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"We'll ride it until they pave it."

-Big Clyde

It is a sad day. Nobody truly knows whether he doped or not. And nobody ever will. This isn't about that at all anyways.

10 years of endless witch hunts that end in "arbitration" with a board dead-set to convict the guy at all costs is a no-win situation. All this without any public testimony. I think that Lance took the right road on this decision, saying he's done with all this shit and all of the drug boards can just go fuck off. They were going to attack him until they found something that would stick anyways.

If the drug tests are not adequate to find the cheaters, then this is a drug testing issue. 10 year witch-hunts based entirely on hearsay make it impossible to defend. The only real evidence here are the hundreds of drug tests he's passed. If he cheated on these tests, good for him for beating the system. We all do it on our taxes to beat the system under the rules specified as much as we can. If he didn't cheat, the drug tests proved that. But that's not enough for this arbitration board anyways. They were going to find something to stick on him regardless of the cost.

Damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. This is a sad day for all sports when a champion can be beaten down entirely by years of hearsay. He won the races under the testing guidlines put in place at the time. He's a hero in my book.

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Velo Ergo Endo

He should have stayed retired.

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"We'll ride it until they pave it."

-Big Clyde

well said

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You never know what tomorrow will bring so go ride your EBike today or walk your pooch
Fear the Yeti
"Go ride your bike today, don't let the old man in.."

Mike

They have enough evidence to take him to trial. Him quitting the fight to me is a guilty verdict.

Quite the contrary, if there was any "real" evidence, this would be a DOJ case and he may actually get a fair trial. I think Lance is doing the right thing. The quickness with which the USADA jumped on this as a victory against a cheat is nauseating. Have some respect.

Their only evidence is the word of admitted dopers saying they saw him. He never failed a test and there never was going to be a 'trial', it would have gone to arbitration.

Not even close. If they did have any evidence to take him to trial they would and he would not be able to opt out but this was just arbitration. They also don't have jurisdiction to strip his 7 titles that falls under the UCI and they have already sided with Lance so there is a good chance he will keep them. I am not even sure they can ban him from international races as that is UCI as well.

I think this is a pretty good commentary on the matter:


Posted by Erick Erickson (Diary)

Friday, August 24th at 4:47AM EDT

I don’t really have a dog in the fight. I’m never cared much for competitive cycling. But it really does seem horrendous and un-American to me that a quasi-government agency, mostly funded by the government, gets to pretend it is not a part of the government and throw out due process to harass an athlete after he’s largely left the sport and all prior investigations turned up in his favor.

The USADA has gone back decades to reinvestigate doping allegations against Armstrong who is probably the most tested athlete in history. He’s surrendered blood and urine and everything else they’ve asked for over and over at frequently unannounced visits and somehow, if you believe the USADA, beaten them every time.

Or . . . he wasn’t doping.

There’s a lot of jealousy in the world. I don’t know whether Armstrong cheated or it is all jealousy. But he tested clean every time and the USADA has ignored its own statute of limitations to make an example of Armstrong.

The horror stories of professional athletes and the abuse they suffer at the hands of anti-doping bureaucrats can boggle the mind. There’s something very much of the feel of a witch hunt to this. If Armstrong was doping, then by God take away his awards and give him a medal for being the smartest damn athlete on the planet.

You can read Lance Armstrong’s statement here. Again, I’ve got no dog in the fight and I haven’t much cared for Lance Armstrong since he left his family for Sheryl “one piece of toilet paper” Crowe. But objectively, it seems the investigation of the USADA amounts to holding Armstrong under water until he dies to declare him human or, should he survive, burning him at the stake for being a witch. In the process they’ve taken a sport made relevant by Lance Armstrong and put the whole thing under a cloud of suspicion that the anti-doping bureaucrats’ tests can’t even beat Lance Armstrong.

Michael Phelps better watch his back with this as precedent.

Exit point: if we’re going to go through this witch hunt every time an athlete gets too famous, maybe we should just let them dope and then, on the same competitive level, see who is best.

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"New York City is a mismanaged carnival of stupidity that is desperate for revenue and anxious to criminalize behavior once thought benign."
--Alex Baldwin, unknowingly describing his socialist utopia.

Please . . . he tried to dispose of this on motion practice, failed, and cut his losses before people like George Hincapie (whom he once described as his best friend in the world) testified against him. The jig was up, and he knew it.

That said, he's still a hero in my book for all he's done raising public awareness and money to fight cancer. It's not that hard to separate Lance the "bad-ass bike racer" (as Floyd Landis called him) from Lance the philanthropist. Very, very few people are all good or all bad.

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A bicycle is a splendid thing.
~Ernest Hemingway

And Lance did fail a test. He failed a test in the 2006 Tour de Suisse for EPO. It was the same day that the UCI received a "donation" from Armstrong in the amount of 100K. Armstrong has "donated" about 500K to the UCI. The UCI recently made a statement that those donations by athletes will never be taken again for these reasons.

I whannah have a couple beers with George Hincappie; if Lance doped this guy would know and George been pedaling for a long time, what is he on, 17 TDF that's crazy.

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"Just stop this walking shit and let's get this done"
Avidtesty (Arch 2019)

as drug tests evolve, so do the drugs to evade them. still not easy staying in front of the curve, especially as they archive and can retest with new assays, and i'm not saying armstrong did or did not enhance. heck, i remember lemond having a tent he'd sleep in, low oxy to simulate high altitude or something. or maybe that was michael jackson.

my point, i guess, is everyone goes for every edge possible. stripping armstrong will only reward whatever lucky ass came in second, who more than likely was doing the same thing.

justice served. the world is back in balance. i'm so relieved.

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Ambition is a poor excuse for not having sense enough to be lazy. ~Milan Kundera

Look at all the guys he beat that were doping. I don't want it to be true but??????
You gotta think......
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012 ... d=pl-share

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"Give a man a fish and feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and
feed him for a lifetime. Teach a man to cycle and he will realize
fishing is stupid and boring."
--Desmond Tutu

Well you got to give Lance mega props. Being able to outsmart every doping lab in the World that has to be a record. I never could of passed 500 drug test. (My asthma meds would fail me)
They should do away with lab testing and just call on the non-1st place winners to testify. They never seem to get in trouble for juicing, like Tiger Woods.