December 21, 2006 – Floyd Landis (formerly with Phonak), winner of the 2006 Tour de France, but who tested positive for testosterone soon after, now has a legal precedent in his favour, reports AP. Landis will plead his case before the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) in early 2007. The USADA previously rejected Landis’ motion to have charges against him dropped.

Spanish cyclist Inigo Landaluce tested positive for testosterone during the Dauphiné Liberé race in 2005. He was subsequently acquitted of all charges by the Swiss-based Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) due to technical problems committed by the Châtenay-Malabry laboratory during the test analysis “” the same laboratory that analyzed Landis’ samples and claimed his results were positive.

“The decision by the CAS to acquit Landaluce on testosterone doping charges was based on procedural deficiencies (at Châtenay-Malabry), reinforcing my affirmation that the tests done on my samples were handled with incompetence and that ‘flawed science’ was used in their analysis,” declared Landis through his spokesman, Michael Henson.