You must admit, even if he was smacked up to his t1ts, this is a stunning recovery yes?

Yeah, Pantani, Riis and Landis all had pretty spectacular rides too. I wonder what those 3 had in common, and so might also be he case for Lance?

I think that the problem that I have with Armstrong is that his supporters are so amazingly reverent of him. He cannot have taken drugs! No never! After all, he almost died from cancer, so why endanger his life again. Somehow, mystically he became almost superhuman, after his illness, and beat the whole world, who coincidentally were taking the strongest drugs money could buy. He is turned into a messiah style figure. There is no question of him possibly taking drugs, or even probably taking drugs. He just didn’t. His association with so many people who did take drugs is irrelevant. Pointless.

For the record, I think he probably did. And it would amuse me no end if he tested positive this summer. Which he won’t. The reason it bothers me? The same reason that God-botherers with megaphones annoy the hell out of me.

My last cycling hero was Pantani. Now he was clean. He never tested positive for drug use did he? 😯

Without LA no-one would have heard of Kimmage

If you think that, then I’d suggest that (along with many others on this thread who know little of road cycling) you’re ill informed to comment. Have you read Kimmage’s book? Checking the copy on my shelf, it was first published in 1990, and became quite a big seller for a book on cycling. I don’t think too many people had even heard of LA in 1990!

I stand by that – ride with quite a few roadies at the weekend , most of who had no idea who he was until recently. Agree to disagree, but thanks for telling me that I’m ill informed to comment.

GTkid – before your time maybe?

I don’t know but I suspect he probably did take drugs…

however, he was/is still an amazing sportsman and his is an amazing story,

makes me laugh when people get dewy eyed about Tom Simpson (including myself – I stood for ages at his memorial on Ventoux) they seem to forget he was a cheat !

ride with quite a few roadies at the weekend , most of who had no idea who he was until recently.

They’ve probably not heard of Raymond Poulidor, Federico Bahamontes or Freddy Maertens either. Anybody English speaking who was around and following the racing scene in the late 80s (or early 90s when the book came out to substantial publicity) would have heard of Kimmage.

Lance is a dedicated and talented cyclist. His VAM (vertical ascent speed) is not stratospheric at 1700 and at 6.5w/kg he’s up there but not stupidly obviously cheating.

However, almost every rider in the old Postal team has now either fessed up or been outed. So let’s say the average TdF is 30 daysx6 hours ish, so 180 hours. Lets say there are 10 hours of epic cols that he is racing. So he gets a rest for 94% on the time, or 170 hours, protected by an awesome, enhanced, team, setting him up in the best possible way for the climbs, nicely rested. Then he is also unchallenged on the flats surrounded by that squad, doing all the work for him, and who are also handing him some seconds in the team time trial.

No wonder he never criticises the dopers – he’s benefitted for years.

Interesting that YouTube have withdrawm comments from that clip.

Lance was in the US road team in 1990 and had probably achieved more then Kimmage ever did with 2 years of that.

I think Lance is coming back purely because he is probably the most selfish person alive, its all about him, he survived cancer because he did what he could, hew studied everything about what was killing him so he could defeat it. His family life suffered because it was always about him.

I think its the same with his training, some people can push themselves beyond what others are prepared to endure. Chris Hoy is the same for track sprinting his coaches say no one is prepared to hurt that hard in training. I don’t hear many on here saying Hoy’s a doper. He beat Ullrich mainly cause he liked donuts too much and was always carrying too much weight early season, Basso was in awe of Lance as he helped so much with his mum who had cancer. Beloki was one of closest challengers but broke hip in crash that forced Lance off road. I don’t think he had an all-round challenger that could compete in mountains and TT.

paddy true he did have the train, he didn’t need to dope when he’s sitting on the wheel of 8 guys upto their eyes in it. But I was on the Alpe in 2004 and that was pure class, he took it to the field then when they did what they could to remove his advantages.

Lance was in the US road team in 1990

My point stands that in 1990 many more people had heard of Kimmage than Lance – LA didn’t make Kimmage.

I think he’s in league with Satan.

I’ve done lots of drugs.

None of them have been performance enhancing.

Personally, I believe LA is a fine sportsman. He has taken on an overcome some huge challenges, as an athlete and a man. You cant knock him for what he has achieved in a somewhat dubious sport. He did it all and has come back to do it again-knowing exactly what is in front of him-and what people would level at hi-Kimmage included. I take my hat off to him, he is almost in a no win situation…..but I wouldn’t wager on him not winning the tour.

I like the way ppl are suggesting that you have to be an arrogant, sanctimonius tw*t to be a top sportsman. I don’t recall people saying this about Muhammed Ali, Michael Jordan, Michael Phelps, or Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor (:P).

Don’t think anyone is arguing that he isn’t an amazing athlete btw – just that he also probably cheated (like everyone else) and is very arrogant.

LA is an exceptional man, without any doubt.
To say that he is the cancer, is a very low insult, especialy said to anyone that has suffered cancer.
He did very well to handle the interview as he did.

However, almost every rider in the old Postal team has now either fessed up or been outed

Really, almost all? 2 from Discovery, and 6 from US Postal that I can find (and one of those was Tom Boonan’s Coke habit)Out of what? Maybe 70-90 cyclists in all those years. Hardly massively conclusive

What I can’t understand, with all the accusations at Lance, no-one seems to query Indurain’s 5(?) straight wins. If some of the arguments vs LA are that it was/is the culture to dope & he beat dopers, why do we not have the same finger pointing vs Indurain?

What about Victoria Pendleton? Paula Radcliffe? Daley Thomson? The 1966 England footy team?

All under suspicion, in my book…

If Indurain was coming out of retirement and being as arrogant about it as Lance, I’m sure we’d be making much the same comments.

Sometime Postal/Disco riders found to be positive? In no particular order, let’s see, um, Landis, Hamilton, Andreu, Heras, Mondini, Beltran, Swart, O’Bee, Basso.

How many don’t get found out?

Oh please – he comes across as a right tw*t in that video.

‘I got back into this for a very noble cause… to fight cancer….’ – no you did it because YOU wanted to.

Actually, by coming back to the sport he is fighting cancer. By coming back to the sport he’s continuing to change peoples perceptions and give people new hope that cancer can be beaten, no matter how bad it seems to be. It also changes non cancer sufferers perceptions; In the past you may have been stigmatised for having had cancer. It takes great people to conquer these perceptions.

I’ve had cancer myself, and whilst I don’t worship LA, he did prove to be a very good role model for me by proving that this awful disease can be beaten.

Rustydub – Kimmage didn’t actually call Lance the Cancer – More that drugs are the cancer of the sport, and that with Lance the ‘cancer’ has returned. I must say that i don’t agree, as quite obviously the tour still hasn’t been cleaned up, i’m thinking of Vino, nearly all the Saunier Duval riders, and loads more i can’t recall – i’m not certain what kimmage’s beef is, although he maybe he feels robbed, as a talented rider himself (i think people forget that he was actually pretty good) – he only got so far and never achieved huge fame and fortune from his acheivements (on the bike) and maybe found a way to make a career for himself because of the bike – who knows, either way someone blew sand up his mangina. My personal view (for what it’s worth (very little probably)) is that yes, there is something dodgy going on, go’s without saying doesn’t it!!!!

What winds me up about this whole story is you get people like Nostac on this forum coming out with utter crap such as there is no test for blood doping. Yes there is, I’m not going to go into it now, but people have been caught blood doping many times, not just in cycling.

IMO Lance is a tremendous athlete, he’s never been caught, and he is the most tested man on the planet, fact. so that’s good enough for me, its a really sad state of affairs, and shows the mess that pro cycling is in when so many people question this though…

My two penneth – really wish we could access the data that was lost when the hackers knacked up the server, would be interesting to see how many of the current nay sayers were praising LA when he won his last and record breaking TdF? ‘I can see a band wagon and must jump on it’ mentallity…

I believe there is no reliable test for autologous blood tranfusions
Warton, you may well know better.

Most tested athlete, man on the planet, etc etc.I have no data on this but for a start the most tested cyclists would be those who race a whole season and not those who concentrate on one event.

Linford Christie got caught in a drug test at the end of his career; was he guilty? Had he taken drugs earlier? Why not tested positive earlier? Why just use drugs at the end of his career?

Actually, by coming back to the sport he is fighting cancer. By coming back to the sport he’s continuing to change peoples perceptions and give people new hope that cancer can be beaten, no matter how bad it seems to be.

No he’s not. If people weren’t influenced by him coming back last time when he had recovered from cancer, why is this time when he hasn’t recovered from cancer (just had a few years off and got bored) going to be different? It’s completely selfish – cancer isn’t the story any more. There are many things he could do which would do more for the fight against cancer than returning to cycling.

Actually I stopped liking LA in 1998 when I read his first book, but then I had come across him in 1990 and watched him win the Worlds, watched him in the Pyrenees on the day that Fabio Casartelli died and the next when there was all that finger pointing, was sorry for him when he was diagnosed with cancer and then had all those operations, and was really glad when he came back with the USPS team.

It’s completely selfish – cancer isn’t the story any more. There are many things he could do which would do more for the fight against cancer than returning to cycling.

Post cancer sufferers are always at the risk of it coming back. You’re never really over it. After effects of chemotherapy can take many years to come to light. Many drugs are so new we don’t know what the long term effects are. That’s why I will be having 6 monthly check ups for the rest of my life, healthy or not.

And why should he do anything different? He is a cyclist, that’s what he’s known for, and what he likes to do.

Linford Christie got caught in a drug test at the end of his career; was he guilty?

Well, there’s some doubt over that one. He was found with traces of Nandrolone in his urine, which could have got into his system through legal food supplements. That was at a time when loads of athletes were getting caught out, for unwittingly ingesting the drug in this manner. Many athletes were let off for this reason. Christie tested negative throughout his career, and as he said himself, ‘why take drugs at the end, when you’re career is almost over anyway?’. I’d like to think LC wasn’t ‘guilty’, personally.

Drugs or not, I feel there is something deeply sinister about LA.

I could be rong, mind. My paranoia could be a result of my previous drug-taking.

Oh well.

I am sure he is a drugs cheat

If I had people saying that about me I’d be an obnoxious c*nt, too. Until anything is proven why the hell suspect the guy of doping? It would wind me up to be in his position having w*nky journos poking accusations at me.

Re the old urine samples getting tested – wasn’t there an urban myth that he’d taken EPO as part of his cancer treatment, and traces kept turning up?

Might explain his reluctance, if testing has improved.

fwiw, he probably is an arrogant selfish and maybe nasty individual. I sit in an office with people like that, nothing to do with sport.

But he survived cancer against the odds and returned to beat the best of the rest for several years – clean or not, that was an achievement.

Sometimes the emotions around drugs cloud the issues – drugs don’t make you ride better per se, they enable you to train and recover better so you ride better. And until all athletes train the same way and eat the same foods, one of them will always have an “unfair” advantage over the others, somehow. If it bothers you that much, ignore it and let those that still enjoy watching the sport, knowing it’s darker side, get on with it in peace.

And why should he do anything different? He is a cyclist, that’s what he’s known for, and what he likes to do.

Fair enough – he does what he wants to. Don’t try dressing it up as some sort of cancer crusade though when it’s nothing of the sort.

Re selfish etc…I don’t think Lance expected his profile to drop so much when he retired….he can’t do much to promote Livestrong when he’s not in the media….best way for a pro cyclist to get back into the media is to return to racing methinks!

He’s an inspiration to many…me included but admired more than liked.

It’s a cliche but I do believe in Innocent until proven guilty… and I’ve seen no proof from a trusted source…old urine from french labs with a vested interest in bringing him down doesn’t cut it for me.

“The cancer has returned” is a bit harsh…think I’d get a bit arsey if I was described that way!

Kimmage has admitted to using amphetamines at low level crits….for those who haven’t read his book…easier to admit stuff once your cycling career is over!

swadey:

Lance definitely took EPO as part of the cancer treatment (openly discusses it in his book, including how it would normally be a banned substance). Whether traces could be found in testing or not is a different story.

easier to admit stuff once your cycling career is over!

For sure – but one of the main reasons Kimmage is disliked by people like LA is because he’s broken the code of silence (spitting in the soup).

Jeez, what a truly tedious sport.

Seems that the STW massive is a bit divided on how they feel about Lance.
Don’t know much about Kimmage but I think Lance handled the interview well.
How Kimmage worded the cancer bit was out of order.
Lance rocks !