Tyler's Truth

American cyclist Tyler Hamilton was supposed to challenge Lance Armstrong when he left his team, US POSTAL, in 2002 and ride for team CSC against his former leader. Butbad luck, injuries and talent didn't allow him to mount a strong challenge against Lance Armstrong.

Hamilton had a boy-next-door persona. He was nice and courteous even if he was winning or losing. He had a magazine column which ended with a, "thanks for reading", note. When he wrote about the death of his dog, Tugboat, everybody felt sorry for Tyler.

 But behind the façade was a secret so unbelievable that to the ordinary cycling fan it was like accusing Fidel Castro as a capitalist. In 2004, he tested positive for autologous blood doping. ABD is when you remove your own blood, store it and transfuse yourself with it at a later date.

He would deny the accusations for years, spent millions in his defense yet he would lose the case and would be suspended for two years. When he resumed his racing career, he was never the same again. There were equivocal admissions of doping but Hamilton was already a broken man. He finally tested positive again for the second time last year and retired for good. If he hadn't he would have been banned for life from professional cycling.It would have been an inglorious end to a person who showed so much warmth in the cutthroat world of professional sports.

Then twelve months ago, former teammate and defrocked 2006 Tour de France champion, Floyd Landis, finally admitted to doping after denying it for four years. Not only that, he also accused his former team leader and ex-rival Armstrong of systematic doping while they were still teammates at US POSTAL.

Since US POSTAL technically is still a government outfit, the US Federal government got into the act and investigated the 7-time Tour de France champion. This after they went after Marion Jones and Roger Clemens and spent US$55 million to investigate and sue Barry Bonds. The accusation was not doping but fraud, for using government funds to finance "systemic doping".

The Federal investigation is still going on and investigators have traveled outside the US to gather information against Armstrong. While Landis's testimony was shocking, it didn't do the Federal investigators any favor since he lied for years. On the flipside, there were Armstrong teammates who claimed that they didn't see or hear him dope. It looked liked the case against Armstrong had become a stalemate.

Then last week, Hamilton made a stunning confession that just like Landis, he saw Armstrong use performance enhancing drugs not just once but a lot times. According to the Massachusetts native, what made him confess was the talk he had earlier with the federal investigators.

But the question facing Hamilton is credibility. Just like Landis, he has nada at the moment. While the media presentation of the case seems like damming to Armstrong, it should be remembered that the Federal investigators failed to put Barry Bonds behind bars when they seemed to have more evidence stacked against him the slugger than Lance.

How Hamilton's admission can affect the outcome of the Federal investigation remains to be seen. There's also this report from CBS News that another confidante and former teammate of Armstrong, George Hincapie, had told a Grand Jury that he and Armstrong doped. However, Hincapie, who helped Armstrong in his 7 Tour wins, denied the report. Hincapie, who never tested positive in his career, would be a viable witness. But for Hamilton, the truth hurts.