What gives with this testosterone scandal? Can't the body create high testosterone levels with high intensity exercise?

Which of these cyclists (Landis is in yellow, of course) has a T-E ratio higher than 6.0? Answer: probably ALL of them!

The answer to the title of this posting is "yes"!

Yet, Floyd Landis is going through a personal "hell" as a result of a higher than average level of testosterone in his system.

As far back as during the Lance Armstrong years (shown on the right -- he won the Tour de France from 2000 to 2005, inclusively), I have been very interested in the matter of testosterone levels in athletes and how one can determine when high levels are "natural" results of the day's activities versus when they are the result of illegal "doping" -- the use of patches an/or pills and/or special medications ... etc.



Most of you (who follow sports) know that officials in professional sports (sports wherein money is involved) use the ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone (T/E Ratio) as the key. Most of us carry a 1:1 ratio, but athletes are known to be able to get rations up to about 5:1 or even 6:1 during and shortly after very high intensity activities. Can't you smell it in the weight room while working out with a bunch of jocks? Typically, a 6:1 ratio is used as the limit beyond which athletes are allowed to test. That, in itself, is crazy.

There are newer tests involving a test of the red blood cells (instead of the urine) which can measure higher-than-average levels of something called, "hematocrit." But guess what? You're right! Athletes can also show higher-than-average hematocrit after high intensity exercise. Lance Armstrong went through year-after-year of such testing and sometimes he "passed" and sometimes he didn't. He (Lance Armstrong) offered to take a polygraph test, but the officials refused to do that.

To his credit, Oscar Pereiro Sio from Spain (lower left -- in front), who finished second in the race that ended last Sunday (the 23rd), has stated that he isn't interested in "winning" the Tour de France as a result of testing for testosterone.



But this whole matter -- in all sports, including baseball and all of the problems that Mr. Bonds is having as he races after Hank Aaron's home run record -- is one that needs to be settled soon. A 100% accurate polygraph-type test is needed, independent of its "constitutionality" or whatever other ethical/political concerns might be involved.

We need sports heroes and we need to know that they aren't doping their ways to the top.

I have no perfect solution to this one and haven't talked to my brother, Richard from Connecticut, yet today to learn what his perfect solution might be.

More to come on all of this as we await the "second sample" taken from Floyd Landis.