Tuesday Roundup

Quote of the Day

"Too much! Too much! Too much!"

(link)

News
LA Times (registration required) reports on the opening of the Floyd Fairness Fund. It's way down under "MISCELLANY". Still no link or deeper details. Maybe this isn't the official announcement but a teaser. DPF now has a thread for discussion. Expect a few "how dare you!" comments there. Ah, here's one now, from Berger at SportsBusinessRadio.

The article and a comment below say,

Tour de France champion Floyd Landis is seeking help to meet the expense of fighting the doping charges against him. A spokesman for the cyclist said he has established the Floyd Fairness Fund, which aims to raise more than $2 million in a public appeal, to help pay his bills for legal assistance and scientific experts.

Landis says he has already spent $150,000 to defend himself against the charge that he doped with testosterone during his victorious ride in the race this summer. Landis maintains he is innocent.

Landis says he will also start a separate entity, tentatively called the Athlete Fairness Organization, to help wrongly accused athletes fight doping charges and lobby for improved protection for accused competitors.

[courtesy M. Hiltzik]

It seems like AFO could also mean Athletes F-ed Over. As long as we don't confuse it with the ASO, we'll be OK.

Our Humble Logo Suggestion

The Daily Peloton covers the Witt Memorial Cycling Classic with an article by Cathy Mehl....

On a day of cool temps and cloud-filled skies, a large crowd gathered to catch a glimpse of cycling stars from the road and track as they came together to raise money for the California Firemen's Fund at the inaugural David Witt Memorial Holiday Cycling Classic in the San Diego Velodrome. However, there was much more than mere glimpses going on--it was a rare opportunity to walk up to the likes of Floyd Landis, Dave Zabriskie, Sarah Hammer and Bob Roll, shake hands and get your photos snapped as these cycling stars spent a casual day hanging around the track, raising funds for a great cause.

FL's hometown Lancaster Online.com Local Sports weighs in on the confusion from this weekend's interviews and yesterday's clarification from Michael Henson.....

- Will the outcome of a hearing in January send Tour de France winner Floyd Landis into retirement? There seems to be some uncertainty about the Farmersville native’s intentions after a pair of stories appeared on the cyclingnews.com Web site this week

Following up, an emailer provides a link to the Outside interview with Armstrong from which we got a quote yesterday by a different route.

Steve Rushin of SI has Landis in his year's snarky list of bad sports stories.

Blogs
Francine's hip is recovering from replacement. This is the kind of blog reference to Landis we'd been hoping to read over the winter.

Dugard talks about the FFF, frugality, Mr. Pound's fact-challenged ejaculation, and gives TBV a plug before talking about seasonal movies - omitting my fave, grrr. In a comment, Cathy Mehl writes of the Witt Memorial:

I went to the track race on Sunday and Floyd was in fine form--laughing, joking with everyone, racing against Friskie Zabriskie, even took a turn with the mike to interview Bob Roll. While his financial situation is probably getting more and more grave by the day, he is still able to meet his fans, pose for photos and sign, sign, sign. He was really great on Sunday. Rumor has it that this event was originally to be held at the Home Depot velodrome, but AEG didn't want to have anything to do with Floyd. Guess this means he won't be invited as a guest at Tour of California, either.

BTW, the fund that is being set up is to help him, but to help other athletes, too, that may not have the resources to fight a doping charge. I think FL is determined to go down fighting, and at least make the attempt to ensure that changes are made in the system so this doesn't happen to someone else.

Rock on, Floyd! He's an incredibly real person; you won't meet anyone more authentic than Mr. Landis.

Rant takes Mr. Pound up on his claim that he has, "no interest whatsoever in having an innocent person convicted of doping."

James Raia's PR blog goes over recent Landis news

Biking Bis says it's official, Landis and Lance at Leadville, with a link to a press release, it must be true. Robbie Ventura is coaching. UltraRob pats himself on the back breaking the story. This is now bouncing all around the MSM as well, mostly rewrites of the press release.

GoClipless muses on the Leadville rumour. Also picked up by The Goat at Backcountry, who thinks it might be a "cleaver" trick by the LT100 folks to drum up interest. MTB always was a bit more brutal than that knife like roadie stuff, so I guess the cleaver analogy works. I'm a little confused about the eligibility, though -- it is a NORBA sanctioned race, so where does that leave Landis? Anyone who understands, please let me know.

JockoHomo passes on that Mad Magazine rates Landis the #10 dumbest story of the year.

VeloGal chastises the media for mangling the Landis interviews over the weekend, and passes on this web funny featuring Floyd performing in a seasonally appropriate and Will Ferrel approved manner.

Activeness points us to the secret anti-performance enhancement agency, WAC, and to the Daily News article. It would be funny if Floyd left them a comment.

Snark o' the Day
Nigel Wynn chomps on the record non-attempt, and gives a hint why Landis and Z-man were on their road bikes at the Witt Memorial:

He didn't do it because he didn't have the right bike. Sounds like a massive excuse to us. But Landis got bucked off a track bike when he went to do a couple of laps of the track, which makes things better. Get used to riding fixed, Floyd, you'll be working as a bike messenger next year.

This is a followup to his previous snark.

Forums
At DPF, Kitty on Wheels comes up with a grab bag of relevant quotes from riders we hadn't seen before, crediting ProCycling as the original source:

Dave Zabriskie: “The riders have a small voice. We are not unionised. We don’t come together well. We need a strong union so we can all be on the same page. I was really disappointed at the Tour when the director of the race was laying down the rules, and we were all in a room. We had all the teams and all the riders together, but no one said anything, even though that’s what was on everyone’s mind. It would have been a good time for someone to stand up and say, ‘What the f**k. Let’s talk about it while everyone is here’ …I’m in a precarious situation because Floyd is a good friend of mine and Basso was a team-mate. I love them both. For the moment, I have to believe Floyd. I’m not scared, it’s just a lot of things don’t make sense right now…”

Sean Petty, CEO of USA Cycling: “…the riders don’t have much of a voice right now. I know the riders are concerned because this can, and will, affect their livelihood because you are not going to get these $15-million-a-year sponsors to step up if we can’t show that we are making the effort to run a clean sport…”

Jonathan Vaughters: “…most of the riders are caught in the crossfire. The more they talk about doping, the more attention it gets in the media, which is going to destroy their sponsorships…. Spouting your mouth off as a rider only breeds contempt. It’s not because everyone is a doper, it’s because you are alienating sponsors by speaking out and sponsors are the lifeblood of the sport.”

Tony Cruz: “In a way there is kind of an unwritten code where certain things aren’t talked about. [Floyd’s] a good guy. He’s a smart guy. I don’t see how that could have happened. He’s too smart to be that stupid. I think there is something really fishy there and it bums me out…. I really think there has to be a union for cyclists where we can all stand up and have a voice. We need to protect ourselves, we need to protect our sport more than it currently is.”

Riffing
"Floyd Fairness Fund?"

That's one F-ed up name, man.

Is this part of that company on Sesame Street that started as "Peter Piper's Products that begin with the letter P", then renamed, "Sam's S Stuff Store"?

What's the deal with alliteration anyway? Always aligned with assonance, albeit awkwardly.

[ba-ding]

Thanks, we'll be here all week. You've been great!

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