I predict an angry Armstrong will pull out all the old lines about never failing a drugs test etc and focus heavily on how much the French hate him because he is American.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2220965/I-hope-breaks-baseball-bat-head-Lance-Armstrong-appears-Livestrong-event-bullying-victims-tell-abusive-tactics-cover-doping-scandal.html

I’m not sure cycling will take that long to recover. People have short memories. I think it just needs another rivalry like Contador/Schlek or Armstrong/Ullrich and few will remember the doping. That is until someone gets busted for drugs and we’ll go for this whole cycle once again.

Cheers,
Mike

I am a bloke. I have not had testicular cancer.

For years I believed in Armstrong — esp after reading “It’s not about the Bike”. I initially thought USADA was on a witch hunt. Then the evidence came in the form of USADA’s reasoned decision. I read Walshe’s book.

Sure, I credit Armstrong with considerable internal strength to come back but that doesn’t give him the rights he assumed. Cyclists were pressurised into drugs. Some died. Walsh describes how some cyclists, on EPO, had alarms to warn them of adverse effects of EPO. Some had to get up during the night and pedal like hell to stop blood turning to syrup. Armstrong and his henchmen virtually made drug-taking compulsory for anyone wanting to succeed. Worse, he turned on those who threatened him. People’s businesses were threatened with boycotts. Armstrong had a team of defamation lawyers ready to pounce. Surviving cancer doesn’t give you those rights.

James

Your last comment is on the mark and cycling will take a long time to recover from the damage.

Hell; even the title of Armstrong’s best-seller was misleading. It was never All About the Bike. Instead, it was always all about whatever was best for Lance Armstrong. That’s why the Oprah interview will be so carefully stage-managed by LA’s people that any mea culpa will have to be taken with a large chunk of rock salt.

At the end of the day, Lance Armstrong won as many Tours de France as you and I did.

Yes, but crucially those races now stand with no winner. I was never an Armstrong Fanboi, but I have to accept that many of my cycling heroes undoubted doped.

Whatever you think of LA as a man (not much in my case) there is no doubt that in a sport that rewards attention to detail and obsessive preparation and training, he was head and shoulders above anyone else of his generation.

USADA’s evidence against him is compelling; so compelling in fact that Armstrong refused to contest it.

Or, there was so much false evidence he didn’t see the need to spend the rest of his life defending himself.

Since when has a refusal to reply to false allegations been evidence of guilt?

However, it’s the future I’m most concerned about. Unless the ICU becomes more willing to change it’s approach to drugs, something like the Armstrong fiasco will happen again, possibly with bigger effects. For example, Bradley Wiggns is loved in Britain, right now – they even had him help open their Olympics. Imagine if he went down for drugs too.

I don”t see any alternative to the ICU adopting a new approach. It will only be able to do so, however, if the public’s willing to accept it. Right now, I very much doubt they are: for example, look at how easily you found it to equate drug use with cheating, even when the majority of successful athletes engage in it.

I guess we shall await the next case of drug use in cycling. It might not be Wiggns, but I remain confident it’ll be someone.

Cheers,
Mike

But other people’s cheating doesn’t exonerate Armstrong of his cheating, and dishonest unequal treatment of the various cheats by the cycling body doesn’t exonerate him of his cheating either.

I’m merely commenting about the remarkable willingness of many to “see the worse in guy”, even when he hasn’t behaved any different to many other famous cyclists.

Then they are cheats also.

That doesn’t elevate Armstrong much in my estimation.

The way I see it, the ICU didn’t have the balls to admit that drugs are rife in the sport. It had no recourse but to strip Armstrong of his titles. That means I see no reason not to talk about him like the legend he is.

Cheers,
Mike

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/nov/26/tyler-hamilton-secret-race-william-hill

Tyler Hamilton’s allegations, like those of Stephen Swart, Frankie and Betsy Andrieu and Floyd Landis to name just a few are far too detailed to have been fabricated. As seanmaitland noted, Armstrong’s whole persona was built upon a lie. Even the Livestrong charity has removed Armstrong’s name from its literature now.

At the end of the day, Lance Armstrong won as many Tours de France as you and I did.

Seanmaitland, of course I think Armstrong’s better than Floyd Landys. The latter didn’t come back from testicular cancer.

Nooklin, if you’re a bloke, can I ask whether you’ve ever had testicular cancer? I haven’t, but I quite imagine that, if I did, I wouldn’t care in the slightest about the drug intake of someone who had it also yet came back to take seven Tour de France victories.

Cheers,
Mike