A Dope?

I've been wondering. Did Floyd Landis really use banned drugs during the Tour de France? A sample tested after his amazing 17th-stage performance came up positive for testosterone, which is a banned steroid. Faith in science would tell us that that is strong evidence that the American was, indeed, employing forbidden compounds to help him win.

And yet....

Remember that many of the world's top riders were banned from the Tour on the eve of its start, because of a doping scandal. Remember that special pressure was on to make this tour clean. Remember that riders who win each stage, and the each day's Tour leader, are subject to drug tests. Remember that testosterone is an old drug--not one of the cutting-edge substances or techniques (like "altitude tents," which lower the air pressure so that the athlete's body becomes more efficient at using oxygen); it is hardly probable that a drug test would miss it in a rider's system. Now Floyd Landis may not be a brain-trust, but is he (or are his team mangers) dumb enough to use such a substance? Especially when he had dropped to 11th place and seemed to be out of the running for the overall title?

This reminds me of the that the authorities in LA charged the great lawyer Clarence Darrow with jury-tampering. Darrow hired a well-known (and well-pickled) Los Angeles criminal lawyer named Earl Rogers to defend him, but as the trial went on Darrow took on more and more of the defense. He wound up giving the closing argument, during which he reviewed the state's case. The prosecution alleged that Darrow had stood on a street corner while his chief investigator passed a bribe to a juror, in broad daylight and in full view of several police and district attorney's investigators well known to both Darrow and his investigator. Darrow went over that with the jury and concluded, "Ladies and gentlemen, if you think I did that, then you should convict me. I certainly belong in some state institution!"