  Let $G$ be a connected graph, and let $\lambda_1$ and $\rho$ denote the
spectral radius of $G$ and the universal cover of $G$, respectively. In
\cite{Fri03}, Friedman has shown that almost every $n$-lift of $G$ has all of
its new eigenvalues bounded by $O(\lambda_1^{1/2}\rho^{1/2})$. In \cite{LP10},
Linial and Puder have improved this bound to $O(\lambda_1^{1/3}\rho^{2/3})$.
Friedman had conjectured that this bound can actually be improved to $\rho +
o_n(1)$ (e.g., see \cite{Fri03,HLW06}).
  In \cite{LP10}, Linial and Puder have formulated two new categorizations of
formal words, namely $\phi$ and $\beta$, which assign a non-negative integer or
infinity to each word. They have shown that for every word $w$, $\phi(w) = 0$
iff $\beta(w) = 0$, and $\phi(w) = 1$ iff $\beta(w) = 1$. They have conjectured
that $\phi(w) = \beta(w)$ for every word $w$, and have run extensive numerical
simulations that strongly suggest that this conjecture is true. This
conjecture, if proven true, gives us a very promising approach to proving a
slightly weaker version of Friedman's conjecture, namely the bound $O(\rho)$ on
the new eigenvalues (see \cite{LP10}).
  In this paper, we make further progress towards proving this important
conjecture by showing that $\phi(w) = 2$ iff $\beta(w) = 2$ for every word $w$.
