I ask Landis how he responds when people tell him, "I want to believe you, but I just can't because it's so hard these days."

"I'd say, 'OK, fine. Don't believe me,'" he says. "But take a look at this stuff in the lab and tell me you'd like to be subjected to that type of testing. It's fine if you don't believe me, but just admit that they didn't prove that I doped. Nobody should be subjected to crappy work like that. If I did my job like those guys did theirs in the anti-doping agencies, no one would have ever heard of me. If I write down in my training diary that I rode for six hours yesterday to make it look good when I only rode for one, I wouldn't win any f------ races.

"I'll never convince every single person that I didn't do it, but I will convince them all that the system doesn't work, and it needs to be changed."

So read both sides of the case, and then believe him or not; the choice is yours. Meanwhile, Landis hopes to ride and win the Tour again -- "I would have been happy with one win, but now I have to make a point" -- but if that doesn't happen, he has his take on those who would take away his jersey.

"If I never ride another race, I won the Tour de France," he says. "And if they don't like it, f--- 'em."