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Tuesday, 29 August 2006 20:41 |
 | Erik Rhyne
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BOONE ÇƒÓ Cycling is not a popular sport in America.
But the popularity of cycling had increased in America over the past seven years ÇƒÓ thanks to Lance Armstrong.
However, Floyd Landis threw out the window everything Armstrong had done to help make the sport popular.
In the Tour de France this past year, Landis seemed like the man to take over for Armstrong.
The United States would continue its reign over the cycling world, winning the most prized race in the cycling world.
Landis had the lead for most of the race and then a horrible 16th stage
put him eight minutes back. A lot of people thought he would never be
able to overcome so late in the race.
Then something remarkable happened, Landis flew through the 17th stage
by winning and jumping into third place. On the night before the final
stage, he took the overall lead by 59 seconds ÇƒÓ one of the most amazing
comebacks in the raceës history.
Then his world turned upside down.
In late July, it was leaked that an anonymous rider had tested positive for performance enhancing drugs.
To the shock of the world, it was revealed to be Landis. He had a high testosterone count after his amazing 17th stage.
Once it was announced Landis had failed a drug test, his sponsor
dropped him from his team pending the results of the second sample.
Landis came out and defended himself quickly. Of course, he said he had
never taken any steroids. Of course, he said he would fight the results.
First, he claimed that he drank alcohol the night before the 17th
stage. Next, Landis said that he takes a small amount of hormones to
help with a thyroid problem.
Floyd, please choose an excuse.
The B sample came back positive and the Tour de France said it no longer recognized him as its champion.
He faces a two-year banÇƒÓ his career is over.
If cycling wants to increase its visibility around the world, it needs to fix its doping problem.
Just this past season, five racers were kicked off the Tour because of testing positive.
Lance Armstrong will never lose the people who still accuse him of doping.
Doping is running wild in sports ÇƒÓ baseball has started to fight back. Another sport needs to help fight the cause.
Maybe they donët care if theyëre on the back burner. If they do not fix this problem, they may not even be on the stove at all.
Erik Rhyne, who writes a weekly column for the Daily Planet, is the
sports editor of The Appalachian, the twice-weekly student newspaper at
Appalachian State University.
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