After triumphantly crossing the finish line of the 2,272-mile Tour de France on the Champs Elysees Sunday, Floyd Landis finally was able to relax -- for a few hours anyway.

After a night of partying until the wee hours in Paris, the 2006 Tour de France champion spent most of yesterday hiding in his hotel room and trying to rest. Aside from a few photo shoots and interviews, Landis laid low.

"I've been hard to find," said Landis, in a teleconference with reporters. "I've successfully stayed anonymous in my hotel room.

"I'd like a week-long nap."

Landis won't have time for that nap for quite a while. The Murrieta, Calif., resident and Lancaster native plans to compete in two criterium races in the Netherlands this week, before jetting back to the United States for what promises to be a whirlwind of TV appearances, contract negotiations, media obligations and another criterium race Aug. 13 in Chicago.

All the while he will be weighing his options for total hip replacement surgery, which he expects to occur within a month.

Landis joined Greg Lemond and Lance Armstrong as the only Americans to win the world's most prestigious bicycle race. And like Lemond and Armstrong, Landis overcame a great physical challenge.

Lemond won the Tour three times (1986, 1989-90), twice after getting shot in a 1987 hunting accident. Armstrong won seven consecutive times (1999-2005) after surviving testicular cancer. Landis suffers from avascular necrosis, a lack of blood flow, which causes the hip bone to disintegrate -- the same ailment that plagued former baseball and football star Bo Jackson.

Landis' right hip was first injured in a bike crash in January 2003, and just revealed during this year's Tour that he would need replacement surgery.

"The mechanical part should be identical to now. What we're trying to do is not fix the mechanical problem, but fix the pain," said Landis, 30. "The pain is getting to be unbearable.

"There is a six- to eight-week recovery period [after surgery]. If things go without complications ... by next spring I won't be in the shape I was in this spring, but I'll be back racing without any trouble."

After finishing ninth in last year's Tour, Landis was considered a dark-horse favorite. Then after several top riders were forced out by a burgeoning drug scandal before the Tour began July 1, Landis emerged as a serious contender.

He led the Tour after 15 stages, but plummeted to 11th place -- more than eight minutes behind -- after a miserable ride in the Alps in Stage 16. Landis said his sore hip wasn't the problem.

"It was a lack of food," he said. "I started the day not feeling that well. That was a disaster. I had low blood sugar and was depressed for a few hours."

Written off by most observers, Landis rebounded the next day with a huge breakaway victory in the mountains, pulling him to within 30 seconds of the overall lead. He then reclaimed the yellow jersey for good during a time trial in Stage 19.

"In a three-week period regardless of what it is, very few people in life don't have one day where they're a little bit down," he said. "That was as down as I had been in a race. Then after Stage 17, that was the best I had felt.

"Once I got my head together, my objective was to come out and fight and make the best of it. The point in that stage, it was the 'Hail Mary' pass, that's all. That was my only chance to make it up."

Landis expects to be back to defend his Tour de France title next year. Still to be determined, however, is whether he rides again with his current team (this year's title sponsor Phonak Hearing Systems is to be replaced by a new title sponsor iShares) or if he heads back to the Discovery Channel team, where Landis rode with Armstrong from 2002-04.

"I have spoken with them the past couple of months," he said of the Discovery Channel team. "I don't have any kind of problem going back. I've been in communication with Lance. I saw him in France. But there's been no contact talks proposed. I'm trying to sort things out with my current team. We have a formula that works. I'm proud of the team I'm on now."