The following attachment is a slide show presentation, in defense of Floyd Landis’s innocence, that was presented at the El Tour de Tuscon over this past weekend by Arnie Baker, MD.
This slideshow presents a complete lack of competence on behalf of the french laboratory that conducted the testing for the Tour de France.
If the information presented in this slideshow is true. The WADA and USADA have a lot of explaining to do and the french laboratory should be sanctioned.
I’m all for the WADA catching and busting drug cheats, however, if in their zealous pursuit of busting drug cheats, they are prosecuting innocent athletes. The WADA needs to be overhauled immediately.
Wow, I don’t usually say much about doping as I really don’t worrry about things beyond my control, but this is really an interesting bit of info. Dr. Baker seems to have shown enough mistakes that no reasonable person could conclude that Landis doped, and actually seems to be under attack for no reason at all. I really think government regulators need to work to ensure drug testing is something that is 100% legit. I look forward to seeing Landis beat this and coming back to race the TDF next year, whether he wins or not.
I’m yet to look through the whole thing, but the argument on slide 6 is not water-tight. Firstly, the contested digit looks far more like the other handwritten "4"s on the document than the handwritten “6”. Secondly, asking people to identify that number is immaterial unless you ask people of the same nationality as the person who wrote the number. (For instance, I could easily see my Czech wife writing the number 4 like that, and have also often misread numbers she has written.)
Lab work is a numbers game. The opposing “view” should be a series of verifible, reproducible results from the lab were the testing took place. All I see on those lab reports are numbers which are many, many sigma beyond the standard deviation established by WADA. So many sigma that the sample should be rejected… well, I take that back, one could accept the initial findings of the lab, but the quoted confidence interval should be ~20%.
Consider this interpretation:
If a man weighed 180lbs and I selected a confidence interval of 20%, I could guess his weight as 42 or 221lbs and still be within my selected confidence regime. That’s a very poor statistical method for determining the quality of a best-fit or finding.
Consider this interpretation:
If a man weighed 180lbs and I selected a confidence interval of 20%, I could guess his weight as 42 or 221lbs and still be within my selected confidence regime\
isn’t that onus on you to present both sides of an argument vs just the side that you choose to support. The other poster is merely saying that an argument like this is a two legged chair. Means nothing without the debatable other side.
drugs are putting this sport in great perile, but this media fronted, litigious casting of doubt will absolutely kill it. Just my opinion. done and out.
Why should he have to put out both sides? He presented something he read and told why he likes it or what he likes about it. If someone wants the other side they have to go get it.
The accepted opposing view to this point has been that Floyd Landis failed his drug test after the 17 stage of the tour de france with a T/E ratio of 11 to 1. I posted the slide show to make arguement that perhaps Floyd Landis did not fail his drug test after all. What I’m looking for, and have yet to find, is any opposing view (WADA or USADA?)that argues against the findings and facts as presented in the slide show. If there is an opposing view to the evidence as presented in the slide show, I would love to see it.
wada et al will argue their case in Court. Landis in the public forum. If the public is being used and abused like this, it should be noted that the case that is being presented by this entity ( landis’ team in this case ) will present a one sided view. This is enough for the supporters of this view to perpetuate it as all damning to wada et al. I am presonally tired of the constant argument that brings into question a labs integrity and agenda whenever there is an athlete in question is popular ( like Hamilton, armstrong … ).
I want to see the WHOLE story, and if one side is presented (like in this slide show ), the other should be presented at the same time. Tell the WHOLE story.
Anyone forwarding this is remiss in presenting it all. the more times it is forwarded, the more it becomes fact in the publics eye. Its how the media works and Landis’ team is quite good at using this ( as have many other highly public athletes tests )
That’s why both sides should be presented.
Blow your brains out debating this on partial stories, but I’ll wait for the whole thing. Or does that not suit what you would like to believe?
I’ll leave that with you to debate amongst yourselves. Done on this topic.
I thought WADA had released their side of the story to the press, which prompted this rebuttal from Landis. I don’t know that WADA has released their rebuttal to Landis rebuttal.
In many ways, Landis’ team is doing WADA a favour by outlining their case so far in advance. It gives Pound a lot of time to prepare for the hearing.
I just went through every slide of the presentation. Its hard to imagine, after doing so, that there is much of an “opposing view”. I would really like to see USADA/WADA’s retort to that presentation. Much of what Dr. Baker had to say was supported by screen shots of the labs own analysis.
wada will release their side of the story in completion in the courts. For now, they have released the ‘basis’ while the opposing side would already like to begin the trial publicly. Its easy to be dazzled by a presentation that few are experts in. A few buzz words, a few figures and there you have it. the fact that there is opinion that this is even kosher to publicly debate without all the information is disheartening in itself. Normal but disheartening.
gotta go and chase down the WMD’s now. Those were real too. - with cool slides to boot.
Well, I guess it is disheartening to me that it seems like USADA and WADA are violating their own rules. They certainly did so when the released Floyd’s A test as being positive before they conducted the B test.
Does everyone remember the movie ‘Chicago’ with Rene Z. and Catherine Z. Jones?? I’m sure we’ve all watched it about 10 times on the trainer.
Remember that scene with the lawyer working over the media and the public like they were his puppets? This is what Floyd’s lawyers are currently up to.
Don’t pretend you haven’t watched ‘Chicago’ 10 times. It’s like Moulin Rouge, we’ve all sung to it while on the trainer over and over.
Don’t pretend you haven’t watched ‘Chicago’ 10 times. It’s like Moulin Rouge, we’ve all sung to it while on the trainer over and over.
Fortunately, I don’t have to pretend as I’ve never seen either of those movies. Although I did get a chuckle out of the thought of training to musical numbers. I also happen to agree with you that this is Floyd’s team softening the public. He may very well be innocent (and I hope he is), but I really want to hear the rebuttal.
“wada et al will argue their case in Court. Landis in the public forum.”
This is hysterical. WADA uses the “Court of Public Opinion” like no other organization I can think of. They routinely leak testing results to the general public regardless of whether they follow their own protocols. I’m not saying Landis is innocent, but lets not act as if WADA is known for doing things “by the book”. They can’t even follow the book that they wrote themselves.
please, this is all part of the descreditation that is perpertuated by ‘athletes in question’ legal camps. Wag the dog… Lets stick to the issue - cheating is killing sports!
for the record, would love to see Landis be innocent. Would not be happy if he is guilty and got off on a technicality.