I actually had the opportunity to meet and talk with Chris Carmichael back around 1996 when Lance was diagnosed for cancer. During the meeting he seemed very real and truthful when I asked him a tough question about whether or not Lance had been doped and if that may have caused the cancer. What he said was that prior to the cancer Lance was indeed doping but when Chris found out about it he told the team that any sort of doping would not be tolerated and they would be released from the team, but he wasn't sure if the doping caused the cancer...ok, Chris probably told the truth about the past before the cancer, but he certainly allowed it, and then as time went on we all found out that Chris continued to allow it. So my respect for the coach went out the window as time went on.
HOWEVER, keep in mind that the lowest estimate of the peloton that was doping was around 65%, the highest was 93%, so Chris probably felt it was necessary to win against others who was doping, and he would be CORRECT about that! Regardless I felt the coach was only partial truthful in answering my question, and I'm sure he also didn't want to tell someone about doping in the future for reasons we all now know.
I think Chris Carmichael approach to training is spot on, which he has put out books on the subject, is he the best coach ever? I have no idea, but he did have a very successful racing team despite the major setback that in my opinion was unjustified since UCI and European racing authorities knew everyone was doping.
I think what happened is that the TDF and road racing is Europe's pride and joy race and sport, and some stupid American was winning it 7 times, and that could not be tolerated, once or twice, maybe 3 times ok, but not 7 times making a mockery out of European racers! So they had to stop him. This wouldn't be any different if say Europe had US style football teams, and after the Super bowl here was played the winner of the Super bowl would play the winner of the European super bowl only to have the Americans get their asses handed to them, not once, not twice but 7 times! But before those 7 times would get even close to happening American referees would step in and call undeserving fouls to guarantee an American win. American style football is an American legacy and no outside country would be allowed to win it more then once or twice without some sort of bad call or calls; and this is how Europe felt about the Americans winning the TDF all those times. Some of you may disagree with that and that's fine but that is my perception of what happened.
If the racing authorities were really sincere about stopping doping then they would eliminate the random testing and test everyone in the peloton at the start and at the end of each and every race. Personally because cycling racing and the TDF has a history of doping going back 100 years they should just allow it and forget about it and save a lot of money on testing for the teams to have to pay. Look, if no one doped in the peloton on those 7 TDF that Lance won the result would have been nearly the same with Lance winning 6 and probably 7 times, so all the doping rea