Floyd Landis says he didn’t cheat to win the Tour de France, he doesn’t know why he tested positive for high testosterone and he’s sure he can clear his name.

Even if he does, the American cyclist said, the disgrace of doping will probably follow him forever.

“Unfortunately, I don’t think it’s ever going to go away no matter what happens next,” Landis said during a teleconference Thursday, hours after his Tour de France victory was thrown into question by a positive test for high testosterone following his gritty performance in stage 17 of the race.

“My immediate reaction was to look for the alcohol bottle,” joked Landis, who’s known to enjoy a beer while on the Tour and said he drank some whiskey with teammates the night before he staked his stunning comeback in the Alps.

The Phonak team suspended Landis, pending results from a backup sample. If found guilty, Landis could be stripped of the Tour title and fired from the team.

“At the exact moment I was told, every single scenario went through my head about what was going to happen,” he said. “There was no way for me to tell myself that this wasn’t going to be a disaster.”

Second-place finisher Oscar Pereiro, who would become champion if Landis is not cleared, said he was in no mood to celebrate.

Tour de France winner Floyd Landis waves a U.S. flag as he rides down the Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris following the final stage of the 2006 event. The newest American cycling hero saw his fortunes take a dramatic turn for the worse Thursday when it was announced Landis failed a drug test following the 17th stage.

“Should I win the Tour now it would feel like an academic victory,” Pereiro told the AP at his home in Vigo, Spain. “The way to celebrate a win is in Paris, otherwise it’s just a bureaucratic win.”

The Swiss-based Phonak team said it was notified by the International Cycling Union (UCI) on Wednesday that Landis’ sample showed “an unusual level of testosterone/epitestosterone” when he was tested last Thursday.

After falling behind the pack the day before, Landis made a remarkable comeback during that Alpine stage, racing far ahead of the field for a solo win that moved him from 11th to third overall.

He wrapped the Tour win Sunday, keeping the title in U.S. hands for the eighth straight year. Lance Armstrong, who won the previous seven, was himself dogged for years by doping allegations that he vehemently denied – and were never proven by a positive test.

Armstrong was riding in RAGBRAI, an annual bike ride across Iowa that attracts thousands of riders. After finishing his ride Thursday, he said would wait to see what happened when his former U.S. Postal Service teammate got the results from his second sample.

“Until that happens I don’t have anything to say,” Armstrong said.

Asked repeatedly what might have tripped his test, Landis refused to lay blame on any one thing. “As to what actually caused it on that particular day, I can only speculate,” he said.

Landis had an exemption from the Tour to take cortisone shots for pain in his hip, which will require surgery for a degenerative condition, and was taking an oral medication for hyperthyroidism. He and his doctor were consulting with experts to see if those drugs might have thrown off his testosterone levels.

Landis said he wouldn’t be surprised if people were skeptical of him and the sport of cycling, but he pleaded for time to clear his name.

“All I’m asking for,” he said, “is that I be given a chance to prove that I’m innocent. Cycling has a traditional way of trying people in the court of public opinion before they get a chance to do anything else.

“I would like to be presumed innocent until proven guilty – since that’s the way we do things in America.”

Landis said he was still in Europe, but declined to say exactly where. “Not to be elusive, I have to figure out a way to get to the airport and get home.”

Arlene Landis said her son called Thursday from Europe and told her he had not done anything wrong.

“Lance (Armstrong) went through this too,” she said in an interview with The Associated Press at her home in Farmersville, Pa. “Somebody doesn’t want him to win.

“Why do they put you through two weeks of misery and spoil your crown? My opinion is when he comes on top of this everyone will think so much more of him. So that’s what valleys are for, right?”

The UCI said Wednesday that an unidentified rider had failed a drug test during the Tour. The team said Landis would ask for an analysis of his backup sample “to prove either that this result is coming from a natural process or that this is resulting from a mistake.”

It wasn’t immediately known when the backup sample will be tested, but Phonak manager John Lelangue said the team would ask for that to happen in the next few days.

“I think there’s a good possibility I’ll clear my name,” Landis said. “Regardless of whether this happens or not, I don’t know if this will ever go away.”

USA Cycling spokesman Andy Lee said that organization could not comment until the process is complete. Carla O’Connell, publications and communications director for the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, also had no comment.

UCI spokesman Enrico Carpani said Landis was notified of the test Wednesday morning. He said the cycling body doesn’t require analysis of the “B” sample, but that Landis requested it.

“We are confident in the first (test),” Carpani said. “For us, the first one is already good.”

“It is obviously distressing,” Tour director Christian Prudhomme said at a Paris news conference, stressing the backup test still must be done. He said it would be up to the UCI to determine penalties.

Under World Anti-Doping Agency regulations, a ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone greater than 4:1 is considered a positive result and subject to investigation. The threshold was recently lowered from 6:1. The most likely natural ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone in humans is 1:1.

Testosterone is included as an anabolic steroid on WADA’s list of banned substances, and its use can be punished by a two-year ban.

Testosterone can build muscle and improve recovery time when used over a period of several weeks, said Dr. Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and a spokesman for the American College of Sports Medicine. But if Landis had been a user, his earlier urine tests during the tour would have been affected, he said.

“So something’s missing here,” Wadler said. “It just doesn’t add up.”

Landis’ inspiring Tour ride reminded many of fellow American Tyler Hamilton’s gutsy 2003 ride. Hamilton, riding for team CSC, broke his collarbone on the first day of the Tour but rode on, despite the pain, and finished fourth overall.

But a year later, Hamilton, then riding for Phonak, tested positive for blood doping at a Spanish race and now is serving a two-year ban. He has denied blood doping.

Speculation that Landis had tested positive spread earlier Thursday after he failed to show up for a one-day race in Denmark on Thursday. A day earlier, he missed a scheduled event in the Netherlands.

On the eve of the Tour’s start, nine riders – including pre-race favorites Jan Ullrich and Ivan Basso – were ousted, implicated in a Spanish doping investigation.

The names of Ullrich and Basso turned up on a list of 56 cyclists who allegedly had contact with Spanish doctor Eufemiano Fuentes, who’s at the center of the Spanish doping probe. Landis was not implicated in that investigation.