Why America can't believe Lance cheated

NIght Runner wrote:

Carl Lewis never officially tested dirty. He had taken a cold medicine that contained a substance that isn't even on the list now and was proven then not to be a perfor mance enhancer.

It was on the list then. He tested positive for it. The test was coverd up. That's dirty.

Probably Did it wrote:

. It is an amazing story of a moderatley succesful triathlete, single day rider who through the ravages of cancer had his body transformed and became the most dominant athlete in ANY sport AFTER nearly being another statistic.

"moderately successful triathlete and single day rider....." Moderate success???

How about:

TRI's-

Youngest US national jr sprint tri champ in history (won at 16, competing against 19 y.o.'s),

Youngest US national Sr winner, winning at, I believe 18, when still a junior.

Cycling:

Youngest (or close to youngest) World Champion UCI Road Race (single day race)

One of the youngest Winners of a stage in Tour de France

More:

In 1993, Armstrong won 10 one-day events and stage races.

He also collected the Thrift Drug Triple Crown of Cycling: the Thrift Drug Classic in Pittsburgh, the K-Mart West Virginia Classic, and the CoreStates USPRO national championship in Philadelphia. Thrift Drug said it would award $1 million to a rider winning all three races, a feat previously unachieved. At the USPRO championship,

In 1994, he again won the Thrift Drug Classic and came second in the Tour DuPont in the United States. His successes in Europe were second placings in Liège–Bastogne–Liège and the Clásica de San Sebastián, where just two years before, he finished in last place as his first all-pro event in Europe.

He won the Clásica de San Sebastián in 1995, and this time won the Tour DuPont and took a handful of stage victories in Europe, including the stage to Limoges in the Tour De France.

Yes, he hadn't shown any dominance in the multi day tours at this point, but he CERTAINLY had more than "moderate success" at tris and single day races prior to getting cancer

I have friends who ARE at the top in Europe, and they disagree. Its different times now, you do not have to take something to be a top sprinter for example.

My question has always been how the treatment for testicular cancer effect drug testing. I imagine he must have been on hormone replacement at least part of the time he competed.

If the George Hincape accusations didn't do it for you, nothing will. The guy is Lances number 1 guy his whole career and outs himself and Lance. Hincape had nothing to gain from saying that.

Also, sure the confessions of Tyler and Floyd look like they could have motives other than truth, but geez, his teammates must hate him if they are trying to bring him down falsely. Plus he has had many of his former teammates get busted, and your telling me this guy is some kind of hero cycling team leader? No way, this is the culture of his teammates!

He made one point in his first book. The French really, really would have loved to bust him even after the very first tour - yet he lived there.

One more - who thinks he was doping last month when he did a world class triathlon at the age of 40?

He doped while riding for the USPS. We funded that doping. Ignorant or not, we funded it.

Sure he used Ferrari, but who paid the bill? We did. He's our doper and we don't want our investment compromised so we look away.

Don't you know the only thing he was on was the bike http://www.splendad.com/ads/show/243-Nike-What-am-i-on

More importantly why do so many people want to believe that he cheated? Because they lost faith in themselves, they are lazy and/or they want to feel justified in cheating themselves or act bitterly because someone is better than they are.

I raced bikes in the 70s & 80s and I sucked. Lots of guys took "vitamins" but I was intelligent enough to realize that suspicion is a dead-end road. The guys who beat me would have beaten me no matter what - maybe just less consistently.

If Lance cheated, so what. I enjoyed watching his transformation. Sport is art & entertainment. I learned that in the velodrome at Montreal. Fans leaving at night did not even know which of us had won. They just came for the show.

If your culture is really concerned about cheating, clean up your politics & the environment. Sports are just soap operas. It is fantasy entertainment. When Geoffrey Mutai runs 12.8 mph for 2 hours straight, it is fantastic! You know, beyond a doubt that YOU cannot do it. Smile, shake your head in wonder, crack a beer & enjoy it! End of stupid thread.

I think the issue is much more complicated than the OP.

What about the case of soccer player Leo Messi-- well known he was given growth hormone as a young boy, not that it turned him into a giant, lol.

But what did it do? Especially, to the epigenetics of a young boy?

Moving on from superstars, how many young, poor, kids could earn college athletic scholarships with the right "vitamins?"

I'd say you could take any kid with the appropriate build and with a decent strength training program/"supplements" get him a college football scholarship.

Same goes with distance running. Even easier for the women (though clearly more ethically dubious because of the health consequences) because a little goes a long way.

America doesn't want to believe Lance is dirty because they'd have to face the fact that our society is so clueless about PED use, and spends such a disproportionate about of time and energy idolizing and fostering athletes rather than scholars.

No one wants to face the fact that the pro athletes we idolize are ALL genetic freaks, cheats, or both.

/end of stupid post.

So, if PED use is ok, should we encourage high school runners to start using so that we can shake our head in wonder at their improved performances?!

My "credentials" if you will: Former High School Track State Champion, Former D-1 Runner, Former Professional Triathlete, Current Competitive Cyclist. I've met Lance, read at least a dozen books on the culture of the sport before, during, and after Lance's era, and written two research papers on the topic. With all the evidence available, its quite easy to say beyond a reasonable doubt that Lance DID use all sorts of PEDs. I won't get into why, but quite honestly, it does not bother me that he cheated. That being said, while it doesn't bother me that he was cheating, it does irritate me beyond words how much arrogance and selfishness with which he has lived his life. Lance is a selfish, arrogant, mean-spirited man. The fact (dispute it if you want) that he cheated is totally understandable to me, but his attitude throughout his dominance, and even more so now I find deplorable. He is no role-model and I predict that within his lifetime he will take a very big fall.

Follow the money $$$

Lance cheated, he got busted for steroids and then got a TUE BACKDATED so he got off. If you look at photos at the Worlds in 93 he has facial features that are consistent with side effects of long time steroid use. Ask any asthmatic about the side effects of long term use of prednisone show them a photo of lance winning the worlds in comparison to his face at the TDF. Also steroid use would explain the rapid growth & spread of testicular cancer all the way to the brain.

ANYWAY the people who say he was "best doper" at the TDF miss the point. Not every human body responds to doping the same way, that is why people are prescribed different prescriptions . Meds do not have the same effect on all people.

Meds might make help make a 4:00 miler a 3:48 miler

but a 3:55 miler might only be able to get down to 3:50

and a clean runner might get down to 3:51 but is pushed aside by all the dopers when he is actually the fastest runner(clean)

Christopher Bassons was a tremendously talented cyclist with better vo2max than Lance but he would not dope and was basically run out of the sport by the dopers

If you think doping is OK

ask the widows of the young belgian riders who died being guinea pigs in the early years of EPO.

Captain Track wrote:

Too little, too late as far as Armstrong (if he was dirty)....the damage was already done by Bonds, Jones, Clemens and others years ago...Novitzky has wasted millions of taxpayer $$ on old news..I'd have more respect for the Govt. if they would go after current dopers getting away with it as we speak..this way the honest athletes today can be on a clean level...we all know who they are--Aroid? And if Clemens is guilty, what happens?? The Yankees will give up their 2000 World Series trophy to the Mets?? Like that's going to happen...

Yah, these Professional Athlete unions are a joke. They do everything they can to keep testing away from athletes. When ARoid was caught it was part of an anonymous testing throughout the league. People were on drugs, got caught, and nothing happened because it was a "test." Um, what? Giambi had to be the bigger fraud, but gets to keep his $$ and rings. Oh, and the performance bonus clause in ARoid's contract makes no mention of steroid usage putting the incentive $$ at risk.

Lance is NOT the best ever. Merckx was a substantially better all around cyclist than Lance.

Lance has won more TDF's than anyone else and is widely considered a doper by most observers of the sport. He was the ultimate winner in the dirtiest period of the sport. The circumstantial and testimonial evidence is fairly overwhelming. In my opinion it's very unlikely that he was clean.

Keep in mind, Marion Jones never tested + either.

Yeah, but that still doesn't explain those disturbing pictures of him wearing ruby red high heels....or his rendition of the National Anthem

I'm glad you guys don't form the juries in America... oh wait...

Guilty until proven innocent? Why do so many of you all like that?

I don't think that America really cares about Lance one way or the other. Athletes in obscure sports (Lance, Phelps, etc) can get some fame and notoriety while they're on top of their game, but they don't really maintain any kind of mainstream presence the way that athletes in major American sports do. In 20 years, my kids will probably at least recognize the names of today's top football players. Lance Armstrong's name will be an answer to a trivia question that my kids get wrong.

So to answer the question "why can't America believe that Lance cheated?", America doesn't really care enough to believe or disbelieve.