brent_dube

from the rolla daily news: (linked from armstrong's official site)

Near the end of the race it was an arrogant competitor who, unwittingly, gave him the "ultimate inspiration," Armstrong said. He described how this competitor had been asking for more than a year for Armstrong to give him a race jersey. Finally, the competitor told one of Armstrong's team members to never mind the jersey, he'd be winning his own "yellow jersey" by defeating Armstrong for the Tour win.

During the final day of the race, after suffering a crash that cost him valuable seconds, Armstrong said he got back on the bike with a vengeance.

"I had the most incredible rush of adrenaline," he said. On top of that, Armstrong said the competitor's words came back to him just then: "I got mad then," he said.

And went on to win his fifth Tour de France.

-------------------------------------------------

Arrogant competitor? I wonder what this was about.

fore

a tie is possible. in the event there is a tie, i believe the win goes to whoever has the most stage wins.

dws5b

Lance will dominate 2004 TDF along with winning a spring classic.

alexs

you think lance will bother to race to win anything other than the tour? maybe he'll give a go at dauphine-libere just to get the competive juices flowing, but that's about it.

this site is infested with lance worshippers who don't know crap about racing, bleh.

simoni is a true racer... he'll win the giro, 3 or 4 classics, and at least one stage in the tour de france. if anyone racing today is the heir of merckx, hinault and anquetil, it's simoni. lance is great press in the USA, but he's nowhere near as dominating as the other 5-time tour winners (except maybe indurain, but at least indurain raced in the vuelta and/or the giro in the same year he won the tour... lance won't bother). even if lance won 10 tours de france, he still wouldn't be half as great of a cyclist as merckx or anquetil.

SamDaBikinMan

The spring classics are for other racers who cannot win the tour!

You obviously do not realize that this is about money and appeasing sponsors who pay out this money.

It's the American way
TDF generates the desried exposure for the money people. That is about it.

I agree that Lance does not dominate like many before him and his focus on only the tour really does not sit well with many of the hardcore fans.

Laggard

And it's infested with people who don't even realize that there are other races besides the Giro and the TDF. Or maybe they do and just don't care.

The fall classics were happening and people here were still arguing about whether or not Jan waited.

Smoothie104

Simoni tested positive for cocaine......twice.

SamDaBikinMan

Jan did not wait, he got passed and blown away

brent_dube

Its hard to care when you get no coverage of the races
Its like with the NFL... there are certain teams that I would have a lot more interest in if I got to see live coverage of their games.

Yeah, thats why all those guys that were dropped (hamilton, basso...) magically caught back up with him within half a kilometre

Lance can get a podium in a race like Liege Bastone Liege.
He is just as dominating as the other tour winners, if not more. He dominates his tours just as well, if not greater, than the past winners have (besides merckx). The competition is much more specialized now... there is no way any of those past guys could win the tour and classics, or the tour and giro, in todays field.

alexs

compare lance's palmares with some of the older guys.

in 1970 merckx won the tour, the giro, paris-roubaix, fleche wallone, ghent-wevelgem, paris-nice, pernod cup, and was the belgian national champion. he was similarly dominating from 69-74.

in 1979 hinault won the tour, fleche wallone, the tour of lombardy, dauphine libere, the grand prix time trial, and pernod cup no 1. in 78 and 80 he didn't win as many classics, but he did win a double.

hell, even indruain managed to win two major tours in the same year (he did it twice) as recently as 1993.

spend some time comparing armstrong to the other riders at https://www.sportsrecords.co.uk/cycling/ and you'll see that he is simply not in the same class as the rest of the greats. even earlier guys like coppi and bartali raced more than lance does. not that lance isn't inspirational, and not that he hasn't dominated the tour de france. just that he isn't nearly the all around cyclist that any of the other guys were.

brent_dube

I know he doesnt have the same wins, but what I'm saying is he is in a different time period where the competition is heavier, and more riders are more specialized in certain races. There is no way that guys like Henault would have had the same results if they were racing today. Would they still have better results than Armstrong? Maybe. But I just think its hard to compare the generations by just looking at results.

SamDaBikinMan

THE COLD HARD TRUTH

It is very simple my cycling friends. Lance and his racing agenda are about money. Cash talks and BS walks. He races to appease his sponsors and fill his pockets with a retirement nestegg. Any of us would do the same if we could.

He is not concerned with entering the ranks of Merkcx, Indurain, etc... All he needs is to win the most prestigious and most commercially promoted race on the planet to insure his cash suppliers get the exposure they want. He will not risk racing hard in a spring classic to possibly spoil his peak for the TDF because he will jeapordize the publicity stunt of his focusing on the tour and winning. He may however use some classics as a training run for his "hollywood" race in France.

I too am growing tired of the focus on the tour while his competition is out there working hard for theor wins to include a go at the TDF. Come on Lance, get off the moneybags and race like a real man would. You don't do half what some of your closest competitors do yet you smile big and wave at the end of your only significant effort of the season. Big deal.

Laggard

But there is coverage. Cyclingnews.com has live coverage of most of the classics. Just 'cause there are no pictures doesn't mean that it's not interesting or that the race can not be discussed afterwards.

Anyway. The TDF and Giro have become so difficult that it's difficult for riders to do well in the classics and the grand tours. The average speed of the TDF has really gotten out of hand. As someone pointed out, it's all because of the huge money behind the tour now. As far as most sponsors are concerned, if the team they're pumping money into is not racing in France in July, then they've wasted a lot of money. Fans are partly responsible for this also. Sponsors are aware that to most people outside of Europe, the TDF is the only bike race there is. Just look at all the people here who posted during the TDF but promptly dissapeared when it was over.

What happens to this board when Lance and Jan retire?

MKRG

Well, I'm not sure what will happen to this board but I'm going to sell my bikes and follow the next trend. Of course I don't expect much money out of them since they are not branded Trek. Maybe I'll even try to sell my used cycling shorts on ebay.

Laggard

Yeah, what's the deal with Trek? I mean, they make some great bikes but there seems to be a near obsession with them here.

Is it because of Postal?

don d.

I own a 1992 Trek 400 that does nothing but hang from the hooks right now, but I think their Lifetime Guarantee is a great marketing tool, and the bikes are good bikes, and Lance Armstrong rides one, and they're made in America, and they have a solid dealer network, and they're doing just about everything right.

dws5b

Non Cycling people ask me if LA is the greatest ever and I answer with not even close. Eddy won everything. It is a completely different time now though. I wish Simoni would concentrate on the tour this year so we could really see who is better. Which 3 classics will simoni win? I say he will not win one. To claim this site is full of LA worshipers is probably true but that does not mean we do not know bike racing. In my opinion the best rider today is the cricket in the classics, LA in the Tour, Simoni in the Giro, and Heras in Spain. You say LA should prove himself by doing the double but your man Simoni did and was nowhere near LA.

ParamountScapin 

Sports, in every game, is a much different beast today. Is anyone out there enough of a bicycle racing history buff to know how important teams and team tactics were before the modern era (say, 1999 to today)? I do not recall ever hearing any of the annoucers of the past few years allude to team tactics when talking about the "greats" of old (Merckx, Anquetil, et al). Would be interesting to contrast the teams tactics of pre-Indurain with those of today.

But, we are stuck with the conumdrum of who is better, Tiger or Jack. And like LA and Merckx, we will never know. Different times.

Laggard

Bettini is the best rider in the world right now.

You are right in that it's difficult to compare Eddy to Lance or Hinault to Indurain. However, in a way this degrades what Eddy did. He won an incredible amount of races but he didn't win them in a vacuum. He raced and consistently beat a lot of very very good riders. The grand tours of today may be more difficult but the Tour of Flanders is still the Tour of Flanders.

ParamountScapin 

One has to think a bit about the pictures of the TdF and other races up until the "modern" era of the 80's, shall we say. That is when science started to be used to define not only the bike but the rider. Modern training methods, etc. Pre-LeMond most riders did not know or care about training and diet other than riding and eating enough. Once scientific methods started being applied then the game changed in all sports. Not that the great riders of earlier eras could not have competed today, it is just that we can't know how they would compare. Look at the speeds in the GTs and the time gaps by which LA won (until this year) and there is no question of how well he performed. Does that make him better than the other "great ones"? Who knows. But it certainly makes him no worse. And no one today rides all the GTs with an idea to winning more than one. If Simoni rides the Giro and does well I predict his TdF result will be the same as this year. Just happy I am getting over to watch again this year.

alexs

watch A Sunday In Hell, it's a documentary about the '76 Paris-Roubaix. there's plenty of evidence of team tactics. it's also a great movie.

Laggard

That's one of my favorite movies.

And you're right - teams were as important then as now.

brent_dube

teams did seem kind of worthless though when you look back at time gaps and breakaways on past tour stages. Maybe they were more important than they seemed.

Do you mean the routes are more difficult, or just the nature of the race and competition have made it harder?

Laggard

The average speed of the grand tours is much higher now.

The 1976 TDF averaged 34.5 km/hour In 1986 it was 36.9 This last tour was almost 41 Km/hour

edwin

I too am fustrated by riders only racing a few races a year. Race the Tour, but also race the classics, and try to win, not just use them for training. Tyler Hamilton and Vino did very well last year, I have a lot of respect for them for doing what they did, I just wish others did the same.