Riders on a Storm
Tyler Hamilton’s win in La Doyenne in 2003 was one of the highlights in what was generally a fantastic season. A great Spring campaign, a great Giro, a great Tour, a great Fall; unpredictable races, and closely-fought battles littered the events. But, with the luxury of 20-20 hindsight and a quick cross-reference of results listings to doping scandals, it’s safe to assume that season landed smack in the middle of an era of jet-fueled racing that rivals the 1990’s in their indulgence.
It’s a tough time to be a cyclist. Death, doping scandals, corruption in the organizing bodies of the sport. We test our athletes more than any other sport, but the tests are flawed and incomplete, and rumors persist that teams and riders pay off not just the labs to surpress positive tests, but also the UCI. Hamilton’s confession on 60 Minutes this week is the latest in an unsettling chain of events that keep peeling back more layers of the onion. I was a big fan of Tyler’s and part of me even believed in his innocence. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy – much too nice a guy to get involved in cheating. But there he was on television, talking openly about the magnitude of drugs-taking within the USPS team.
On the other hand, I’ve never been a fan of Armstrong’s. I find him to be arrogent, controlling, manipulative. His Tour wins were too formulaic; in sharp contrast to his fight with cancer, his racing showed no element of humanism. I have taken it for granted that his wins came with considerable assistance from a carefully planned and executed doping regimen. But these beliefs were woven together by a thread of doubt, and the possibility always existed that his were clean wins.
Hearing Hamilton talk of the seemingly nonchalant attitude towards doping at USPS and, in particular, by Armstrong, is surprising not in the content of the message, but in how hard the message hit. I expected the words. I had read them. I have even written many of them myself. But there was always a tangible element of speculation about them. For me, that element is now gone, and it feels strange to say the least.
Even as someone who generally accepts that doping is commonplace in the peloton, it hurts me every time another allegation of doping comes out. It takes me days to recover from it. But even if the worst happens, if Professional Cycling as we know it today falls apart, cycling will continue. Because cycling is more than watching others race bikes. It’s about racing or riding the bike yourself. It’s about overcoming your own limitations. It’s about the rider and the machine working together. It’s about cleaning, caring for, thinking about your bike. It’s about taking photos of it so you can look at it when you’re away.
Cycling rides through a storm today, but we will always have the bike. We will always have la Vie Velominatus.
While I may disagree with elements of what you say, I can’t fault the sentiment. Great work, Frank.
Very well put. Cycling will endure.
BTW, I would be very surprised to see Bruyneel on American soil anytime soon – at least willingly…
True dat. And we can have it all too. Like this morning I went for a hilly ride with my brother and I was riding my bike and talking about pro cycling and bike gear then pushing hard and imagining I was like tapping out a tempo for Cadel or someone, then dissing the dopers and talking more cycling shit and it was fucking great!
Good perspective. I love cycling and refuse to abandon this love because of doping scandals These riders are revealing to us the beauty the drama and the challenge of cycling Without them there won’t be desire in us.
I’ve been on the fence with Armstrongs credibility. Floyd coming out about it was blown off by most people. Hamilton’s interview came across as pretty believable to me. The real nail in the coffin for me will be if Hincapie did in fact describe the same scenario in his deposition with the grand jury. I don’t think George has anything to gain. He would have everything to lose.
Absolutely true. While we enjoy watching the racers blaze over the cols of Europe, part of that love is the visceral empathy we have for their suffering. When I am in the mountains in a car, and I see a cyclist blaze by on the descent or pedal squares against the unrelenting force of gravity, I feel jealously and a pang of sorrow I could not share their joys. The pang has nothing to do with being PRO; the pang is purely love. It’s the love spending idle time planning your next big ride; the love of rivulets of sweat running down clean legs; the love and need for the pain to wash away trivialities. Surely such a love will persist long after Armstrong is old and Hamilton is forgotten.
My only worry and sadness is how the potential fallout will affect Livestrong, which truly does wonderful work. I fear the American public will allow their misplaced self-righteousness to slay an organization that has provided hope and, more importantly, heaps of money for research.
How apropos that it is raining cats and dogs right now.
Well written, I didnt get to see the 60 minutes interview and I cant say I really want to. Hamilton came clean got the load off his chest dobbed in some old boys with out substantial proof and will walk away a broken man who may have ounce of dignity left.
Why not lag on the guys still riding who are doping? We know you guys doped in the past – the cycling public should be more critical of that fact and the riders committing the crimes. We need to rub it out of cycling today and chasing retired cyclists who doped 10 years ago wont help the sport move forward.
I watch every race and tour in the hope that everyone is clean and we dont see a DQ 6 months down the track and our beautiful sport take another step backwards.
Focus on the now people! RIP Tondo, read that great article on cyclingnews today from vaughters back in Feb 2011 HERE didnt hear to much about the guys he blew the whistle on but its guy like him that the sport needs.
Does taking drugs really matter ?
We idolise riders of the 60s and 70s – somehow we ignore the fact that they were doing it too. Merckx tested postive three times.
I feel sorry for people who were genuinely clean. They have been cheated and deserve better. But not even changing placings helps when doped riders have affected the outcome of races and stages.
If we learn anything from the Lanceina Affair I hope it is that just as we are never going to suppress drugs in society we are never going to do it in sport.
While the argument against banning recreational drugs has some validity in terms of damage to health and potentially harm to others, it doesn’t apply in a tightly controlled medical environment.
In fact by banning PEDs we increase the risk to the riders who take it in uncontrolled ways.
So hunt Armstrong down (I’m not a fan of his BTW) and burn Contador at the stake (see what I did there) but I’d like to see some realistic thoughts from the many crowing commentators and tweeters about how they think this is not going to keep happening for the next 10 years or more.
And if the extent of those thoughts is that now we’ve caught Lance we’ll enforce it and everyone will stop because it’s wrong then they need to get away from their keyboards a little more.
Get real – people murder, steal and mug with a much higher chance of being caught and a clearer sense of wrong-doing than just somehow being cheats, and does the threat of prison or the example of the many people being caught stop them ?
Why would this be different when the harm to others and wrongdoing is less obvious – some would say non-existent – and the rewards much greater.
It’s always happened, it will continue happening – we need a reality check not a blood check.
IMO, the constant doping scandals are a calamity to the cycling community. There comes a time to fight for every non-PED, clean-legged rider, that has already taken grief on the road or in the office for the many issues “the kit” (or other rules) seem to spawn in the eyes of the general public. Who is willing to fight that fight? It continues to appear that the team leaders, team managers, and the governing bodies are not. And at times it seems that the French, especially their media, will do anything they can to kill the “Superbowl” (used without permission) of the Grand Tours?
We certainly don’t need our luminaries providing all this additional free ammunition to the red-neck, lift-kit driving Diesel pickup dude on the country road we are already sharing. I have always just made the assumption that the shotgun in that window rack was already loaded!
I really just want to ride …
The
This is the same argument that suggests insider dealing is a victimless crime. It isn’t. It destroys confidence in the market, and without confidence, said market doesn’t function. Cycling has already got itself into a position where participants (and observers) have severely qualified faith in the outcome. Surely it can’t hurt want to improve the situation by cleaning out the augean stables (will likely make sport more lucrative). Insider dealing will always be with us, as will murder, rape and war. Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try and stop them from happening.
I’ve been thinking about some of the same things as I watch Contador in this Giro; at what point will the collective *we* admire his dominance? He discourages the Tough Underdog we love to cheer on (especially in the U.S.). We were discouraged and annoyed at Armstrong’s [boring] wins. Were we annoyed with Indurain? Or Hinault? Or on back through the Greatest of the Greats?
Doping is disheartening for those of us wanting to believe in these guys’ incomprehensible strength and endurance–things SO inspiring as one is out climbing his or her own version of the Zoncolan or sprinting for that mailbox 4 mailboxes on down the road, and that doping easily becomes the helmsman on our ship of disdain of the Unbeatable. But if [since] they all have doped, at some point, the ship sinks into the murky waters of memory/history, and all that’s left is admiration of the dominance once so-hated. It’s a very odd psychological phenomenon.
“Even as someone who generally accepts that doping is commonplace in the peloton, it hurts me every time another allegation of doping comes out. It takes me days to recover from it.”
The message hit me hard too. All along there was plausible deniability but, at least for me, that is gone with regards to those 7 wins. It tore Tyler up to finally come clean and detail what actually went on. However, it wasn’t Tyler’s piece in 60 Minutes that really depressed me, it was the suggestion that Hincapie had corroborated these events to the grand jury. I thought (to to some degree still do) thought that Tyler was a badass for winning a stage of the Tour with his collarbone broken in two places, held together by tape, and grinding his molars to dust. I thought that there was a chance that these people I have admired did what they did purely though sacrifice and hard work. I hope that the young riders can reverse this bullshit. I hope that we see a clean Tejay Van Garderen and a clean Andrew Talansky battling it out for a Tour title in 6 or so years. Enough monku, monku, it’s time to get out and ride.
Credit to Hincapie for keeping his yap shut and observing the Code of Silence (subpoenas notwithstanding, of course). Sometimes silence speaks volumes – he hasn’t exactly rushed (or been called) to LA’s defense, either. If I am not mistaken he is eyeballing a TdF record of his own this year. It appears the puppeteers in this big charade are going to give him that. I am not defending the doping but nobody likes a rat. These confessions and allegations are only coming out under duress, leading me to believe, that they are not motivated by good intentions alone. Not to say they aren’t credible, but nobody’s just coming forward and saying they cheated. That is until, of course, they get caught. A clear conscious is but a fringe benefit.
We all have a “Mother’s Little Helper.” A few tricks we like to pull to gain a little edge. Could be that special electrolyte slurry, could be that super light wheelset with the ceramic bearings, hell I know guys who rip a few bong hits before every ride. I imagine when you are racing at that level, and the competition and the money and the egos are at that level, well you have to take your tricks to that level too. Water, honey & molasses don’t cut it anymore. Again, not defending, just trying to understand the mindset.
Assume everybody’s doing it, and it is part of the game. Are we really to believe that Phillipe Gilbert won that triple crown clean? How is that possible if everyone else is doping? Passing the doping control is almost like a second stage of every race now.
@Nof Landrien
No it’s not. Insider trading means other people lose money – clearly there are victims.
The rules on insider trading are to ensure a level playing field and that what is available to one is available to all. Just as legalising drugs would do. Anyone can take PEDs, not everyone can play golf with the CEO. Totally different.
How, in a situation where anyone could take PEDs and it was known and controlled, would someone else be harmed ? I agree people have been harmed but I’m talking about preventing this in future.
It only destroys confidence because it isn’t supposed to happen. Take that arbitrary rule away and you have no claim to undermine confidence.
As for performance, they don’t get that out of a needle. They don’t take EPO and eat crisps for three months of winter (well apart from Der Kaiser obviously). It’s a marginal, incremental thing. It rewards those who train hard, it helps recovery in training, it helps them to train hard and race hard.
To me it doesn’t change anything about their riding and the admiration for it and in fact making things more level would only enhance that competitiveness.
One thing about the difference between past doping and current PED use is just that: the science and effectiveness of the substances and methods in use today is light years beyond anything used 30-40 years ago. Even in A Dog in A Hat Joe Parkin describes riders still using amphetamine injections as had been done for decades, and that was the late 1980s! I’m sure other versions of ‘speed’ or other drugs like steroids had been tried in the 70s and 80s, but it seems to me it was the 1990s when the technology of PEDs in cycling really took off. Can anyone imagine what Moser, DeVlaeminck or Merckx would’ve been like if they were on EPO or blood doping?? And let’s not forget what tragedies can befall those racers who can’t handles “The Game”. RIP Pantani. RIP VDB…. Let’s not forget, these heroes of ours are also human beings.
Let’s not forget, these heroes of ours are also human beings
However, those who pressure teammates into doping, then bully them into continuously lying about it and threaten them with personal or professional harm if they refuse, don’t fall into this category. I think we all know who this describes…
@Collin
I too worry about the impact to Livestrong. I have personally seen the profound level of help & support the organization can provide to people with cancer. I recommended Livestrong to a coworker who had been diagnosed with breast cancer. She still thanks me each time we speak, as she is now 3 years in remission.
Thanks Frank for this post. I watched the 60 Minutes bit. It was a heavy interview in my opinion. Tyler was visibly in turmoil at ratting on a friend and at finally telling the truth of his ruined career with tv cameras right there.
I was also a big fan of his for many reasons and I defended his bullshit stories for quite some time. I’m not very bright. This interview shed some light on the pressure to dope, why he didn’t come clean immediately and it seems like one massive nail in Lance’s coffin. I do feel badly for him and I like more again.
It’s overused but the truth will set you free, for Tyler and Cycling.
If we are out there, shaving our legs and hurting ourselves on our own crazy rides, the terrorists don’t win? Sorry, I lost my thread…
You could really see that in his eyes. they looked like he had been balling since he came out to his family and friends days before.
My take on doping, as long as people depend on it for a paycheck then there will always be dopers. there is way more pressure for those guys to perform then we can ever imagine.
PS I dont like the COTHO because he is an arrogant prick not because of doping.
@RedRanger
A-Merckx brother.
I’m impressed Garmin no longer gives any kind of injections, shots or IV, that is really getting serious. I’ve seen amateur cat 2 racers getting IV saline after a Tour of the Gila stage in the medical tent. I guess they didn’t have domestiques bringing up bottles.
The dichotomy between professional and avocational exists in all sports. Cycling for me is experential. Sure I watch the pros on TV and follow it on the web. However, nothing about what occurs at the pro level has any tangible effect on my weekday and weekend cycling wether it is training, racing, or just goofing off. It is the same with baseball. Used to I played in a weekend adult league, while my son played league ball also. Again, what happened in MLB had no bearing on what occured on the field at my level. Ken Burns quoted someone as saying “its a great game that has endured despite the efforts of the owners (and you might add now players’s union and MLB comissioners) to kill it”. I think the same can be said about cycling. In its purest form at the non-professional level, its a great sport that endures each time you get on the bike and lay down the “V”.
Got to give Tyler props for coming clean with the intent of moving on rather than dodging and defending the past.
The UCI is already broke, so perhaps it’s better to stop chasing retired racers. Perhaps there should be a rule that if something happened more than a year ago, cyclists are free to go. It stops ruining the competition and it saves the UCI money.
Sponsors. Gerolsteiner? Phonak? The people who pay the actual salaries of the teams don’t like the look of scandals, which is one reason to clean the sport to within an inch of it’s life.
That, and if the sport’s mechanisms for staying clean can’t be seen to be operating correctly in the present there is no reason to expect that it will in future. Current riders and team administrators have built careers on the back of doping, and if they’re around as some sort of open secret, people will feel a sense of entitlement that they can continue to do that in the future.
@GottaRideToday
I’m with you ChrisO and the others who acknowledge that doping is pervasive and unpreventable. Do I like it? No. Does it affect my day-to-day? No. Will I continue to watch pro cycling? Yes. For now.
@Minion
You’re peeling back the onion now…. Sponsors don’t like scandals, but they do like wins and publicity. There’s no way that such pervasive and nearly universal doping occurs without the complicity of doctors, soigneurs, DS’s and yes, even sponsors. Sponsors could clean the sport up immediately by writing contracts that penalize teams severely for doping. The UCI and WADA could impose stiffer sanctions. Doctors could face loss of licenses. But money talks and BS walks. The actuaries and the suits know wins generate more revenue than scandals will curtail.
If you don’t want to watch dopers compete, don’t watch pro cycling. That’s the sad state of play. If everyone would stop watching races with dopers, the incentive to sponsor dopers would end. but that’s not going to happen. And everyone knows it.
Sorry to be a downer, but I’ve grown completely nihilistic on this topic. Ho hum.
Yup, doping sucks. It’s always been there and probably always will. Maybe pro cycling should have just remained as it used to be. Half ass testing just to put up a front. Then the “secret” remains and racing goes on. Operate the same way mainstream sports do, like football and baseball. It’s all entertainment anyway, who cares if Johnny Football is on the juice. Who cares if Ricky Racer is on EPO?
Well, I guess as cyclists we do care. Why? Because many of us “fans” also ride and race, so we feel more connected to the sport. How many football and baseball fans actually play themselves? Besides kids, not many.
We on the other hand, know what it’s like to grind up a hill, heart pounding and legs screaming. Watching the elite level pros do what we do – on a whole different level – gets us psyched to do the same. Knowing that some sophisticated and expensive cheating process was involved takes away some of the awe. Then add in stripped titles and other related crap that takes away from the sport. All pretty lame.
I was a Lance fan. I dug watching the Tours he won. I enjoyed his “comeback” and last races as a pro. There was always a doubt that he doped, but since not proven – the hope was there it was done clean – despite the circumstantial evidence. With the latest media bombshells, that thread of hope appears to be severed. I’m curious how this will all play out. If Lance is stripped of his numerous Tour titles, pro cycling will look even worse then it does now.
Pro cycling however is just a thin slice of the cycling pie. If it disappeared, wouldn’t really matter much. Most of us will still be out there, pedaling away and testing ourselves. We’ll race at the grassroots level – where cycling really lives – cheering each other on. Screw the pros, kill your TV, and head out to a local race. That’s real deal. No EPO or blood doping required.
The fans were annoyed with the Greats – Anquetil, Merckx and Indurain all were regarded by many fans as being boring for the relentless domination they showed in winning their Tours. Hinault was spared perhaps because his 5 wins were more spread out over time. The popularity of Poulidor, Zoetemelk and Chiappucci were all arguably greater than the champions they failed to vanquish…
@Dan O: No matter how this plays out, I am fairly sure LA can’t be stripped of his Tour titles. He might choose to relinquish them, but I think that’s fairly unlikely! If he was stripped of them who would they elevate to first place anyway, Ullrich? Zulle? Beloki?
Was told an interesting story by an ex-pro earlier this week. He said that in his day (early 90s), the team would see how you rode on bread and water and then they could decide whether it was worth “improving” you. This is in line wtih Hamilton’s “little white lunchbag” story where he was only given PEDs once he had proven himself to some extent. Reckon it goes a long way to explaining the doping mindset – you strive to be the best you can be, eventually the boss says “well done chum, you can join the big boys now. Here is what you need.”.
In the bubble of a pro team environment, I reckon that would be fairly difficult to resist.
NB. ex-pro said this is what “put him off” pro cycling…
@sgt
That’s why my two favouraite cyclists this year are Anna Meares and NZ’s Shane Archibold. Meares for being a consumate pro while laying down what may be the best season of her career so far, and Archibold for the Mullet, and killing it in the Omnium which, having only done once at club level, I can attest if F#@cen hard. Also not to be confused with another hero of mine, surfer Shane Archibold, ay Oli?
FACEPALM Matt Archibold is the surfer, Shane is the track cyclist.
I’ve always thought Tyler was a cool bike racer. A little scrappy, rode with panache, the loyal lieutenant-turned leader who gets a shot and lays it all out on the road only to be hosed by circumstance. I was enthralled by his 60 min. interview and applaud him for coming clean, as it were.
And isn’t that what it comes down too? We like the riders whose personalities, racing, and riding styles we like and deride the riders we don’t. That’s what we’re rooting for, style. And lord knows we can’t agree upon that. In that respect, pro-cycling is no different than professional wrestling. They all dope to win and we are drawn to certain personalities. Shit, cycling is even fixed sometimes.
So at the end of the day, for me, pro cycling is all about banter, drama, some cool scenery, nostalgia and the camaraderie it holds with you fucks. But do I get inspired by those assholes? Somewhat. I really dig the bikes and places they ride but that’s about as far as it goes as they’re not my peers.
What does inspire me on rides? At the risk of sounding trite, it’s knowing there’s a bunch of other OCD dickheads (read Velominati) out there in all corners of the globe doing the same thing I’m doing. Trying to have fun, stay fit, talk shit, obsess, and balance cycling with life and knowing all the while that cycling is life.
And that’s all Tyler, Floyd, LA, Bertie, Uli, et. al. are doing, they’re just doing it at another level and the steaks (see what I did there?) are higher.
It’s ARCHBOLD, by the way, not Archibold. ;-)
@sgt
Agreed. I was going to basically make the same points, but you got to it first and probably said it better than I could. It’s frustrating, but unless the sponsors and governing body actually want to do something about it, nothing at all will happen.
So I’ll just leave this photo instead.
This Guy. On the left.
http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Myron+Simpson/Shane+Archbold
Thanks for your words Frank, they echo my feelings. Its always disappointing because it affects us,the 5th circle, in OUR sport. As fans we’re always considered last and doping eats away at fandom.
Really great thoughts from everyone. What a cool group all y’all are. I feel better already.
We’re not going to solve doping. It’s fucked, and it’s here. I’ve been back and forth around the block a thousand times about whether I care, whether it should be legalized, whether it’s safer, whether it’s shit. And the fact is, it’s all those things. The reason it matters, though – the reason why it matters that they dope is, in my best estimation, for the simple reason that they lie about it. It’s not the boosted performance, it’s not the safety. It’s not the acceptability of a method. It’s the lying.
I also spend a lot of time thinking about the psychology of the riders doing the doping. They get into this mindset where it’s so commonplace that if they don’t consider it cheating so long as they pass the tests. It’s a twisted mindset, but the fact is they still see fit to lie, so it’s hard for me to believe that version of the story.
At the end of the day, some of my favorite races were during the most drugged-up years. The racing was spectacular, and you can’t dope on The V. You have it or you don’t, and drugs or not, when they’re blowing snot bubbles and drooling on their thighs going up some mountain, that’s just good bike racing.
I’d rather they didn’t dope. But it’s OK with me if they dope. I just don’t like the lies, and I feel bad for the clean riders who don’t stand a chance because of the dopers.
As for COTHO, I don’t care for him and don’t care what they do; he was fully aware of his actions and he’ll suffer the consequences. That’s life. What I feel awful about – AWFUL – is people struggling with cancer who hold his story as a beacon of hope. And the fact of the matter is, he did fucking survive cancer. It was in his brain. And he beat it. That’s the amazing story and his riding didn’t have anything to do with it. But the patients won’t see it that way and that breaks my heart.
@Oli
Very well said – and as much as Merckx is the Prophet, I wouldn’t have been a fan of his if I was alive during his domination. From where I’m sitting now, though, they were great wins.
I did hate Indurain, and was a major fan of Bugno, Chiapuccci, Rominger all for that same reason.
@ChrisO
You bring up good points – difficult points. But as for the doping of the past – and this has been echoed already by some – but the drugs since EPO are very different from those being used back then. In the 60’s, 70’s, 80’s, they were using amphetamines to get a little boost – little more than some motivation in syringe form. Or some steroids in the off-season to build up some muscle. Cheating, yes, but the fact during those eras was that the champions were champions, and the domestiques were domestiques. They were different caliber’s of rider, and the drugs could not make one into the other.
With EPO and blood doping, suddenly we saw riders who normally spent their days in the laughing group winning mountain stages. Donkeys into thoroughbreds, as they say. Completely different matter, and it added considerably to the temptation for riders to join in. Suddenly some guy around whom you could ride circles is dropping you on a flat stretch of road and you say to yourself, “This is wrong, what’s going on here.”
There’s a great story in Fignon’s book about this; he’s riding along in the bunch, about midway through a race. All of the sudden, the bunch is stretched out. There’s no sprint coming, nothing. Everyone’s just going a bloc for no reason. So Fignon fights up to the front to see what’s happening and there’s this domestique sitting on the front, on the tops of the bars, with his arms straight, like it’s a Sunday afternoon, going along at 50kph. That’s what those drugs did to the riders.
@Dan O
Really well said, Dan – I was thinking about that as well. Our sport is different in that we’re all cyclists – very few people follow the sport who aren’t cyclists. And that’s cool.
@all – always good to be reading the “IMO’s”. A healthy debate is good for the mind.
Great sentiment frank.
What underpins the piece for me and some of the comments made I think, is disappointment. We want and expect these people to be worthy of the mantle we place them on, but do we place too high an expectation on them, be that the public or the sponsors? I would argue yes.
At the end of the day they’re human, open, like you and me to the foibles we all inherently possess. Some are able to overcome/ignore, others will comply and/or fall victim to their weaknesses.
Do I care whether they’re doping or not? Nah, not really. Do I need them to be grilled (see what I did there?) over their failings? Only if it is of benefit to the sport rather than the indivdual. If one had the integrity in the first place, then one would question those choices previously made by the individual and then needing to redeem themself later on, me thinks.
Am I disappointed? Yes. Am I surprised by any of these so called relevations? Not at all. Am I over it? Bloody oath.
+1. that sums it up for me.
My only other comment re: Tyler Hamilton – wasn’t he pretty much responsible for the compact crank’s popularity?
Correct, frank, as per the norm.
Professional cycling will survive – regardless the buffoonery in Aigle and the chemistry in the field.
Take a couple of kitted-out pros into a school room – watch the eyes of those kids light up – and you’ll understand what I know.
Kids will always want to ride. Some will always want to be the fastest. Racing will continue.
Perhaps, next iteration, someone with the organizational and business development skills of, say, Bernie Ecclestone will hold the reins.
That would be nice.
Didn’t realize he grew up skiing and didn’t realize he was from MA.
He did seem to be pretty upset about coming clean.
It’s always a shame when this comes out, especially on such a widely watched U.S. news program. It pains me that all many Americans see regarding cycling is about doping. Ugh, there are so many other beautiful aspects that never, ever get brought to light.
I’ll keep riding though, and need to clean my bartape and bike tomorrow. No time tonight, hate going to bed with them dirty.
And excited to watch more Giro.
Tyler’s interview was heart breaking to watch. I watched it through Cycling Tips blog, which had linked outtakes from the interview and in those outtakes Tyler was VERY reluctant to finger lance specifically, always insisting that it was part of the trade, and you can see the effect on Tyler of laying out things that for decades he’d kept secret. It was watching someone divorce themselves from something that’s been a part of their whole life, and he knew he was doing that. It’s hard to back any sport that would make demands like that upon a person. No one else I know has to lie to their family about their trade, and the effect of that on Tyler was very sad to watch, and no doubt he’s far from the only one who’s found himself in that position.
As for cycling as a whole, I think cycling is taking repeated body blows over this and is in denial about how serious those blows are.
@Oli
AAAARRRRGGGHHHHH! I blame teh google for making me dumb.
http://www.livestrong.com/article/77736-signs-sociopathic-behavior/
I’m at a loss for words.
@Jeff in PetroMetro
That would be hilarious were it not so scary. Good grief.
A+1, Mate.
@Jeff in PetroMetro
@G’phant
What is scary is that JiPM found that article. WTF were you doing reading health articles at the livestrong site?
I only went to the article because I thought it might have some thinly-veiled reference to the Retired-Cyclist-now-Stool-Pigeon-formerly-known-as-the-Hard-Man-From-Marblehead.
@Jeff in PetroMetro
Wow. I think this article needs to be in the lexicon under the definition of Ironic.
Does this have anything to do with Rule #51?
http://www.livestrong.com/article/13968-sperm-taste/