Lance, Landis, Bonds and the Tour
Here we are. A couple of days a way from the Tour de France. The grand daddy of cycling events (meanwhile the grand daddy of tennis events is going on as I write). We don’t even know who last year’s winner is. According to Trust but Verify we may have an arbitration decision by tomorrow. Thank God! I am tired of hearing about Floyd. Whether it be the people supporting him stating the French Lab was mishandling, USADA is out to get him, ect. or the other side not even looking at the facts, at least there will be a resolution. Yes, I know there will be yet another appeal; however, this one is a biggie. This is the one people are going to remember. After this, people will either deem him as guilty or not. I hope he wins, but I would bet against him at this point. It will be interesting if he loses to see if he shows up for his book signing in Chicago on July 10th.
Once again, the Tour bring out other fireworks too. An author, who I will not name just as to not promote his book, released yet another book slamming Lance. Lance came out swinging. I love his response. It is aggressive, just like he was in cycling. I am going to pull just one quote, but you can see the entire response here.
“Here is the simple truth – while others may have cheated to try to beat me, I didn’t cheat to win. Beating a cheater doesn’t make you a cheater. I won using hard work, single minded devotion to a goal, dedication, exhaustive preparation and training, physiological and mental advantages, pain and suffering, innovative technology, teamwork and sacrifices that came with a price in my professional and personal life. None of that came in a pill or a bottle. All of that is why I could beat others, even when they weren’t racing clean. If I beat people that were cheating, it was because I worked harder and got more from my abilities, not because I cheated. “– Lance Armstrong, June 29, 2007
I believe that Lance did not dope post-cancer. I will believe that until there is actual proof otherwise. I will not let people try to profit off of bringing him down. As you notice, I say post-cancer. This doesn’t mean I think he did pre-cancer, but it is hard to imagine anybody not doping in cycling in that era. At this point though, it doesn’t matter. I believe he was a clean champion.
Finally, it isn’t just cycling that has doping woes. Barry Bonds is just 4 shy of tying the greatest record in all of sports. There is turmoil and controversy on how to treat it. The truth is, I am actually pulling for Barry to break it. If he doped, oh well. The sports writers aggravate me more than the players at this point. These writers now want to denounce Barry for being on steroids and the steroid era in baseball. What a crock!!!! If these sports reporters had been doing their jobs in the last 20 years, instead of just wanting to be on the “inside”, they would have broke this story 15 years ago by doing some investigative reporting. Instead, they just wanted to not rock the boat and cover teams and not make waves. Can you tell me they didn’t hear rumors? See things? Of course they did, but they figured it was fine and let it go. Now, these same reporters want to hang the players out to dry. I think the reporters are even more at fault than the players. These reporters are supposedly there to report and protect the game. Instead, they just wanted to watch baseball and get a paycheck and not make waves.