Lance Armstrong?

[yenrod]

The juries still for me and will be till he ever does a riis...

 

[andy_wrx]

What is striking is Lance's extremely litigious approach to any suggestions he may have doped.

From many sources, Lance comes-over as a not very attractive personality - aggressive, control-freak, disfunctional personal relationships, etc.

Read 'Tour de Force'/'Lance Armstrong's War' or quite a few other books about him - but avoid the cloying sentimental thing his mother wrote...

But is this very surprising ? He was at the top of a major professional sport for a significant time.
Was, say, Michael Schumacher 'a nice man' ?
Other top-of-the-tree athletes, footballers, boxers, etc ?

The qualities which get you to the top of a sport, enable you to stay there against allcomers, mean you're going to be ruthless, aggressive, obsessive, etc - without these qualities (in addition to your genetics, skill, training, etc) you wouldn't get there or stay there.

'Nice guys' tend not to win, although their PR may make them appear 'nice guys' on the surface

Lance, at least in the States, is not just a 'nice guy', he's almost a saint.
As a cancer-survivor-turned-worldbeater, he had (still has) a huge number of fanatical fans, many not cycling fans but cancer sufferers or relatives, who view him in almost religious awe.

The possibility he may have doped would bring their worlds crashing down.

 

[Kovu]

From many sources, Lance comes-over as a not very attractive personality - aggressive, control-freak, disfunctional personal relationships, etc.

I see what you mean there. I was reading his book he wrote, and although I could tell it was more of 'I am very nice and the best person.' But the stuff he wrote, still made me think that he wasn't the nicest person ever.

I'd like to think he is clean, not because of the whole cancer thing etc, just because it'd say something to those who took drugs and he won it 7 times.

I know the evidence says various things, but you guys have brought up alko of good points i didnt consider.

 

[fuzzy29]

Sadly, the evidence saying he doped is a lot stronger than the evidence saying he was clean. The excuse that he was "the most tested athlete in the world" is like saying "I've never crashed" if you only drive when drunk. If he was clean, then after beating all those guys on EPO, he should have gone for the hour record. I bet he would have pushed it over 100km...

 

[ufkacbln]

Evidence?

Interesting use ofthe term "evidence"

With the array of reporters, rivals and opponents, how come no-one has ever come up with any?

As before - not hearsay, gossip, but actual evidence that would stand up to scrutiny and be admissible in a court.

 

[Tetedelacourse]

Cuno is correct as usual. I base my views purely on circumstantial. Do you think he was clean Cuno?

Here's another point (possibly stretching it a bit!) for consideration. Due to Armstrong's dominance for all those years, it's possible his success pushed his competitors into looking for underhand measures to help them compete.

Let's face it, Lance is to blame for every single doping report since 1999! I'm joking. No smilies in quick reply box.

 

[ufkacbln]

Personally I have the prehaps naive view that with the people who are after Armstrong ifthere was any evidence it would be out there by now.

Otherwise I have seen people recover from Cancer and other serious diseases with a single minded dedication that allows them to complete feats that others would not manage. Look at Jane Tomlinson for one.

It is possible and hopefully the case that Armstrong is clean, but until the evidence is established we should give the benefit of the doubt.

 

[steviesch]

slightly off topic - but is blood transfusion using your own blood detectable? Could I go to altitude,train like crazee,syphon off some of my own highly trained and presumably red cell enriched blood? I could then return to sea level,taper,pootle about in a few shorter stage races. I could then whack in the good stuff produced in my altitude training phase and then go and blitz round the prologue of the TdF whilst everyone is saying "how does he do it?"....and i would still test clean!...would anyone do such a thing??

 

[Tetedelacourse]

yes it is detectable but less easily detected than homologous (receiving someone else's). It's called autologous blood doping. Trouble is when you donate your blood for later doping, your performance suffers for some time as a result of making the donation, so homologous is more attractive.

Good accessible article here:

http://www.velonews.com/news/fea/7027.0.html

 

[mr_hippo]

Watching a trailer for the Larry King talk show on CNN -
King "Have you ever taken an illegal substance?"
Armstrong "I have never doped."
Read into that what you may.

Blood has a shelf life and will degenerate and these changes can be seen under a microscope. They will also contain preservatives which will show up. You can freeze red blood cells but it is expensive and, again. the preservative will show up.

 

[steviesch]

Merci monsieur..informative stuff..i wonder how much random, out of competition blood testing goes on nowadays..amd when did it start...I recall LA bitching about the testers turning up at breakfast..but i think he only had to pee in a bottle. L'equipe et al would have us believe epo can be thus detected but i wonder if auto or homologous transfusions would show up in a urine sample.

 

[Tetedelacourse]

I think they might need a blood sample - but I may be wrong!

 

[John Ponting]

Watching a trailer for the Larry King talk show on CNN -
King "Have you ever taken an illegal substance?"
Armstrong "I have never doped."
Read into that what you may.
.

did he ever use "recreational" drugs when growing up? I have no idea either way but recreational drugs are illegal substances but many people have tried a bit of smoke in their youth.

 

[Steve Austin]

Merci monsieur..informative stuff..i wonder how much random, out of competition blood testing goes on nowadays..amd when did it start...I recall LA bitching about the testers turning up at breakfast..but i think he only had to pee in a bottle. L'equipe et al would have us believe epo can be thus detected but i wonder if auto or homologous transfusions would show up in a urine sample.

no, you would need to look at the blood to test for autogolous doping. and even then it is very very very difficult to detect

 

[Tim Bennet.]

I used to be a huge admirer of Armstrong. (Obviously not huge enough to actually buy a US Postal shirt, but pretty huge-ish.) I spent hours around the time of his early Tour wins justifying his dominance by highlighting the rigour of his training, the fact he even trained on Christmas Day, his focus on only a few specific events, the amount of research he did on his aero position in the wind tunnel, the fact his team only had one objective and knew who was boss, that they actually practised for the team time trial, that his opponents seem to have quit before the race even started and seemed reluctant to attack him, etc, etc...

Sadly I no longer feel confident enough to offer anything in his defence. If it every came out he was a doper I would still be sad, but also accept that deep down, it's probably what I've believed for a while now.