Two scientists expressed doubts over Tour de France winner Floyd Landis’s doping results at his public arbitration hearing on Monday.
Landis, fighting to keep his 2006 Tour title after testing positive for elevated testosterone to epitestosterone (TE) levels, sat patiently as the experts testified on his behalf.
With their evidence taking up much of the seventh day, lead arbitrator Patrice Brunet said Landis would take the stand for a second time on Tuesday, when US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) lawyers will have a chance to cross-examine him.
American John Amory, a medical doctor and professor at the University of Washington, raised concerns over Landis’s test results while speaking at length about TE ratios.
”I do not consider those results to be consistent with the use of testosterone gel over a period of time,” he testified.
”And based on my review of the literature, testosterone does not have a benefit of recovery.”
Lawyers representing USADA claim small doses of testosterone, applied in gel form over a period of time, can help cyclists evade doping detection in multi-stage events.
Andrology expert Amory, who specialises in the study of functions and diseases peculiar to males, said documented studies did not support any benefits through micro-dosing.
”It would be very useful for a sprinter or a weightlifter but there is no evidence that it would be helpful for endurance sports,” he added.
Gained ground
The Landis camp also gained ground earlier in the day with testimony from Wolfram Meier-Augenstein, a German professor in stable isotope forensics at Queen’s University, Belfast.
Meier-Augenstein said he had no confidence in some of the data produced by the French laboratory outside Paris that analysed the Tour de France champion’s urine samples.
After looking at chromatography done on the Landis ‘B’ sample from Stage 17 of last year’s Tour, he said: ”This is like shooting fish in a barrel.
”You can’t go by appearances. You have to go by data. If someone’s life or career depends on it, you don’t work on assumptions.
”Even cheaters have a right to a fair hearing and to have data used against them which are sound and can proven,” he added.
At the nine-day hearing being held at Pepperdine University, three arbitration experts will determine whether Landis injected himself with testosterone.
If found guilty of doping, he faces a two-year suspension and the possibility of becoming the first Tour winner to be stripped of his title.
However, the 31-year-old could take the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
The Malibu hearing ends on Wednesday when lawyers on both sides will present closing arguments. – Reuters