Say it ain't so....LANCE!

[hutch]

The man raced all those years.  He was constantly tested.  he never failed a single test.  Now they go back and claim that someone said something to someone and swears that they saw someone else do something with someone.  Sounds like a lot of sour grapes to me.  He was tested, all negative.  That is proof enough for me.  The organizations who go back now and strip medals are hollow, spineless, and weak at best.  Leave the man alone.  He passed your own test for all those years.  Medals stripped or not, I consider him the seven time champ and anyone else selected to take his place are mere puppets of their little game of gotcha.

There is no "gotcha" but dozens of people testifying he was doping. Its a coincidence? All these people have it in for him? WHY?

I agree 100% with keeping samples for future testing when anti-masking tests get better..


You'll see all those Jamaican runners also eventually be found out.

It is amazing the lengths people will go to to not see their hero taken down. "Its a persecution! Hey they were all cheating anyways!"

Lance Armstrong: a fraud.

And to answer James' statement the reason he is not fighting it is because he simply couldn't.. he was going to be found guilty so rather than go through with that he stopped fighting it. Why else would he have stopped? He had appealed to everyone he could. There was nothing else he could do. He would have been stripped anyways. This way he can say "Oh I'm tired of being persecuted!" whch is a load of baloney.

[RatBastard]

I'm sorry but IMHO the tests speak for themselves.  Who knows what all incentive people have.  For all we know the agency paid those folks to say what they did.  I am not at all saying that is what happened but he tested clean so I will believe the tests.  Any good detective will tell you that an eye witness is actually one of the weakest forms of evidence available.


I 100% agree with you on the "everyone was doing it" argument being worthless.  100% that means nothing at all.

I do find it funny how people tend to pick and choose the idols they demonize though.  Take baseball and Pete Rose / Barry Bonds.  IMHO Bonds belongs in the HOF no questions asked but Rose should NEVER be in.  Even if one believes Bonds should be out, there is absolutely no argument that supports Rose being in.  He has been proven of and has acknowledged breaking a rule of baseball that in the rules expressly calls for a lifetime banishment.  End of story no more discussion needed.  He has absolutely ZERO respect for the game, never did, never will. This web site states it perfectly.  Any parent who holds Rose out as a role model or as someone who plays baseball 'the way it should be played' should lose their kid.  (Not really but it is damn close.  Rose was and still is a total scum bag.  Bonds has never been proven to have used anything.  While many (including me) believe that it is, at the very least, highly probable that he used PEDs, he did not test positive.  Benefit of the doubt in my case.  Even if he did test positive, the rules do NOT call for a lifetime ban for use of PEDs.  I believe a first offense is 50 games (am I right).  So again IMHO Bonds absolutely belongs in the HOF.  Rose never.  But because everyone loves to demonize Binds and they adore Rose, a vast majority would believe the exact opposite.

[Sir HC]

From what I gather, a lot of the people who said he did then got reduced sentences for their confirmed doping.  This stuff happened years ago and is a waste of time and money instead of investigating what may be going on now.

[hutch]

From what I gather, a lot of the people who said he did then got reduced sentences for their confirmed doping.  This stuff happened years ago and is a waste of time and money instead of investigating what may be going on now.

The process started many many years ago. Should they stop now because he has been appealing for years?

[Relaxer]

There are long and widespread reports that Lance has been paying off and bribing testing labs for years and using his PR machine to intimidate adn freeze out anyone who has talked about what he's done. He didn't quit out of fatigue, he quit because there's a prosecutor gathering more and more evidence against him.

Just because he says he never failed a test doesn't mean its true. People do lie and Lance is a liar and a bully. It doesn't exonerate him that others were doing it. He won those championships and then lovingly draped himself in his Livestrong group. Which is also kind of a sham. Its not like Livestrong is this wonderful group curing cancer or even doing anything remotely to assist in fighting cancer. Its a PR group that has collected enormous amounts of money, much of it which went to funding labs that are willing to give Lance a pass and bribing officials over and over. 

I mean, what reason could biking possibly have for smearing the Michael Jordan of their sport? If this is a sham conviction, it's the most self-defeating campaign ever seen.

[hutch]

I mean, what reason could biking possibly have for smearing the Michael Jordan of their sport? If this is a sham conviction, it's the most self-defeating campaign ever seen.

bingo.

[RatBastard]

There are long and widespread reports that Lance has been paying off and bribing testing labs for years and using his PR machine to intimidate adn freeze out anyone who has talked about what he's done. He didn't quit out of fatigue, he quit because there's a prosecutor gathering more and more evidence against him.

Just because he says he never failed a test doesn't mean its true. People do lie and Lance is a liar and a bully. It doesn't exonerate him that others were doing it. He won those championships and then lovingly draped himself in his Livestrong group. Which is also kind of a sham. Its not like Livestrong is this wonderful group curing cancer or even doing anything remotely to assist in fighting cancer. Its a PR group that has collected enormous amounts of money, much of it which went to funding labs that are willing to give Lance a pass and bribing officials over and over. 

I mean, what reason could biking possibly have for smearing the Michael Jordan of their sport? If this is a sham conviction, it's the most self-defeating campaign ever seen.

Not making any judgment on the validity/truth of said rumors, what you are saying boils down to 'they have been saying it so long it must be true'.  This is how urban myths start and become so popular.  However, it does not add any more (or less) validity to the underlying story.

[Frank Gallagher]

I think a common sense resolution to this fiasco is to simply draw a line under his 7 victories and declare nobody the winner during that period as those just behind him had a good chance of being dirty.....then move on. I doubt that will happen though.

I believe (and hope) pro cycling is now clean, because it's a great sport if you take the time to learn the politics and tactics that go between teams and individual riders during a race.

GO WIGG-O!
 

[hutch]

THere should definitely be no "winners" of those Tours...

[Frank Gallagher]

THere should definitely be no "winners" of those Tours...

GOT IT!!!!

Give them all participation trophies!!!!

[vansmack]

I mean, what reason could biking possibly have for smearing the Michael Jordan of their sport? If this is a sham conviction, it's the most self-defeating campaign ever seen.

Because for the Tour de France, it's not about the individual.  There's a tremendous amount of National pride involved, and that's why certain countries have been pushing hard for a public flogging of Lance.

[Frank Gallagher]

I mean, what reason could biking possibly have for smearing the Michael Jordan of their sport? If this is a sham conviction, it's the most self-defeating campaign ever seen.

Because for the Tour de France, it's not about the individual.  There's a tremendous amount of National pride involved, and that's why certain countries have been pushing hard for a public flogging of Lance.

Correctomundo!!!

Wiggins would be a good case in point. The French were not pleased that a Brit was wearing maillot jaune, but by the start of the final week they were actually rooting for the bloke, thanks to his honest and humble post stage interviews.

[hutch]

I mean, what reason could biking possibly have for smearing the Michael Jordan of their sport? If this is a sham conviction, it's the most self-defeating campaign ever seen.

Because for the Tour de France, it's not about the individual.  There's a tremendous amount of National pride involved, and that's why certain countries have been pushing hard for a public flogging of Lance.

But I thought it was a US agency that was involved...

Look people can come up with whatever excuses they want.. some people wouldn't believe anything at this point but there is plenty out there to lead one to believe that the guy was doping. If he hadn't, with the tens of millions in ad revenue he has now lost he'd be pretty silly not to keep fighting it. After all, its not like he's the one fighting it as much as his team of highly paid lawyers.

And before Lance began acting like a first class prick he was pretty well liked everywhere in spite of being American.

Maybe it is all made up but the latest story is that even Hincapie was willing to testify against him.

[i am gay and i like cats]

girl look at that body . . . i work out.

[Relaxer]

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/lance-armstrong-stripped-of-his-seven-tour-de-france-titles.html

RatBastard, still clinging to your hopes that despite mountain ranges of evidence and testimony to the contrary, that Lance is still innocent? Still standing on the deck of SS Romney as it slowly sinks below the surface?