AP: Armstrong won't challenge doping allegations; loses Tour titles (Lance to confess)

[AsiaticSkinsFan]

But Predicto...were you IN the room when he was doping? Did you SEE him do it with your own eyes? Unless you have that then he is......nevermind. Dude is guilty as hell. I'm glad that he has done a lot for people and helped raise awareness and money for cancer. That doesn't change that he is a world class cheat.

its not that he is a cheat for me, I really dont care about PED in sports and think the hysteria over it is ridiculous. My problem is that Armstrong is a bully and likes to push people around who defy him. That upsets me.

[zoony]

I am no fan of Armstrong, but I do think this entire thing is over the top.

I mean, it's established that EVERYONE in that sport dopes. So to me, what he accomplished is no less remarkable. And lets face it, if he'd only won 1 Tour, this would never have gone this far.

Rooting for people on their way up and cheering as we tear them down. It's the American way.

[ixcuincle]

Yeah, everyone dopes...but is everyone as much of a jerk and denier as Armstrong was? He's like the Roger Clemens of cycling.

[AsiaticSkinsFan]

Yeah, everyone dopes...but is everyone as much of a jerk and denier as Armstrong was? He's like the Roger Clemens of cycling.

exactly

[Elessar78]

He's smart enough not to keep fighting and just burn through his money. People have this perception that athletes live for us and that all of them should be worried about their legacy—at least their legacy toward millions they've never met.

I posted when this thread last came up that the people who came in 2nd to Armstrong in the TdF ALL have been sanctioned for doping. We complain that the field is not level, but in a perverse way, it was level. Just like it's going to come out in the next decade that 95% of the NFL was on PEDs.

[AsiaticSkinsFan]

the field was level in that they were all doping, but Lance had the best doctors and chemists. By far the best system of a cover up too. And he had the UCI in his pocket, literally. That USADA report says that he gave the UCI 100K to cover up his positive test at the 2001 Tour of Switzerland. He even joked about it with his teammates.


Armstrong was the leader of the 2nd drug wave in cycling.

[Elessar78]

If this was auto racing and Michael Schumacher has a better pit crew and mechanics that would unlevel the playing field? Arguably every cyclist has the same access to dirty doctors.

In a perverse result of his cancer treatments, my theory now, according to his bios when he got sick he relied on his research as much as what his doctors told him because he felt you had to be proactive about your own health care. It's conceivable that he learned things about the human body functions, how drug tests work, etc.

[China]

Details of Doping Scheme Paint Armstrong as Leader

To start what was deemed a new and better doping strategy, Lance Armstrong and two of his teammates on the United States Postal Service cycling squad flew on a private jet to Valencia, Spain, in June 2000, to have blood extracted. In a hotel room there, two doctors and the team’s manager stood by to see their plan unfold, watching the blood of their best riders drip into plastic bags.

The next month, during the Tour de France, the cyclists lay on beds with those blood bags affixed to the wall. They shivered as the cool blood re-entered their bodies. The reinfused blood would boost the riders’ oxygen-carrying capacity and improve stamina during the second of Armstrong’s seven Tour wins.

The following day, Armstrong extended his overall lead with a swift ascent of the unforgiving and seemingly unending route up Mont Ventoux.

At a race in Spain that same year, Armstrong told a teammate that he had taken testosterone, a banned substance he called “oil.” The teammate warned Armstrong that drug-testing officials were at the team hotel, prompting Armstrong to drop out of the race to avoid being caught.

In 2002, Armstrong summoned a teammate to his apartment in Girona, Spain. He told his teammate that if he wanted to continue riding for the team he would have to follow the doping program outlined by Armstrong’s doctor, a known proponent of doping.

The rider said that the conversation confirmed that “Lance called the shots on the team,” and that “what Lance said went.”

Those accounts were revealed Wednesday in hundreds of pages of eyewitness testimony from teammates, e-mail correspondence, financial records and laboratory analyses released by the United States Anti-Doping Agency — the quasi-governmental group charged with policing the use of performance-enhancing drugs in Olympic sports.

Click on the link for the full article

[AsiaticSkinsFan]

If this was auto racing and Michael Schumacher has a better pit crew and mechanics that would unlevel the playing field? Arguably every cyclist has the same access to dirty doctors.

In a perverse result of his cancer treatments, my theory now, according to his bios when he got sick he relied on his research as much as what his doctors told him because he felt you had to be proactive about your own health care. It's conceivable that he learned things about the human body functions, how drug tests work, etc.

I dont understand the Schumacher analogy, but he left Benetton for Ferrari because Ferrari had the best team in the F1 circuit even though he won back to back titles at Benetton (he also got paid more at Ferrari too).

And it isnt arguable, Armstrong had the best chemists and doctors in cycling. They were so great that he didnt share those tools with most of his teammates.


Also, there is a theory that drug use is how he got cancer originally. I do not know to believe it, but its interesting.

[Gibbs Hog Heaven]

Just been listening to some pretty damning interviews from Bradley Wiggins and Sir Chis Hoy on British TV.

Brad saying he had no sympathy and wasn't surprised by the reports findings tell's me all I needed to know and removes any lingering doubts I may of had on Lance.

Hail.

[Rocky21]

Yeah, everyone dopes...but is everyone as much of a jerk and denier as Armstrong was? He's like the Roger Clemens of cycling.

Perfect example. Not only is he a egomaniac, not only is he a cheater and a liar, he is a bully and using every possible means to clear himself at the expense of people he should care about like his teammates.

But I'm sure despite this overwhelming evidence some people will bury their head in the sand and believe what they want to believe.

[GoSkins0721]

This just in:

Armstrong steps down as chairman of Livestrong cancer-fighting charity

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2012/1...#ixzz29YgS6WRU

[Monte51Coleman]

And Nike drops him-

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...532317222.html

[Mursilis]

Rooting for people on their way up and cheering as we tear them down. It's the American way.

I don't know who's cheering as the Armstrong myth falls apart. I'm enough of a (former) cycling fan to have traveled to France a number of years ago to cheer him in Le Tour, and to have all his Tours on DVD, but I'm only saddened by his fall and disgrace. Still, I don't regret that the truth has come out - maybe finally that sport will clean itself up.

[Elessar78]

I'm sure it sucks that Nike has dropped him but he's also suckled from that teat for a long time. Hopefully he's been smart enough to bank enough of that money to last a lifetime.