Floyd Landis Doping Case - Doping Accusation

Doping Accusation

On July 27, 2006, four days after Tour had finished, the Phonak Cycling Team announced Floyd Landis had a urine test come back positive, having an unusually high ratio of the hormone testosterone to the hormone epitestosterone (T/E ratio) after the epic performance in Stage 17. Landis denied having doped and placed faith in a test using his backup sample. Phonak stated that he would be dismissed should the backup sample also test positive. It did, and Landis was suspended from professional cycling and dismissed from his team. Landis's personal physician Arnie Baker later disclosed that the test had found a T/E ratio of first 12:1, later 11:1, in Landis, far above the maximum allowable ratio of 4:1. The test on Landis's Stage 17 A sample had been performed by the French government's anti-doping clinical laboratory, the National Laboratory for Doping Detection (LNDD). LNDD is a division of the Ministry of Youth, Sport, and Social Life and is accredited by WADA, the World Anti-Doping Agency. The B sample confirmed the A sample, and also tested positive for an unnatural source of testosterone.

Following the reported positive drug test on his A sample, Landis suggested that the results had been improperly released by the UCI. On August 9, 2006, UCI president Pat McQuaid rejected the claim, saying, "We acted correctly. We informed the team, the rider, and the federation that there had been an irregularity. Then we issued a press release saying that an unnamed rider had been found positive in the Tour. Landis's team published his name, two days later... I have full faith in that laboratory, and there are stringent measures kept in place by the anti-doping agencies to ensure they proceed correctly."

Landis has written a book titled Positively False which contains his personal account of the case and in which he maintains his innocence.