Why do folks need to believe Armstrong

[DiabloScott]

Its very stylish... I can see the kids of NY city getting into the gear of a bloke who always finishes 7th or falls off his bike......

http://www.hincapiesports.com/details.php?ccode=110&scode=RTS-RTMC06

I've never seen them in Northern California either. Hinc's own website is probably not the best place to look for unbiased user stats.

He did finish 2nd in Roubaix and that was to Boonen. Hincapie bashing is fun because it's so over the top, he's not a winner but he's not a clown either.

 

[limerickman]

Hincapie isn't a clown, I agree.

Tactically DSC got it wrong at P-R and RVV last year.
Was that Hincapie's fault?
I don't think so.

In respect of George, he's been a consistent performer as a one day rider.

 

[bobke]

Interesting about the Lance haters...
convenient memories.

I recall Lance writing a letter to the UCI reporting the rumors and appearance/evidence that blood doping had returned to the peloton a few years before he retired...and donating money to hep develop tests to catch those folks.

In light of what we now know about O.P. interesting facts.
Facts, not opinions. Facts.
Of course this story only came out a year or more after he wrote the letter.
Doesnt sound like the voice of a guilty person, writing the UCI, does it?

 

[thunder]

Interesting about the Lance haters...
convenient memories.

I recall Lance writing a letter to the UCI reporting the rumors and appearance/evidence that blood doping had returned to the peloton a few years before he retired...and donating money to hep develop tests to catch those folks.

In light of what we now know about O.P. interesting facts.
Facts, not opinions. Facts.
Of course this story only came out a year or more after he wrote the letter.
Doesnt sound like the voice of a guilty person, writing the UCI, does it?

no, just the voice of a ruthles person looking to cut off his competition from their streams of dope.

Lance had the top tier exclusive system, and got his stuff through one agent that could not be compromised by many outside interferences. He minimised his risk, but would have been paying more for the arrangement.

 

[patch70]

Interesting about the Lance haters...
convenient memories.

I recall Lance writing a letter to the UCI reporting the rumors and appearance/evidence that blood doping had returned to the peloton a few years before he retired...and donating money to hep develop tests to catch those folks.

In light of what we now know about O.P. interesting facts.
Facts, not opinions. Facts.
Of course this story only came out a year or more after he wrote the letter.
Doesnt sound like the voice of a guilty person, writing the UCI, does it?

Lance paid big bucks to the UCI to keep his name clean, to get the word in advance when he'd be tested, and to keep his competitors 'less dishonest'.

Pretty much everything he did related to bikes had "the voice of a guilty person"!

Either you are completely deluded of just full of sh!t.

 

[patch70]

I stand by what I said. Would people pay him so much or buy his books (however filled with propaganda the pages are) if he was just a run of the mill mid pack rider. The answer is no they wouldn't. Without even entering the debate of how he achieved his victories it is his success on the bike that affords him the lifestyle he now has.

Anyone who believes that any cometitive sport doesn't have some skeletons in the closet is severly deluded as to human nature and the financial rewards offered through success.

There are plenty of other successful cyclists - in many eras - that have not made money from books and advertising that promote themselves as the only cyclist that ever trained or was obsessive about their equipment etc.

Such PR spin is an absolute insult to the other Pro cyclists. Even the local A grade cyclists are doing ~700km per week and go out rain, hail, or shine. Do you really think the Professionals are sitting in the bar drinking beer and eating frites every time a cloud is in the sky?

 

[bobke]

Lance paid big bucks to the UCI to keep his name clean, to get the word in advance when he'd be tested, and to keep his competitors 'less dishonest'.

Pretty much everything he did related to bikes had "the voice of a guilty person"!

Either you are completely deluded of just full of sh!t.

I keep forgetting why I find these forums tedious and the inhabitants odious.

If I am not mistaken, cursing and namecalling are not allowed on the forum, directly baiting other forum members, etc, am I forgetting?

G'day mate.

Since this forum has obviously failed and the unhappy one or two people posting here under 8 different names need to get a life, look in the mirror why the forum is a complete failure and a waste of time.

 

[patch70]

The usual rubbish

Keepin' it unreal...

Hilarious - bobke = hombredesubaru accusing others of having separate identities.

Don't worry - we won't miss you.

 

[tcklyde]

To my knowledge, this sport is the only one where success breeds contempt merely by the achievement of succeeding. That's why the biggest names in the sport -- Armstrong, Basso, Ullrich, etc., get their names dragged throught the mud of the media --- who gives a **** if tomorrow someone said Laszlo Bodrogi is doping? The point is, everyone knows that everyone dopes, so it only raises headlines if you accuse the ones who are winning.

You're being daft. Armstrong, Basso, and Ullrich aren't getting their names dragged through mud because they are winning (and in Armstrong's case, 95% of his press is laudatory so let's not even talk about "mud"). They are getting their names dragged through the mud because there is strong evidence that they cheat. And in Ullrich's case, the evidence is all but incontrovertible.

This sport "breeds contempt" because it is worthy of contempt. Do we have to run through the names again? Winners of all three GTs are either suspended for doping, likely to be suspended of doping, or closely linked to major doping scandals. Countless former professionals have testified to their own cheating. Others aver that doping is widespread and accepted. A doctor gets busted taking a suitcase full of cash not from some second rate amateur, but from one of the best known DS in the sport. The doctor's office is full of thousands of doses of steroids, blood boosters, and bags of blood, one set of which has been conclusively established to be the blood of one of the top two or three best GT riders of the last ten years.

All this, of course, is almost certainly the mere tip of the iceberg. But even if it isn't and even if the reams of circumstantial evidence and the testimony of dozens of former riders, amateurs, and support staff are lies, there is no question that cycling is a deeply sick sport.

I have to confess that I don't even understand what your argument is anymore. Are we supposed to just shut up and ignore what's going on? Or do you think that it's all a lie and there is no doping problem? Or is this some sort of Armstrong infatuation where you have to defend him -- a multi-millionaire and one of the most respected people in the world -- from the justified frustration of a small group of cycling fans on a internet forum? Whatever the case, I don't get it.

 

[poulidor]

I recall Lance writing a letter to the UCI reporting the rumors and appearance/evidence that blood doping had returned to the peloton a few years before he retired...and donating money to hep develop tests to catch those folks.

In light of what we now know about O.P. interesting facts.
Facts, not opinions. Facts.
Of course this story only came out a year or more after he wrote the letter.
Doesnt sound like the voice of a guilty person, writing the UCI, does it?

If you are really looking the facts, you could only conclude that Lance was using PEDs and he has insulted intelligence of millions of people with his pathetic speech of his last TDF.

 

[Leafer]

I recall Lance writing a letter

I recall Walsh writing a whole book about Lance's doping.

 

[Denia]

In the history of sport there are numerous examples of athletes that are simply better than their peers. Ali, Sugar Ray, Maradonna, Pele, Jordan, Gretzky, Sampras, McEnroe, Phelps, Owens, Schumacher etc. etc. Each one reached the top of their game through a mix of genetics, aptitude, commitment to training, coaching, luck, family support, circumstances and, of course, the physical and social environment they were brought up in. Long before most of the greatest sports men and women on the planet were exposed to the pressures of professional stardom they had shown they were a class above the rest throughout their formative years. They didn´t suddenly find a chemist and transform into superman.

Most of these heroes are or were flawed geniuses (gambling, alcohol, drugs, extra-marital affairs,wife abuse - you name it our heroes have done it)- but geniuses they were and we accept them as human beings who raised their sports to new levels.

Is there something singularly different about the sport of cycling that its fans cannot accept it when someone comes along who is, quite simply, better than his peers. If that cyclist, through a mix of the factors listed above, was destined to raise the bar in cycling? The Armstrongs, Indurains, Hinaults and Merckxs of this world all achieved greatness by seeking out every advantage available within the parameters of the professional cycling world. I doubt if any achieved it without artificial assistance - but the same goes for all our other sports heroes. Ali used to have pain killers injected into his hands before fights, Maradonna snorted coke, Best was an alcoholic, Bonds pumped up on steroids and the list goes on. Blood transfusions were used by runners decades ago, steroids have been ripe in all strength sports since they became available and that´s just scratching at the surface - every sport has a dark side, an aspect that is less than savoury if you want to be puritanical about it.

On the other hand, if you want to be realistic and accept that professional sport and science have always been, and always will be, interlinked then you might come down from your pulpits and enjoy the world of sport for what it is - warts and all.

I reckon Lance achieved what he achieved by being the best all round Tour cyclist of his generation - physically and mentally. Any other contributing factors would have been secondary to this and would also have been used by his peers (as well as the greats that went before him).

Flawed genius - you bet, but sporting genius nevertheless.

 

[Leafer]

In the history of sport there are numerous examples of athletes that are simply better than their peers. Ali, Sugar Ray, Maradonna, Pele, Jordan, Gretzky, Sampras, McEnroe, Phelps, Owens, Schumacher etc. etc. Each one reached the top of their game through a mix of genetics, aptitude, commitment to training, coaching, luck, family support, circumstances and, of course, the physical and social environment they were brought up in. Long before most of the greatest sports men and women on the planet were exposed to the pressures of professional stardom they had shown they were a class above the rest throughout their formative years. They didn´t suddenly find a chemist and transform into superman.

Most of these heroes are or were flawed geniuses (gambling, alcohol, drugs, extra-marital affairs,wife abuse - you name it our heroes have done it)- but geniuses they were and we accept them as human beings who raised their sports to new levels.

Is there something singularly different about the sport of cycling that its fans cannot accept it when someone comes along who is, quite simply, better than his peers. If that cyclist, through a mix of the factors listed above, was destined to raise the bar in cycling? The Armstrongs, Indurains, Hinaults and Merckxs of this world all achieved greatness by seeking out every advantage available within the parameters of the professional cycling world. I doubt if any achieved it without artificial assistance - but the same goes for all our other sports heroes. Ali used to have pain killers injected into his hands before fights, Maradonna snorted coke, Best was an alcoholic, Bonds pumped up on steroids and the list goes on. Blood transfusions were used by runners decades ago, steroids have been ripe in all strength sports since they became available and that´s just scratching at the surface - every sport has a dark side, an aspect that is less than savoury if you want to be puritanical about it.

On the other hand, if you want to be realistic and accept that professional sport and science have always been, and always will be, interlinked then you might come down from your pulpits and enjoy the world of sport for what it is - warts and all.

I reckon Lance achieved what he achieved by being the best all round Tour cyclist of his generation - physically and mentally. Any other contributing factors would have been secondary to this and would also have been used by his peers (as well as the greats that went before him).

Flawed genius - you bet, but sporting genius nevertheless.

I don't think the logic that a rider who is dominant still would've been the best rider without doping (whether Indurain, Armstrong, etc) holds up, simply because we have no idea how much the individual benefited/didn't benefit from doping. Maybe he would've been just as dominant, maybe he would've been back in the pack. We have no idea. And that's why doping sucks - it distorts to the point where we don't know what to believe is "real" achievement anymore, we don't know to what extent it is affecting the outcome of an event. Would the greats still be the greats without doping, or if all were doping? Dunno. It might seem logical to assume that the strongest among the dopers would also be the strongest among the non-dopers, but the reality is that no one really knows.

 

[e0richt]

Why do some folks, let's face it, mostly Americans, need to believe that he was clean.



I will posit some possibilities.

1. He actually was clean, they are right.

2. They suspect he doped, but feel a process determines opinion versus an individual

3. Vicarious, they aspire to the alpha status only in their dreams is it manifested

4. Nationalism, existential collective culture of America, that creates adversaries where there are none, and attempts to place things in black-white categories like good and evil. Armstrong is a representative of America giving it to the old world countries who no longer have influence as far as yankees are concerned. A metaphor if you will.

5. American dream, born out of the collective culture again. Note: Barry Bonds and Marian Jones and tim Montgomery are less likely to get their dues in this paradigm, strictly for the boy next door done good(sic). This channels many facets of (3) yet is more an external influence on the individual versus endogenous.

6. Cannot separate the cancer philanthropy and the sport.

7. Similar to (2/6) suspect he doped but the means justify ends wrt the good done for cancer community.



America is not the only country that likes to believe their heroes are clean and not doped, and only the former Communist bloc and the People's Republic dope. They are not the only country to hold heroes on a pedestal. But there has been a paucity of investigative journalism in the popular media and the NT Times has only taken to associate wire reporting of the Armstrong issue. Does big business have a stake in this?

Why do some folks, let's face it, mostly French, need to believe that he was not clean?

 

[Bro Deal]

I don't think the logic that a rider who is dominant still would've been the best rider without doping (whether Indurain, Armstrong, etc) holds up, simply because we have no idea how much the individual benefited/didn't benefit from doping. Maybe he would've been just as dominant, maybe he would've been back in the pack. We have no idea. And that's why doping sucks - it distorts to the point where we don't know what to believe is "real" achievement anymore, we don't know to what extent it is affecting the outcome of an event. Would the greats still be the greats without doping, or if all were doping? Dunno. It might seem logical to assume that the strongest among the dopers would also be the strongest among the non-dopers, but the reality is that no one really knows.

Exactly. And by looking at Armstrong's pre-Ferrari performance we can see that he had no aptitude for climbing in the high mountains. The post-Ferrari performance were a complete, radical change. At least with Merckx and Hinault we can say that although they had dope available they did not have dope that would turn a donkey into a racing horse.

 

[Bro Deal]

Why do some folks, let's face it, mostly French, need to believe that he was not clean?

Because they have eyes and brains?

Nice to toss that French thing in there. Nothing like a little bigotry to buttress your case.

 

[Bro Deal]

What amazes me about this poll that there is that big of a percentage of people who read a racing forum and are stupid enough to think that Armstrong was clean. I guess Dubya was right: You can't fool all the people, all of the time. But you can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones you need to focus on.

 

[fscyclist]

What amazes me about this poll that there is that big of a percentage of people who read a racing forum and are stupid enough to think that Armstrong was clean. I guess Dubya was right: You can't fool all the people, all of the time. But you can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones you need to focus on.

That's because the question is not whether you believe he's clean. It is why do you think most people believe he's clean. I think most people believe he's clean because of ignorance. Whether I think he's clean has a much different answer.

 

[patch70]

In the history of sport there are numerous examples of athletes that are simply better than their peers. Ali, Sugar Ray, Maradonna, Pele, Jordan, Gretzky, Sampras, McEnroe, Phelps, Owens, Schumacher etc. etc. Each one reached the top of their game through a mix of genetics, aptitude, commitment to training, coaching, luck, family support, circumstances and, of course, the physical and social environment they were brought up in. Long before most of the greatest sports men and women on the planet were exposed to the pressures of professional stardom they had shown they were a class above the rest throughout their formative years. They didn´t suddenly find a chemist and transform into superman.

Most of these heroes are or were flawed geniuses (gambling, alcohol, drugs, extra-marital affairs,wife abuse - you name it our heroes have done it)- but geniuses they were and we accept them as human beings who raised their sports to new levels.

Is there something singularly different about the sport of cycling that its fans cannot accept it when someone comes along who is, quite simply, better than his peers. If that cyclist, through a mix of the factors listed above, was destined to raise the bar in cycling? The Armstrongs, Indurains, Hinaults and Merckxs of this world all achieved greatness by seeking out every advantage available within the parameters of the professional cycling world. I doubt if any achieved it without artificial assistance - but the same goes for all our other sports heroes. Ali used to have pain killers injected into his hands before fights, Maradonna snorted coke, Best was an alcoholic, Bonds pumped up on steroids and the list goes on. Blood transfusions were used by runners decades ago, steroids have been ripe in all strength sports since they became available and that´s just scratching at the surface - every sport has a dark side, an aspect that is less than savoury if you want to be puritanical about it.

On the other hand, if you want to be realistic and accept that professional sport and science have always been, and always will be, interlinked then you might come down from your pulpits and enjoy the world of sport for what it is - warts and all.

I reckon Lance achieved what he achieved by being the best all round Tour cyclist of his generation - physically and mentally. Any other contributing factors would have been secondary to this and would also have been used by his peers (as well as the greats that went before him).

Flawed genius - you bet, but sporting genius nevertheless.

You're assuming everyone is on the same dope or at least gets the same benefit from doping.

Not many cyclists are/were personally sponsored by one of the world's biggest pharmaceutical companies.

 

[House]

Because they have eyes and brains?

Nice to toss that French thing in there. Nothing like a little bigotry to buttress your case.

I am curious what your feelings are on claiming biggotry when someone calls out the French but not when someone does the same about Americans. Very selective, but we already know that's you MO.