Courtesy of Lancaster Online (click the Link to view)

Sunday's Landis reception sold out
Second event added to aid Tour de France champion

By Morning Update
Lancaster New Era

Published: Mar 19, 2007 10:35 AM EST

LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. - Call it "chill with the champ."

For people interested in just meeting and mingling with Tour de France winner Floyd Landis, those who are already convinced of his innocence and don't need to hear his defense presentation, or for those who could not get tickets to Sunday's sold-out event, a second event has been added.

Floyd Landis' Floyd Fairness Fund will hold a "champion reception" on Saturday at the Ephrata Performing Arts center.

The unstructured event was quickly planned late last week when it appeared that tickets to Landis' town hall-style fund-raising event would sell out. The last of those 300 tickets were gone Friday afternoon, less than 72 hours after the event was announced.

"The hometown crowd is definitely turning out for Floyd," said Mike Farrington, a long-time friend and mentor of Landis, and owner of Green Mountain Cyclery bike shop in Ephrata.

Farrington is selling the tickets for the events.

Tickets to the Saturday reception, at $25 each, officially went on sale this morning. But, Farrington said he and his wife, Jen, have already contacted people who were unable to get tickets for the Sunday event. They sold about 40 tickets already and Farrington expected to sell many more today.

"There are already four people in the parking lot waiting to come in and buy tickets today," Farrington said shortly before the store's 10 a.m. opening.

"The phone has been ringing off the hook. I'm confident that we will have a very good turn out for Saturday's event too," he said.

For more, see the full story in today's Lancaster New Era or this afternoon at www.LancasterOnline.com