The Tour de France champ will be stripped of his 2006 title and suspended from competition.
By Michael A. Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer


A three-member arbitration panel today found 2006 Tour de France champion Floyd Landis guilty of doping with testosterone during the marquee race and stripped him of his title. The panel's 2-1 ruling also suspended the Murietta-based cyclist from further competition until Jan. 29, 2009.

The ruling, which follows a nine-day evidentiary hearing held in May, is likely to spur considerable controversy over the legal standards employed by the international anti-doping program, which is overseen by the World Anti-Doping Agency. The panel, for example, ruled that the initial testosterone screen of Landis' urine sample was done improperly by WADA's Paris laboratory and threw those results out. But it upheld the later confirmation test performed by the same lab, even though the confirmation would not have been performed if the initial screen had been ruled clean.

The panel majority also acknowledged that the Paris lab's procedures, which had been questioned by Landis' defense, gave "some cause for concern." But it found that its shortcomings did not invalidate the ultimate results.

In a strongly worded dissent, arbitrator Christopher Campbell contended that the evidence at the hearing demonstrated "beyond a reasonable doubt" that the Paris lab was "not trustworthy" and "failed to abide by its legal and ethical obligations." He said Landis should be found innocent.

Landis' attorney, Maurice Suh, said after the ruling that the cyclist and his defense team were "weighing all our options," possibly including seeking a review of the case in a federal court or pursuing an appeal to the International Court of Arbitration for Sport.