<p>His entire team testified against him. If even Hincapie says he doped, he doped. There is no more room for doubt.</p>
<p>I followed online as it happened, including interspersed comments by some of those who testified, including Hincap</p>
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<p>I was speaking in a more broad sense. Cycling fans are well aware of the team sanctioned doping that’s rampant in the sport. If some one’s been following cycling before this investigation, I don’t think their view of the sport will change now.</p>
<p>On the other hand, cycling has lost its white knight.</p>
<p>Lance is still a knight to me- maybe not white, but I never viewed him as totally a white knight since he is a flawed person in many ways- as is everyone. He is still the greatest cyclist and beat everyone else on a level playing field. It just turns out that playing field was a lot more druggy than I had hoped. I feel bad for Lance that he can’t move off his “I never did it” position but I understand why he can’t. Most of the athletes I know who have followed Lance and this whole saga for years are sort of just shrugging our shoulders at this point. Nothing much to do.</p>
<p>Here’s my take on this. I could care less whether Lance “doped” or not and if he did, I would not consider it “cheating”. The use of science and technology to improve performance past the body’s “normal” capacities is hardly new and in many contexts, doesn’t even raise an eyebrow. Nutritional science, training science and technology, “legal” supplements, hyperbaric chambers and tents for “altitude” training - the use of “doping” is just another dimension of science applied to human performance. The only caveat for me is that it should be safe science that is medically sound and the only way to accomplish this is to bring it into the light of day and have it regulated just like the FDA regulates prescription drugs. As far as “cheating” is concerned, if it’s open and regulated and everyone has notice that performance enhancement is permitted, then everyone is on the same playing field. Of course, at the pro level of cycling, everyone was really on the same playing field even though it was covert and cycling’s best known “secret”. The reality is, Lance beat all of his peers who were operating by the same defacto “rules” as he. Every single runner up in every Tour Lance won were themselves subsequently found to be doping. (There’s no runner up who could be awarded Lance’s Yellow Jerseys. They were all suspended or banned from cycling due to their own “doping convictions”!) All the time and resources spent conducting the inquisitions of these athletes who are expected to perform at levels that are superhuman would be much better spent providing a system to assure that training and performance enhancers meet uniform standards of safety and efficacy.</p>
<p>That being said, there is an aspect of this that does not lend itself well to this approach. The thorny dilemma is how this impacts on youth and high school athletes. It’s one thing to be talking about adult professional athletes with extensive team resources available to them. It’s another thing to to be talking about youth and teens who have not reached physical maturity and do not have the resources available to assure safety and efficacy. The culture of enhancement trickles down. Over and above issues of role modeling and the acceptance of a culture of enhancement use, the reality is that many youth and teens are under tremendous pressure to perform whether it be an over zealous coach for whom winning is everything or the pressures of competing for college sports scholarships. If performance enhancing drugs are permitted at the pro levels, it must be accompanied by strict and stringent regulation and enforcement that draw a bright line between the worlds of pro athletics and that of amateurs.</p>
<p>^^ Post of the Day.</p>
<p>Totally agree with MOWC and the preceding post.</p>
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<p>All very well, but how do you defend Lance Armstrong for destroying the life of the team soigneur (masseuse) who outed him in 2004, and who he hounded for years with lawsuits? She told the truth, and look what he did to her.</p>
<p>No one is saying Lance isn’t an ass in many respects. He always has been.</p>
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<p>Sorry, but Lance might be the second greatest cyclist ever. The greatest, who has remained in Lance Armstrong’s camp through the good and the bad, is and will forever be Baron Eddy Merckx.</p>
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<p>Another reality is that Lance Armstrong never failed a test. Hearsay and perjuries got him convicted in the USADA Kangaroo Court.</p>
<p>Not talking about “Lance the person” and whether his ethics of how he treated people were worthy of respect or contempt. I’m talking about the ethics of performance enhancing drugs in sports and whether an athlete’s accomplishments can be respected or are diminished and even irreparably tainted by their use. I’m talking about whether ridiculous levels of resources, funded by our tax dollars, are well spent pursuing a “just say no” policy, often with inquisitorial zeal and personal vindictiveness by quasi governmental agencies that play loose with real due process under procedural and substantive rules that stack the deck. </p>
<p>Lance may be a grade A schmuck whose personal values and behavior are worthy of contempt and whose altruistic accomplishments are driven by his flawed ego and need for adulation or he may be a truly caring person. I don’t know him nor do I presume to pass judgement and I’ve got better things to do with my time than dwell on such issues or fixate on the reports of pundits so eager to peddle their views. He may have “doped” or he may not have. There certainly is no determination of this by an objective tribunal that meets any real standards of jurisprudence and frankly, I don’t care one way or another other than being offended by what others have correctly characterized as a “kangaroo court”. All I can evaluate are his accomplishments and when it comes to his success as a pro racer and as an advocate in the battle against cancer, the objective facts can not be ignored and should not be written off.</p>
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<p>Most doping athletes don’t. Any athlete who manages to test positive on a doping really screwed up.</p>
<p>Look at the list of riders who finished second to Lance in the Tour.</p>
<p>Positive enough?</p>
<p>As long as the same set of rules is applied consistently around the globe, I dont have any trouble with it. </p>
<p>Would posters here be as forgiving if Lance is Russian or Chinese?</p>
<p>You may also find this new film interesting. Of the 8, only 2 have never been “linked to drugs”.</p>
<p>[Ben</a> Johnson doping story told in ESPN film -](<a href=“http://www.suntimes.com/sports/olympics/15673220-777/ben-johnson-doping-story-told-in-espn-film.html]Ben”>http://www.suntimes.com/sports/olympics/15673220-777/ben-johnson-doping-story-told-in-espn-film.html)</p>
<p>Re post 93: 20/21 of the podium finishers in the 7 Tours have tested positive and countless other top tier pro riders have been “outed”. But whether he doped or not, Lance dominated the field and he and his cohorts provided some of the most spectacular and thrilling competition in the sport. And when you look at what constitutes some of the “illegal” doping, the attention paid to it is absurd. Blood loading- ya know, storing up your own blood from earlier in the season and then transfusing it back in to increase red blood cell counts before a race. It’s your own blood for god’s sake. Or taking drugs that speed the body’s recovery between stages back to it’s full capacity? Yeah, I’ll give that a lot of thought the next time I see a recreational rider pop a bunch of Advil to recover between stages of a MS 150 charity ride. At the elite level of professional cycling, team sponsors, advertisers and even the public expect and demand levels of performance that push competitors beyond the pale of “normal” and exact a tremendous toll on the human body. Why shouldn’t competitors at this level have the benefits of the best science of performance that money can buy. And why should anyone, particularly those who don’t have the will, drive and capacity to compete at this level, whether "drug"assisted or not, condemn them for doing so.</p>
<p>It’s 30 degrees out, the skies are going to be blue, enough Internet, I’m going riding!</p>
<p>[BBC</a> Sport - Lance Armstrong case creates an unlikely hero](<a href=“http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/19930514]BBC”>Lance Armstrong case creates an unlikely hero - BBC Sport)</p>
<p>Mercier’s world was far removed from that of professional cycling until a few months ago, when Usada began to investigate Armstrong and US Postal.
“It certainly gives me some validation for the decision I made,” he says. "It wasn’t that I wasn’t good enough, it was just that I made different choices. They talk about winning at all costs, but are you willing to push well beyond the limits?
“I’m not, I think there’s more to life than that. Sport should be a level playing field and it wasn’t. It was who had the best team and resources and the best medicine and that wasn’t the game I wanted to play.”
After Usada’s full findings came out on Wednesday, Mercier’s wife called him. “She said ‘imagine you’re sitting down with your son and daughter, explaining hey, daddy’s a liar and a cheat’. I don’t have to do that.”</p>
<p>I am deeply saddened by George Hincapie admitting to doping. He always seemed like an honorable guy and a loyal friend to Lance. He seems to be relieved to finally tell the truth about what went on behind closed doors. I wonder if they will ever find out who was tipping Bruyneel off in advance of drug testing.</p>
<p>Well familiar with Mercier and you have to respect his personal sense of ethics, the decisions he made and his reasons for them. His story though, in my view, makes that much more salient how flawed the current approach to performance enhancing science and medicine is. Here’s an athlete who by all accounts had the raw talent and capacity to compete at the top levels of cycling but walked away from it. One has to wonder what his decision would have been if cycling were not regulated by bodies and individuals concerned not with questions of good and safe science and medicine but with an “anti drug” fervor that is based on zealotry. If the system of regulation were based on good science, safety and efficacy, then the decision of whether to compete at that level would be made based on an athlete’s life priorities and goals and not on extraneous concerns foisted on them by the prejudices of regulators.</p>
<p>I’m not arguing that those who doped were good people with values that I would subscribe to or that they were even particularly smart in doing what they did. I’m not going to condemn them either, though, for succumbing to the pressures to do what was needed to compete at that level when the regulatory system that has resulted in them being “condemned” is so systemically flawed and run by individuals of questionable motivation.</p>
<p>Seems to me he became the Walter White (Breaking Bad) of cycling, although from what I hear, Walt is more likable. I feel completely comfortable condemning Lance for being, in effect, a drug kingpin and a coward. Giving him a pass because of a flawed system buys into his cowardice.</p>
<p>By many accounts Lance is an objectionable human being in his behavior with others and if the accounts are true, his behavior with others would be contemptible in any context. The issue transcends Armstrong however. There are many pro cyclists who have been brushed with the taint of “doping” who by all accounts are very decent people. Lance just happens to be the flashpoint on the issue right now because of his notoriety. I am separating the issue of the rationality of the current regulatory scheme from the man. The man may be a grade A bully and contemptible human being for the way he abused his position of power. If those accounts are true, I have no issue with those who condemn him on that basis. It’s the condemnation of him and other riders and broadly brushing them as “cheats and frauds” for the use of performance enhancing science and medicine that I have an issue with. I am not defending the man , I am criticizing the system and the perception in some circles that the use of science and medicine to enhance performance is somehow inherently “evil”.</p>