Lance Armstrong vs. USADA

[London424]

Welshbeef said:

But surely the sport can only punish him for taking drugs.

Bullying and sueing people is out of their hands and just highlights that he might not be a very nice individual or is willing to go a long way to hide his big lie.


What have the UCADA actually charged him with? If its doping /PED then he gets the punishment associated to that big that should be identical for all. If its lifetime ban (which generally now in sport everyone wants a lifetime ban) then they all get it rightly

As for the nasty bully person who ruined people's lives close friends etc then they can sue his arse.
As for the Cancer suffers surely everyone benefitted from him giving awareness and rasing money. I cannot see how him telling a big fat porkie pie about his drug taking and cheating in sport would harm their recovery. There wouldn't be any "claim" from cancer suffers due to his lie.


Lastly he is getting vilified worse than a pedo or killer when all he has done is cheating and drug taking plus being a not very nice person. It needs to be put into perspective its all the sports regulator who are to blame they allowed this to go on for so long they had mass cheating under their watch and did nothing about it. Were they complicit or if not then not fit for purpose so let's nail them too

That basically sums up my thoughts.

[London424]

Interesting interview with Lance and O'Reilly meeting up.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/othersports/artic...

[London424]

el stovey said:

pablo said:

It's such a great photo for a number of reasons.

1) It shows he's a totally deluded sociopath.
2) Despite just being outed as the greatest cheat in sport he's kicking back on his sofa and saying "fk you" to everyone.

I think that photo is brilliant as well.

[London424]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/cycli...

So they've selected the panel and Lance says he'll appear.

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He wrote this about Pantani.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/armstrong-if-i...

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http://m.cyclingnews.com/news/report-armstrong-nam...

Lance has named names.

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[London424]

A new interview...pretty interesting reading

http://m.espn.go.com/general/story?storyId=1086730...

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epom said:

Strong rumours (pardon the pun) of a big investigation to come very soon into Rugby and the size, speed, strength of the players. I appreciate there are rugby threads but felt this was more apt.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/rugby/international-rugby/paul-kimmage-rugby-has-to-face-up-to-its-growing-pains-30766512.html

http://thecity.ie/2014/12/02/kimmage-chasing-expos...

[London424]

Efbe said:

Welshbeef said:

He didn't make anyone take it - they were adults of sound mind, they elected to take the doping they made that choice.


Heck I'd assume its no different to adultory - any married man could do so if opportunity arose but does every man listen to their mate go on do it she'll never find out. Nope you individually are responsible for your actions

yes you are but...

if you have spent your life with the sole goal of becomeing a professional cyclist. Then after several years of training, ignoring all else you start rising up in the sport.
Then you hit the brick wall. you are 10% slower than the peloton. The only way throug is drugs. what do you do?

Lance wasn't just another one of these dopers, he was in control over most of it. It was him protecting the hidden side of the sport.

And what do you do if you are in the peloton, realise it's all fked up and want to leave?

You try and tell the truth and your career is gone. then you are dragged through the courts for slander and sued. This wasn't just against cyclists, but support team members too.

He wasn't the first, he won't be the last to dope.

You make it sounds as if he was some mafia Kingpin. It's frankly laughable to suggest that he was "in control over most of it". Everything he did was with the knowledge of a whole host of people and my guess is the amjority of the peloton were on something or other. Yes he controlled the comings and goings of his team...but with such a systemic system someone had to control it.

Every other rider and team boss is just as guilty...the only difference was is he was the guy that won.

[London424]

pablo said:

johnxjsc1985 said:

Indoor athletics coming up and Russian's seem to be some what tainted. No st.
Why I don't really go with the "Burn Armstrong" brigade is professional sport is rife with drug takers.
My sporting hero is Tom Simpson he had a choice when he got to the continent to race in 1960 be average and clean or a winner and dope. It cost him his life but I still admire and respect him.
Many people would have known of Armstrong's drug taking programme but remained silent. Some of his sponsors made a fortune from association with him.
I have never met Lance Armstrong if I did I doubt we would be friends but I dislike people being made scapegoats and blaming him for everything bad in cycling will not make cycling clean.
If you ever watched Chris Boardmans career you will have seen someone who had all the natural ability and skill's required to succeed but unlike his peers when a major mountain stage occurred in the TDF he could not replicate his performance day after day. No st he couldn't because his body could not recover quickly enough and yet this man had all the engine that his competitors had.

Its been done to death but what Lance did was way more than just take drugs, in order to facilitate his own success, he pretty much made doping a cultural norm within cycling and becuase of his actions, put pressure on other teams and riders to go down the same route, riders who previously would have had no desire or need to take PEDs were heavily encouraged to dope by their team in order to put up a reasonable challenge to US Postal/Discovery... Everyone in the peloton knew what was going on but they had nothing to gain from talking and Lance had already used his power to silence others. I agree he is a bit of a scapegoat because the likes of the UCI knew what was going on but they also knew in Lance, they had a marketing tool worth millions that was brinign huge sums of money into the sport. For me its the same as Bolt and the IAAF, if Bolt is at a Diamond League event, it will sell out, if he isnt, it will be 3/4 full, if Bolt is doping and the IAAF know about it, they are going to keep schtum...

Boardman was always a track rider, he never trained to be a GT rider and thus didnt really have the same engine as the others. He had no intention of ever doing a full three weeks as his focus was always the track and then, come the tour, ride the prolopgue, get yellow and earn his sponsors some air time then plan to pull out after a few days. Sure he could ride at GT pace for a few days but was never going to challenge.

Doping has been the norm in cycling since it began...Lance was just the next guy on train. In order for him to be competitive he had to dope. He then made the most out of it.

To suggest that he was the kingpin of it and invented it is absolute nonsense.

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pablo said:

lol, one tiny typo and you all leap on it, I meant to say was he made doping the cultural norm in the period he cycled, as in if I have to cheat, you're coming with me... I hope you are all happy with your pitchforks.

But that's just not the case. He was just the next man along.

Science may have advanced more during his period, but if you think now he's gone that everyone is clean then I'm not sure what to say.

[London424]

pablo said:

London424 said:

pablo said:

lol, one tiny typo and you all leap on it, I meant to say was he made doping the cultural norm in the period he cycled, as in if I have to cheat, you're coming with me... I hope you are all happy with your pitchforks.

But that's just not the case. He was just the next man along.

Science may have advanced more during his period, but if you think now he's gone that everyone is clean then I'm not sure what to say.

And please point me to the bit where I said that everyone was clean?! I'll leave you to your private "I know more about pro cycling than you" pissing contest.

Edited by pablo on Thursday 19th February 16:32

I don't know much at all that's why I asked the original question. However you have said that he made doping the 'cultural norm' in cycling. I've just said that it's been around a lot longer than him and will carry on long after him.

[London424]

The CIRC report has been released...only skimmed bits but it's not pretty reading.

Here's the Exec summary

http://velonews.competitor.com/2015/03/news/circ-r...

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WestyCarl said:

Contador never admitted cheating but returned 12 months later.

Armstrong created a lot of enemies and p****d important people off, therefore they took great pleasure in giving him a life ban which wasn't consistent with others. In my opinion this was wrong and gave LA the opportunity to cry "it's not fair, I only did the same as everyone else"

They should have given him 2yrs for drugs and 10yrs for brining the sport into disrepute for all the bullying.

I couldn't give a st about bullying. Lots of very successful people are bullies...it's the nature of the beast.

[London424]

Did anyone else see this...pretty interesting experiment!

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest-news/wa...