Monday Roundup

News
Pez covers French interview.

NPR's Fresh Air today has an interview with Mr. Pound. He's plugging a new book, Inside Dope: How Drugs Are the Biggest Threat to Sports, Why You Should Care, and What Can Be Done About Them

Says his swimming peers weren't doping, but field competitors and weightlifters probably. One prompt for WADA was '98 Festina/Tour scandal; Also Samaranch misstatements created a firestorm. Consensus independant agency because Federations couldn't do it on their own. Needs a combination of sport and government. Talks about Kelli White and "concocted explanations". Insufficient penalties for enablers (doctors, chemists, etc.). Complaints about masking agents and ducking OoC tests. Talks about "The Whizzinator".

What does he think is a fair penalty? "Our consensus" settled on two years. Pro sport teams aren't interested in that. The thought of losing a star for two years because of a little thing like drug use is unthinkable to them. Baseball's 50 game suspension is a big improvement over previous state of no real penalty until 5th offense. Do you try to be controversial? "It's part of the job description," and "The people who scream are not the athletes who are playing fair."

Marion Jones: Why comment before there was a violation? "I have to respond to questions," he says.

Standard of proof? "Not a criminal matter." Believes "comfortable satisfaction" is good enough.

Blogs
The Calgary Herald Press Display says that Floyd is annoying.....

FloydLandis.com officially announces Slide Show 2.0 will be presented at El Tour de Tucson on the 17th at 5:30pm. Dr. Arnie Baker is promising new revelations and arguments.

Comments appear to be open, usual moderation delays.

Dugard talks about Landis again, and a prospective book. It's high drama, you gotta admit.

Rant has some New Rules applicable to the Landis case.

Craig Hackney commentary at Sportingo on testosterone usage generally argues for less restriction, and better health monitoring, with this on Landis:

Cyclist Floyd Landis’s positive test came as a bit of a surprise, although his recovery, after blowing up in the mountains, was nothing short of miraculous. On the surface it seems like a stupid way to get caught. Testosterone isn’t a fast-acting drug, so on that ground his protests of innocence have some merit. Whether his positive test was as a result of blood doping, or any one of a number of other possibilities, is irrelevant - the damage that this will do professional cycling will be immense. This year's Tour de France will be forever tainted by drug accusations, not only by Landis’s transgression, but by the loss of a large number of front runners to drug accusations before the race even started. Sadly, this year will not stand out as an exception, with a drug cloud hanging over the race since the 60s.

Self-proclaimed Gods of Sport remain underwhelmed by the blame-the-lab excuse.

Khabar Bike covers the French Interview.

Brand Destruction Research replies to TBV's comments, basically saying Landis is still intercoursed, and still isn't being forceful enough in the attacks on the Lab.

light globes is like totally on the ball -- wants Phonak to dump Landis to give Axel his chance.

Forums
At DPF, a rambling discussion of true and false positives and negatives, with many opinions and few conclusions. One-mint-julich postulates Landis is more likely to be innocent as the only one flagged positive than if there had been many, based on the statistics.

Italian Forum has been loosely following since document release; more sympathetic than you might suppose.

Comments to AFP article in French, and translated, offers this beauty:

“I am innocent! ”, my buttocks oué

so not all of France is maintaining a dignified restraint.

Snark O' the Day
Not directly related, but came upon this jape about track running:

Sprinters have used drugs for so many years that we are now in a situation where it is physically impossible to break the world 100m record without using drugs. As soon as Gatlin broke the 100m world record he should have been banned - it's the clearest test for cheating.

It's like winning The Lottery (commentary).

[end]