How did Landis pass every test but the last one? he didn't really take something that night that made the difference the next day, did he?
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/tour-de-france/teammates-to-testify-against-lance-armstrong/story-fn8s9i81-1226418109647Selective prosecution is a poor argument. That they also could be going after other competitors does not negatively reflect on a case against him. Not to mention that there are good reasons for them to be gunning for him over other U.S. athletes.
Such bullshit.Lance has given up fighting the doping charges and will probably be stripped of all his TDF wins.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/C/CYC_ARMSTRONG_DOPING?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-08-23-21-52-08
VN: There was reportedly a lot of evidence in the case, there was witness testimony and presumably more…do you expect any of those details to emerge?
TT: Yes, absolutely…at the right time. Obviously there are other cases that are alleged to be involved in the conspiracy. Their cases are still proceeding, so it will be in due course.
VN: So there is no impediment to USADA releasing the evidence?
TT: No, no.
Also, apparently his ex-wife testified against him in 2005?@Buster_ESPN: USADA had 10 former Lance Armstrong teammates prepared to testify against him. http://t.co/xaMvoq55
In 2004, a Dallas-based promotions company initially refused to pay him a $5 million bonus for winning his sixth Tour de France because it wanted to investigate allegations raised by media in Europe. Testimony in that case included former teammate Frankie Andreu and his wife, Betsy, saying Armstrong told doctors during his 1996 cancer treatments that he had taken a cornucopia of steroids and performance-enhancing drugs.
Well he definitely still means something to cancer survivors - whether or not he cheated, his wins in the TDF have given him an amazing amount of wealth and opportunity to help others. So far that help has come in at the tune of $500 million...half a billion bucks to his foundation. Yes, I know not every penny goes to cancer research - but an awful lot of it does. And an awful lot of his time does. Whatever your personal opinions are about his professional life and whether or not he's a cheat, that yellow band still signifies something that's bigger than cheating, bigger than sport, bigger than the USADA - it signifies hope for a lot of people. I hope people can see that he's done so much good with his spoils and riches that some may see as "ill-begotten." I know I see it.I just find this whole thing very sad. Call me naive, I prefer a sporting romantic, but I always wanted to believe he was clean and that the yellow wristband I've worn for the last 7 years or so meant something.
Maybe Livestrong can still mean something and I have to divorce myself from the Lance of the professional cyclist and cheat and just concentrate on the cancer survivor and charity worker. This creates a more fundamental problem to me and the way I view athletes as it's now become obvious that it's time I put away the rose-tinted spectacles.
My disgust & hatred for any pro athlete who cheats knows no-bounds, whoever they may be, even if one of my sporting heroes is now shown to be a fraud. Sad.
I don't think you are missing anything.Forgive the naivete, but exactly why is it a given that Armstrong is guilty merely because he's no longer choosing to fight the charges against him? What if his statements are true and he simply lacks the energy to continue? What am I missing here?
I know, I know, it's silly of me to think he's anything but dirty, Still, there seems to be a general conclusion that's being drawn and I'd like to know why that is.
that's Frankie Andreu's wife Betsy, not Lance's wife.Also, apparently his ex-wife testified against him in 2005?
There are still cheaters; there always will be, but I think it's gotten infinitely better. The wattage outputs from the top riders now are much more in line with what they should be and you see top riders crack from time to time going up steep climbs and they'll start climbing and then hit the wall and have to drop back into a group, that's something you hardly ever saw in the late 90s or earlier in the 2000s.And now the United States can resume not caring about cycling. Oh wait, we already did that when Lance Armstrong retired.
We don't need to ban doping in cycling, we need to ban cycling. They are all cheating.
Well the USADA has a job to do just like everybody else. Shouldn't your issue be more with WADA?I have little sympathy for Lance Armstrong. I have nothing but disgust for the USADA.
I don't have a horse in this race (cyclist in this tour?), but I think it's useful to consider context. Armstrong put together a superlative string of success in a period we know to be one of the dirtiest in all of sports, in a sport that we know to be one of the dirtiest. So many successful cyclists during this period were found (or admitted) to have doped. When one guy wins seven in field full of PEDs-users, there will always be a cloud of suspicion.Tearing down our heroes is of course an American pastime, and much of the time the objects of said game are well-deserving of the honor. But it's just very interesting to me that he's automatically assumed to be lying and guilty when he says he no longer has the will to continue the fight, which has been going on since...when, 1998?
Again, I realize these are all very naive questions.
I think mostly timing, partly LeMond's style himself. The 80s drug-testing regime was less rigorous and there fewer people caught. If wiki is to be believed, LeMond has a vigorous anti-doping stance and spent some time trying to get Landis to admit doping. This all probably unfairly insulates him.OK, then how come Greg LeMond, three time Tour winner (and likely could have won 5) not get put through the same process?
Agreed. Tygart seems to be treating this awfully personally.Armstrong may well be a cheater, but the tenor of much of the investigation strikes me as fantastically vindictive and personal. The object doesn't seem to be to clean up the sport, the object appears to be to tear Armstrong down at all costs.
He never denied that. In fact (I think) he admitted freely that he took tons of stuff that is banned durring his cancer treatments. It's the reason he survived the treatments.saying Armstrong told doctors during his 1996 cancer treatments that he had taken a cornucopia of steroids and performance-enhancing drugs.
While cancer treatment almost always includes steroids, your interpretation wasn't the meaning intended. If I were to guess, this lack of clarity was brought you by the punctuation-hating AP style guide.He never denied that. In fact (I think) he admitted freely that he took tons of stuff that is banned durring his cancer treatments. It's the reason he survived the treatments.
Duriny my cancer treatments I took lots of white blood cell boosters that are strictly banned by USADA and had I bbeen tested by USADA I would have failed, but they alowed me to go about my daily life while getting pumped full of tons of very tixic chemicals that destroyed my cancer. They also damaged white blood cells, hence the booster.
Thanks, that's me mis-reading, and not noticing that it was corrected above.Betsy is Frankie Androu's wife.
And, the re-phrase should be "Frankie and Betsy Androu said that Armstrong told his oncologists that he had used a cornucopia of steroids and PEDs."
This doesn't follow at all. I have no presumption. I was parsing the accusation, not the accuser. Nice try, though.Your own presumption of guilt has fucked with your ability to parse language even when you are correcting someone else (or you didn't read where the quote came from, but since you mention Betsy "his wife" I kind of assumed that you did). The power of negative thinking. Nothing against you personally, I'm talking more about the general rhetoric.
I misunderstood the timing there, thanks.EDIT: Really, why would you need to inform the people treating you that you're on allopathic steroids? The point of this claim is to say that Armstrong admitted to having doped prior to cancer / treatment.
True, and completely reasonable. This is why I said "allopathic" - presumably the doctors treating him know that they're treating him with. I think the reference to "performance enhancing drugs" was to drive that point home. The whole idea of this accusation is to drive doubt about Armstrong's credibility by claiming he admitted doping when the chips were down.I misunderstood the timing there, thanks.
He would do this because it could cause SERIOUS health risks if he didn't. If his doctors didn't know everything that was going on in his body they wouldn't be able to treat it properly.
Yeah, I think part of the reason there was no outcry about Lance was that everyone's known for decades that all the cyclists cheat--PED use goes back at least to 1924. Same reason every successive steroid user gets less backlash, while the early suspects were demonized.And now the United States can resume not caring about cycling. Oh wait, we already did that when Lance Armstrong retired.
We don't need to ban doping in cycling, we need to ban cycling. They are all cheating.
It has more to do with the American need for heroes. Nobody gets more hype and become more overblown than an American star. America loves to create gods not heroes.Tearing down our heroes is of course an American pastime, and much of the time the objects of said game are well-deserving of the honor.