Floyd Landis returns positive B sample

[Flagg]

Floyd Landis returns positive B sample

Floyd Landis is set to lose his Tour de France title and faces a two-year ban after returning a positive B sample for excessive levels of testosterone.

The American's Phonak team dismissed Landis on Saturday when it was confirmed he produced levels more than twice the legal limit after stage 17.

Landis, 30, has said the high levels detected were a "natural occurrence".

Spaniard Oscar Pereiro will be declared the winner of the Tour de France if Landis is stripped of the title.

Pereiro was second overall behind Landis in the race, which finished in Paris on 23 July, and would become the first Spaniard to win the Tour since Miguel Indurain in 1995.

The official decision to strip Landis of the victory rests with the International Cycling Union (UCI), but Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme said: "It goes without saying that for us Floyd Landis is no longer the winner of the 2006 Tour de France."

Landis said in a statement: "I have never taken any banned substance, including testosterone.

"I was the strongest man at the Tour de France, and that is why I am the champion.

"I will fight these charges with the same determination and intensity that I bring to my training and racing.

"It is now my goal to clear my name and restore what I worked so hard to achieve."

His lawyer Howard Jacobs added: "In consultation with some of the leading medical and scientific experts, we will prove that Floyd Landis's victory in the 2006 Tour de France was not aided in any respect by the use of any banned substances."

A Phonak statement said: "Landis will be dismissed without notice for violating the teams internal Code of Ethics.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/other_sports/cycling/5233476.stm

[Heidi]

1. Locking.

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