Something's amiss, WADA doc claims

Something may be amiss with the result of the test, both a former pro cyclist and a WADA physician speculate. The WADA is responsible for the lab in France that administers the tests on the riders of the Tour de France.

From "Mark Conley: We shouldn't be surprised by Landis' plight" (link)

Since the sample taken after that stage is the one that has implicated Landis, it's easy to connect the dots and speculate his super-hero performance was anything but au naturale.

At least one former pro rider, "Fast Freddy" Markum of Santa Cruz, believes that's a bit too easy of a connection.

"They had probably tested him a dozen times over the course of the race to that point, so the last one comes up positive?" Markum says. "I smell a rat."

Markum, a two-time Olympian who raced against Greg LeMond in his prime and Armstrong in his infancy, smells a French rat, to be specific.

"The French have been so anti-American since Lance's second or third Tour win, they've tried to tear him down for so long now," Markum says, referring largely to the newspaper L'Equipe. "It's just a witch hunt at this point. They're tearing their own sport apart."

A World Anti-Doping Agency doctor agreed Thursday something seems amiss, telling an Associated Press medical writer, "Something's missing here. It just doesn't add up." If Landis had been cheating all along, then why wasn't there a positive test earlier in the race? The idea that he could load up effectively between his 16th stage death ride and his 17th stage super-heroics is bunk, the doctor said.