(Update below) Floyd Landis wanted a full and open hearing to defend the accusations that he doped during the Tour de France so the public could judge the veracity of the evidence against him.
What viewers got on Thursday was a tawdry peep show that had little relevance to the accusations, but revealed much about the depths that each side would sink to gain an advantage.
It happened when three-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond was called to testify about a phone call he'd had with Landis soon after the doping allegations surfaced last year.
The hearing
According to news accounts of the hearing, LeMond testified he had told Landis at the time — in an effort to demonstrate how keeping secrets can ruin one's life — that he'd been abused as a child. Until today, that story had never been disclosed publically.
Under questioning, LeMond then testified that on Wednesday night he received a call from someone who identified himself as Uncle Ron who said he'd be in court on Thursday to talk about how “we used to hide your weenie.”
LeMond hung up, redialed, and got a voicemail from someone called “Will.” After contacting police, they ran the phone number and discovered it belonged to Landis' business manager Will Geoghegan.
The response
After a recess, the Trust but Verify blog reports, a Landis attorney announced that Geoghegan had been fired on the spot. He's also been charged with intimidating a witness, a felony in California that could mean a trip to the Big House.
Of course, most of this has nothing to do with whether Landis did or did not take performance enhancing drugs. But who's going to remember that when a close associate of Landis is caught intimidating a witness about revealing a painfully personal story?
The USADA initially called LeMond to the stand to say that Landis told him in that phone call that he couldn't see anything good from admitting he doped, and it would hurt his friends. I'm sure that testimony would have been easy enough for Landis' lawyers to fend off.
But it didn't stop there. Now we know that LeMond was abused as a child and that Landis had hired a Neanderthal (no disrespect to the Geico cavemen) as his business manager.
The backstory to all this is that a November message in the Daily Peloton Forums regarding that phone call and attributed to Landis states, in part:
“Unfortunately, the facts that he divulged to me in the hour which he spoke and gave no opportunity for me to do the same, would damage his character severely and I would rather not do what has been done to me. However, if he ever opens his mouth again and the word Floyd comes out, I will tell you all some things that you will wish you didn't know and unfortunately I will have entered the race to the bottom which is now in progress.” (background on his excerpt at Trust but Verify)
So far, with all this public disclosure, I don't know any more about whether Landis did or didn't dope. But I do know that professional cycling can be an ugly, sordid, cut-throat business and I wonder why I waste my time following it at all.
For more check the blogs Trust but Verify and Rant Your Head Off; and news sources: VeloNews; CyclingNews; Los Angeles Times; Washington Post.
Update — Geoghegan released the following statement on Friday morning:
“I apologize to Greg LeMond and his family for the distress I caused by my call. I also apologize to the arbitration panel and to Floyd Landis and his legal team for the distraction. I have been very angry about how unfair this whole proceeding is to Floyd, a great friend and a greater champion, and stupidly tried to take out my anger on Greg. I acted on my own, impulsively, after a beer or two. I never thought about keeping Greg from testifying. If I had, I would have concluded that since Greg is such a fierce competitor my stunt would likely make him more resolved to testify. What I did was wrong and very unfair to Greg. I am very sorry about and embarrassed by my conduct.”
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