped a bomb on the sport that had made him.

Landis singled out American riders Lance Armstrong, George Hincappie, Levi Leipheimer, Dave Zabriskie and Canadian rider Michael Berry as those that have also used PEDs. Landis went so far as to send numerous e-mails to the various governing bodies within the sport of cycling, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) with his allegations. Sure, cycling has had it's darker days and is still somewhat considered a "dirty" sport because it's assumed that almost all the riders use or they have a way around a positive test. Landis even points to Armstrong and Johan Bruyneel, Lance's longtime coach, as having the means to "avoid" a positive test by even claiming a payoff for a positive result by Armstrong in 2002. Needless to say, all that Landis have pointed to strongly refute his claims. WADA president John Fahey and IOC president Jacques Rogge, recipients of some of the Landis e-mails, have both stated that Landis will need concrete evidence to back up his claims. Landis admits he has no such evidence except for personal journal entries which would then bring about the infamous "he said, he said" scenario.

Sounds almost like a Jose Canseco episode here, but it's not if you really think about it...for now, anyways.

When Canseco penned his booked Juiced, it was a ploy only to obtain finances. Which he did. What a better way to make some cash than throw people under the bus. But Canseco was insightful with his allegations and his book ultimately led to MLB now having a drug policy. Same can't be said in Landis' case because cycling has some form of testing already in place and it has for at least the better part of a decade. And Landis has already tried the book thing. He authored his autobiography entitled Positively False in which he avoids the 2006 Tour in a lot of ways, but doesn't hesitate to tell of his unfair treatment after his positive test and the appeals process. The book's done so well, you can find it on Amazon for as low as $2.74. (I have provided the link just to show you.)

What Landis may have commenced is cycling's own version of the Mitchell Report. All Landis has to hope for is at least one person to buy into his little story and an investigation could ensue.

Landis said his defense cost him almost $2 million. He set up the Floyd Fairness Fund to aid in offsetting his legal expenses and to ensure no other athlete should have to be subjected to such a harsh road as he trod in his defense. Now, he comes clean after his "fund" had raised almost $1 million.

I'm not saying Landis is a liar for his accusations, but his credibility is far from perfect considering that for almost four years he's been telling the world he did not cheat and that his sample was mishandled by as French testing lab. His denials were an outright lie, so why should anyone believe him now? He's put himself in this situation and despite his screaming and kicking, no one may even care.

I hope Landis' conscience is clear, but I have a question for him. Sending e-mails? Even Canseco wouldn't stoop that low.

One last thing and the reason why I named this post "...more than a snitch". Shouldn't Landis have to refund any monies taken in from his little fund and the monies that his publisher advanced him on a book in which the main thrust was a defense that's an outright lie? That's the reason why Landis is more than a snitch. He scammed people and a publisher out of money.

But we shouldn't be surprised. He did it for almost four years.