mprelaw

True. Contador never bought his way out of a failed test. He just offered the lamest of lame excuses.

He also had a national anti-doping federation that winked at the test and accepted his excuse. Of course, "Spanish anti-doping federation" is one of the biggest oxymorons in all of sport.

Too bad he couldn't get a backdated 'script for clenbuterol, though, or he'd have been able to keep his 2010-2011 results.

barnabyjames

True, but they've also cost themselves more $$$ by supporting Lance as long as they did. Now "all of a sudden" you dump him(knowing from the get go) he was a doper? They hitched their ride to an admitted doper, bully, scam artist and con man. All the while alienating, and dumping on an american hero in Lemond so that they can make a few extra bucks? Yeah, seems like a smart marketing tool.

Zinger

I'm thinking Trek sold a LOT of bikes by sponsoring Armstrong and don't seem to be hurting for it. They probably are the only sponsor not suing him for anything back so they must be ahead on the profit side of that sponsorship. As far as discontinuing Lemond's brand, I'm not so sure that wasn't a marketing decision that didn't really involve Armstrong's input. I'm not taking sides in their feud but Lemond's outing their sponsored rider wasn't exactly a practical business move on it's own merits.

The whole bullying thing is a bit overplayed anyway. A 160 lb. Anglo named "Lance" doesn't get by with much of that over there without some support from the peloton I don't imagine.

mprelaw

True, but when you stack a few of those yellow jerseys in a row, you become the 800 pound gorilla in the room. Once you tie Mig at 5, no one is going to dare screw with you.

TiHabanero

Like Baj, I am a big LeMond fan and purchased a new race bike in 86 because of him. It replaced a Raleigh I had raced on for 3 years. I still have the Raleigh, but sold the LeMond after I quite racing.
Armstrong never inspired me as LeMond did. Having dealt with Trek as a company is likely why I never became a fan of his. The company and LA are like minded entities.
A friend of mine met LA before he became famous and had some not so nice things to say about him as well. Seems he was spot on about LA.

fietsbob

Im old enough to be his father , and was riding before he was born..

My Race style bike was an AlAn , then I replaced it with an RB1 Bridgestone, bought frame/fork,
after BS quit the US Market .

some of the components on it are still older than he.

Zinger

Agree, lol

Ol' Lance got a little greedy to one-up the Euros everything considered. He knows his audience and knows that contributes greatly to his popularity.

Still though it was the USADA that went after him and I've got to wonder where Tygart gets his inside information from about Armstrong being responsible for Trek discontinuing Lemond's line of bikes. Since he's not privy to Trek management discussions I'm guessing he made it up.

I'm not against reforming the sport and would like to see Pat McQuaid step down and anti doping functions separated from the UCI.I think that McQuaid is bucking the trend here. On the other hand it pains me to see an athlete take such a fall as to be automatically describes as "disgraced" by people who have never competed at anything in their lives.

For myself, I liked him better as an underdog while struggling for stage wins riding for Motorola. I just instinctively knew something was up upon his 1st Tour win and knew what it was by about his 3rd.

xfimpg

Nope, not me.

peter584

Lance is the reason I took up cycling again, I'm thankful.

Syscrush

I don't know if I'd say that I bought a bike because of Lance, but I do credit him for some of my enthusiasm for getting out there and riding it when I was a 245 lbs fatso who hadn't been on a bike since getting my DL 15 years earlier.

His personal story about his battle with cancer, his dominance as an outsider of a European sport, his dedication to his charity, and the way that he won the hearts of his fans at home whose level of interest in cycling rarely rises above shouting "get off the road" at cyclists are all inspirational to me, and will remain so.

I don't care about the drugs that he took - everything he took was available to every other cyclist out there, and he still managed to beat everyone. Unless I learn that he had an electric motor hidden somewhere on that bike, I will always consider him the winner of those tours and a personal hero.

Allez3

Yeah, but Specialized bikes rule. Treks are overpriced copies.

tracyshapiro

I did NOT. But I did greatly admire and respect him. And now, I feel stupid and cheated out of a hero. I'm just thankful he didn't sulky the reputation of other major races as well.

mprelaw

Well, when you built your whole career around focusing on the TdF, to the almost-total exclusion of the other grand tours, it's easy to avoid sullying their reputation.

He entered one Vuelta, and one Giro, if I remember correctly. The Giro wasn't until his comeback year.

This isn't a knock on him--not for doing that, anyway--it was smart marketing by an American, to focus on the only tour that 99% of Americans have ever heard of. Plus, because he basically ran his teams, he got to call his own shots.

tracyshapiro

Very true. I was referring to his focus, as opposed to the couple of times he went vogue and competed outside the Tour de France. I just it could have gone so much worse if he'd gotten away with doping and winning other grand tours.

Zinger

Well he still has two Tour stage wins on record. I'm good with that. This was always my favorite Armstrong win anyway.

Leinster

I took up cycling because of Stephen Roche and Sean Kelly. And really got into it because of Indurain, Bugno and especially Chiappucci. But read A Rough Ride at the age of 13, so always had questions about anyone who did too well on the Tour.

Cat4Lifer

I was cheering for Alcala, that day.
Armstrong got his payback (sort of) for getting second in the GC at TDP and getting dusted in the TT.

Zinger

I was an Alcala fan too from the 7-11 days.
Glad to see Armstrong hit the big time with a stage win though. Either would have been good with me. I didn't get to watch it happen though. I heard about it on the news that night and saw the finish years later. Didn't even realize that Alcala was who he beat out at the line until then.

sprince

I've always had a bike, since age 4. The first one I bought myself was around age 10. Until about age 30, I never realized that road cycling was a sport, I thought the only cycling competitions were in a velodrome. The first Lemond TDF was a revelation. Oddly enough the person that first sparked an interest in getting a decent bike (for training, not racing) was Marc Girardelli. I couldn't have been less interested in road cycling as a sport during the Armstrong years, then a buddy at work turned me on the the TDF and I was hooked. Too bad I missed the entire Eddy Merckx era, that may have inspired a bike purchase.

jmio

hahah, no lance did not get me into cycling, but he was an american winning in Europe, I was proud. I also loved seein Sosa and mcguire smashing huge homeruns. I was pissed off when the freaking gov took up investigation to seek out their heads. I could give two craps about PEDS, who does, and who doesn't. It is awesome to see humans turned superhumans in their field of professionalism.

Syscrush

I agree with this to a large degree.

My biggest heroes have always used drugs, long before Lance and probably will after Lance: Vasily Alekseyev, Arnold, Hulk Hogan, Ernest Hemingway, Neil Young, Ken Kesey. Hell, if Bobby Fisher had been smarter about choosing some appropriate drugs he might have been able to keep it together and remained on top of the chess world for a longer time.

We want 150 pound men to generate 1/2 of the power of a 900 pound horse for hours at a time. We want to see them fly up Alpe d'Huez in under 40m during the middle of a race that goes on for weeks while avoiding injury and recovering from complete exhaustion on a daily basis. AND we want them to do it "clean". It makes no sense to me.

hedgeapple

I don't want to see anyone meet any such specific criteria. I just want to see the game, or in this case, the race, and may the best win.

After 20 years, I wanted to get back into bikes for a number of reasons - health, fun, commuting, touring, my brother who's been doing RAGBRAI for decades. Lance was a small part of it, too. I wasn't following racing so his performance was for me nothing more than success, and inspiring, even if I had no intention of racing.

The best commentary I've encountered on Lance was by a Brit in the letters section of Adventure Cyclist a few months ago: Armstrong didn't fail to live up to my unreasonable expectations, he failed to live up to his own unreasonable expectations. As for myself, I won't apologize for being impressed or for feeling let down. I took Lance at his word; now I know better. And I pity him.

live311

I got into road cycling for a few reasons. Considering the timing (circa 2003) it's hard to deny that Lance was a factor.

1. fell out of touch with my mountain biking buddies
2. got sick of having to drive 30 minutes to get to a decent trail
3. during an unusually wet summer, I was disheartened by considerable trail erosion caused by mountain bikes
4. lost my nerve due to an injury. Walking the technical sections or avoiding the more technical trails altogether because your shoulder is guaranteed to dislocate on your next endo can be a bummer after a while.

There are plenty of times I've pretended to be Lance or one of his lieutenants on some hilly rides. Regardless of how he did it, he and his teams' consistent dominance of that race was truly awe-inspiring, and will probably never be repeated by anyone. I just hope that people don't stop riding because of these revelations.

midschool22

Nope. But I will admit to buying a bike because of Andy, Greg and Stephen.

Leinster

Damn, 80's bikes looked deadly.



Did the small-front-wheel, no-aero-bars-only-bullhorns bikes have any real aero advantage over good ol' drop bars at all? Or would Roche have been as well off putting a disc wheel on the same road bike he would've rode the day before?


And when are Mavic gonna make full groupsets again? They had black finishes before it was cool!