Lance Armstrong

[AX17609]

I just finished watching the two-part ESPN "30-for-30" series on Lance Armstrong. Do you cyclists have a take on this? I find myself not feeling terribly sympathetic. I saw candor but not remorse. He seems to regret getting caught, not having done it in the first place. He seems to feel unjustly punished for something everyone did. He regrets the lost income more than the lost relationships. He's holding a lot of bitterness.

[HodgdonExtreme]

Not a cycling enthusiast...

Not justifying it, but I can understand being bitter about being singled out as the bad guy when "everybody else" was cheating.

[ssjk]

Barry Bonds has lots of records with no asterisk
ARod is making a mint as a commentator
Alberto Contador forfeits one race and goes back to the Tour

I could continue for a while and never leave baseball

Because Armstrong was an arrogant jerk and won too much, and no doubt cheated better than everybody else did he was a perfect object lesson. So he's the designated pariah.

Yeah, I'd be bitter too.

[Hoyt]

Used to be a big cycling fan, but cheaters and hypocrites— on Armstrong’s level — deserve criticism and worse.

[Brucebubs]

Wikipedia tells it straight.

Armstrong became the subject of doping allegations after he won the 1999 Tour de France. For years, he denied involvement in doping. In 2012, a United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) investigation concluded that Armstrong had used performance-enhancing drugs over the course of his career and named him as the ringleader of "the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen." While maintaining his innocence, Armstrong chose not to contest the charges, citing the potential toll on his family. As a result, he was stripped of all of his achievements from August 1998 onward, including his seven Tour de France titles. He also received a lifetime ban from all sports that follow the World Anti-Doping Code, ending his competitive cycling career. The International Cycling Union (UCI) upheld USADA's decision and decided that his stripped wins would not be allocated to other riders. In January 2013, Armstrong publicly acknowledged his involvement in doping. In April 2018, Armstrong settled a civil lawsuit with the United States Department of Justice and agreed to pay US$5 million to the U.S. government after whistleblower proceedings were commenced by Floyd Landis, a former team member.

You can make your own decisions on how you feel about the guy.

[Fogducker]

If he'd just have stayed retired but he came out for one more "kick at the cat" and got nailed by a disgruntled teammate. He wasn't really liked by his other teammates or a lot of other folks either. There's lots of money in the sport so cheating follows naturally. He DID put together a cancer fighting foundation that still exists.

Never can tell what the foreign folks get all excited about. Is there a sport that combines cycling with soccer? A polo thing maybe.

Fog

[frankmcr]

Originally Posted by Fogducker

Never can tell what the foreign folks get all excited about. Is there a sport that combines cycling with soccer? A polo thing maybe.

Fog

You betcha!

[dwalton]

I’ve been a fanatical cyclist nearly all my life. Was deep into the racing scene decades ago. Worked in bike shops. I love bikes.

Lance is really messed up - severely damaged goods, and a world-class jerk - and he just needs to be quiet and go away. And this coming from someone who understands and somewhat looks the other way at the Euro tradition of doping in cycling over the last 80+ years.

Lance, take your millions, and be quiet and go away.

[patrickgm60]

I'm a long-time cyclist enthusiast, both riding and following the pros. Like much of the general population, I was completely taken in by LA's performances at the TdF, year after year. The most grueling sporting event in the world, repeatedly being won by an American team, led by an American - exciting stuff.

Much of the vitriol towards him is due not to his cheating (his entire teams doped), but the vicious attacks he made on anyone who questioned him about it. Careers were ruined, for no purpose other than to maintain his aura.

The cycling forum I visit doesn't seem to be overly interested, either way, in his media posts and appearances. It's all history now.

One reminder: LA was an elite athlete, from his youth. He had natural talent, worked extremely hard, and planned meticulously for every stage. He even was part of a revolution (bad pun) toward higher pedaling cadence for endurance races, such as the grand tours.

Unfortunately, the sport still suffers from the doping stigma. For all but the team leaders, there's not much money for the riders.

[raysachs]

I was a hard core cyclist from the mid-90s until about 4 years ago when my asthma went to a new level and pretty much knocked me off of it. I was not a racer, but I rode with and knew quite a few, a couple of whom had tried to race in Europe. And from when I was first into it, EPO was in the peloton. That drug was the game changer. Without it, you couldn't even be an effective domestique, let alone a contender. The folks who had ridden in Europe said they were faced with a decision very very early - play the game or go home. One came home, the other stayed and couldn't cut it and THEN came home.

There was never any question Lance was doping. I wanted to believe for that first Tour he won in 99, but it was more like temporarily suspended disbelief. Because when you started seeing some of the times he was doing on some of the more famous climbs and when his power numbers were publicized, they were typical of people who'd been doping and impossible for people who hadn't. Greg Lemond pointed this out, quite correctly, at the time, incurred Lance's wrath, and lost his bicycle company for his trouble. And he was totally right.

His fall from grace wasn't because he doped - it was because he was an awful, terrible, no good, very bad, (short version of richard) head of a human being. EVERYBODY, at least among the contenders and most well below that level, doped. Most guys, when they got caught, did their year or two suspension, came back, and it wasn't spoken of. But Lance just burned everyone he knew who wasn't totally loyal to him. Treated people HORRIBLY. And so when the dominos started falling, they were more than happy to turn on him. And everyone has taken their pound of flesh.

He was a great cyclist. He'd have been great in the era when the doping was much more pedestrian (amphetamines mostly), which really didn't help much if at all over a three week race, but might help you get through a bad day. But he'd have probably been a better one-day, Spring Classics rider and not so much a great grand tour champion. He was just too big to be a great climber in the days of lower red blood cell counts.

I don't have much problem with how he presents himself now. He's open about everything he did. He knows he was a jerk. He pretty much admits in the same situation he'd do the same things again, although maybe he'd have been less of a jerk. He's not trying to present himself as a paragon of virtue - nobody would buy it. Despite it all, he DID do some good stuff for cancer research, not so much in terms of money raised, which wasn't all that much, but just in terms of awareness, public attitudes, etc.

I loved watching him race. I hated the person I was aware he was (I was aware of a lot of it at the time, not all for sure, but enough). I find him a sort of fascinating character, but I don't need to see too much more about him. But this documentary was pretty good I thought - I still have about an hour of it to go. It presents ALL of the key players with plenty of hindsight and perspective and that's sort of interesting. He REALLY needs to get over his attitude toward Floyd Landis though - he can't stand Floyd because Floyd played it about the way Lance would have. One of the great ironies in sports is Floyd losing his 2006 Tour win because of a testosterone patch. That's roughly akin to Bernie Madoff getting busted for shoplifting a candy bar and being sent to jail for that without any of the other stuff coming to light...

-Ray

[AX17609]

Originally Posted by AX17609

I just finished watching the two-part ESPN "30-for-30" series on Lance Armstrong. Do you cyclists have a take on this? I find myself not feeling terribly sympathetic. I saw candor but not remorse. He seems to regret getting caught, not having done it in the first place. He seems to feel unjustly punished for something everyone did. He regrets the lost income more than the lost relationships. He's holding a lot of bitterness.

I find myself comparing LA's public rehabilitation with that of Alex Rodriguez. Personally, I thought there was no chance that A-Rod would be accepted back by his baseball colleagues much less the public, but he's managed to do it. He's been very humble and seems to have undergone a complete personality change. From a distance he seems likable.

Lance on the other hand is assertively bitter. He still denies some important aspects of the story, and his hatred for his accusers runs deep. I wouldn't want to cross paths with him. One of the commentators noted that with Lance, you can't tell if he's a good person who did some bad things or a bad person who did some good things.

[flagstaffcharli]

I really wanted to love cycling. Doping ruined it for me. I also walked away from baseball during the steroid era. Being a spectator is never as much fun as being a participant, but there is something to say for watching and appreciating the best do their thing. But when they’re just cheating? A waste of time. And I wasted too many hours rooting for Lance.

Lance seems to be in a class with Barry Bonds.. They were already uniquely talented, but then they were more ruthless and better at drug cheating than everyone else. I have no appreciation at all for that.

Also, an often over-looked element of this is the money. These sports are big business. If you are cheating, you’re basically stealing money from your sponsors, fans, and opponents. It isn’t much of a stretch to consider it a criminal act.

And finally, people make mistakes. They serve out there ban or pay their fines. Hopefully, they offer some apology and get on with it. I can respect that.

But these guys just kept cheating, and I don’t believe they ever really expressed any authentic remorse. They’re simply hardcore cheaters. And in Lance’s case, he really went after a lot of other folks’ livelihoods and personal lives. Awful.

[AX17609]

Originally Posted by raysachs

...But this documentary was pretty good I thought - I still have about an hour of it to go. It presents ALL of the key players with plenty of hindsight and perspective and that's sort of interesting. He REALLY needs to get over his attitude toward Floyd Landis though - he can't stand Floyd because Floyd played it about the way Lance would have...

-Ray

Good comments. Thanks. The last hour of the broadcast was a game-changer for me. Up to that point, I had some sympathy. After the last hour, I had none. I'll be interested to see if you have the same reaction.

[HodgdonExtreme]

I'm a fan of motor racing. At first, it was all about who could design and campaign a machine that was FASTER than everybody else. Over the years, rules upon rules have been created to make it cheaper, safer, more interesting to watch, etc.

That's fine, there's room for ALL kinds of different "racing classes". Frankly, I'm totally ok with what I call a "super unlimited" racing class that allows the teams to do anything they want within confines of a very skinny rulebook.

I guess the analogy is: To me, it's interesting to see what a non-doped human is capable of. But it's also interesting to me to see what they can do with drugs, bionic hearts, servo-actuated legs, etc. Lolz... Why not let them, if they want to?

[Dirk Hofman]

I'm half Belgian, and as my father was a professor, we traveled to Belgium many summers growing up. We watched the Tour on TV from the late Merckx era, through Hinault and Lemond. We watched races in Belgium go through Oostende, and we rode our bikes along the canals. We stopped in bike shops and talked about the sport. I've always loved it. My avatar here is even a reference to a cycling meme, not my real name. As I moved out of the house and started a life of ski-bumming and later college, I watched a lot less. News was hard to come by in the US, I was busy, and no one was carting me to Europe every summer. But as I entered the professional world, had some money to spend, and the internet came alive, my passion for the sport was re-kindled.

And this is where Lance came in. He was an American hero for me in so many ways. An underdog in the sport coming back from cancer, a fighter, good-looking, strong, and he rode with aggression and "panache" as the French say. I loved his ride in '99, following it on a ticker on a now-defunct cycling forum. I was going through some serious health issues of my own at the time, and in watching the Tour recap from World Cycling Productions, there was an interview with him where he said, "you gotta be brave, and you gotta be strong", and that stuck in my mind vividly. I can see it clearly as the day I first heard it. He inspired me to do the things I needed to do to get over my health issues. I understand the impact he had on others with more serious issues must have been massive.

But growing up with the sport, I had no illusions about what was happening. Armstrong was always a strong one-day racer, doing well in the spring classics that I grew up loving so much. But he never had the sustained power to climb in the big mountains or time trial with the best. He never looked like someone who could complete at the Tour, so when he did win, I simply assumed he'd finally gotten on board with what the rest of the peloton was already doing. And that turned out to be the case, despite legions of fans angrily denouncing any suggestion like this on any comment section or message board in existence. There were even bot farms created by his PR agency that littered the boards with his talking points, a technique known as "astro-turfing". He had become all about the brand, and the documentary points this out really well.

It's true that he was doing what everyone else was doing, using EPO, HGH, testosterone, and other products and techniques to enhance his performance. He hangs on to this fact tightly. But he also used his power and money to sue, defame, and destroy anyone who pointed out the rather obvious fact of his doping. He ruined people's lives and livelihoods. He's not just a jerk or an a-hole, he did legitimately horrible things to a lot of people. He colluded with the UCI to protect his team and destroy other riders. Ullrich did nothing like this. Pantani did nothing like this. Nor did Vandevelde, Hincapie, Basso, or any of the others he compares himself to. He still won't cop fully to what he did. Always the fighter.

He's a complex and charismatic guy. He's inspired many, ridden beautifully, and given hope to millions. He's also a mean, petty, vindictive guy who still can't seem to fully account for his own actions.

I thought the documentary was fantastic. A nice end to a fascinating and sorry chapter in the sport. Time to move on.

But if anyone thinks the the fundamentals of doping in the sport have changed, that those were the "Bad old days" and the sport is in a "new era", you're kidding yourself. The speeds on all the major ascents are just as fast as they were back then, some faster. Some of the blood testing has put a small governor on how much riders can dope, but they have just found new ways. Contador, Froome, and all the riders winning the big races since then are up to the same kind of tricks as riders in the past.