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The day after Floyd Landis enters the nasty ring of accusations and denials, it appears clear Lance Armstrong is his sentinel opponent - and he has landed the first punch. Sure there are others, Hincapie, Levi, DavidZ, etc. including UCI head Dick Pound, but Landis came out swinging for the top step of the America podium of cycling icons and there's only one guy standing there - sorry Greg - it's Lance.
This has the makings of a grand soap opera reality movie the likes of which a nation tired of economic bad news, Wall Street stumbles, endless desert war, oil spills and Glenn Beck's Hitler-Obama tirades is dreaming.
But that's it - its and American soap opera. Okay, maybe David Walsh, self-appointed cycling-doping-journalist is taking glee in the pilot episode of what will undoubtedly consume the summer cycling season, but does this really have historical legs to stand on, in the only arena which really counts - The Tour of Cycling History?
I sound a bit like a broken record here, but folks, read your history books. And you know what you will find? History doesn't just repeat itself, it's been riding the same old grand boucle for more than a hundred years. Doping in cycling isn't new news.
Wait. Let me repeat that.
Doping in cycling isn't new news.
That is unless you love old news. News that has been chewed up and spit out a dozen different ways. News that has been printed and recycled so many times that it barely holds the ink. You can tweet and IM it a thousand times, its just old news.
This is not a condemnation or support of Landis, Armstrong or any other cyclist or person that has used some performance enhancer. Personally I think drugs are wrong. But this is about history. A history of a sport born out of marketing, media, and men who make money. Drugs have always been the lubrication of the 3Ms. They made this machine run throughout history.
The sport we love so dearly, cherish so passionately, are willing to put our lives on hold for 23 days each July for, is just that, a sport. SPORT - period. What we do on the weekends and a few other days a year is ride our bikes - we are not pro athletes - we are not paid to do this - and we are not paid to take certain risks to do this. Pro athlete are.
Landis landed the first punch while swinging at Lance Armstrong, and maybe a few others he feels wronged by, but what he is clueless about, and so too a litany of non-cycling-journalists at The Wall Street Journal, ESPN, NY Times, and others, and armchair cycling critics everywhere, is History (yes, with a capitol H) doesn't give a damn. It didn't give a damn in 1892 when they pedaled the first Paris-Brest-Paris, it didn't give a damn in 1896 when they pedaled the first Paris-Roubaix, it didn't give a damn in 1903 when they pedaled the first Tour de France, it didn't give a damn in 1924 when Henri Pelissier and his brother Francis spilled their guts and little boxes of pills to journalist Albert Londres for his Forcat de la Route, and it didn't give a damn in 1967 when Tom Simpson O.D.d on amphetamines and alcohol climbing the slopes of Mont Ventoux, and it didn't give a damn at king Eddy's tearful exit from the '69 Giro, and it didn't give a damn in 1998 at the Festina Affair, and it didn't give a damn at Il'Pirata's overdoes failed blood test in the '99 Giro d'Italia or after he died of a cocaine overdose in 2004, and it hasn't given a damn in past 107 years of drugged racing in Italy, Spain, Belgium, France or any other country.
Yes, I hate doping, I wish they, the pros, wouldn't, but History says it's not about Floyd Landis or any of them, as individuals, but as Le Tour de France Director Christian Prudhomme put it, it's about a dream:
“Cycling has always made me dream,… It is an extraordinary sport, a legend of a sport, a sport of legends. It's almost as hard as boxing and combat sports. It takes place in exceptional conditions, obviously the mountains, the cobbles. It's a sport where anything can happen. The weather plays a significant part and the riders have to confront it. It has always made me dream.”
We all dream of riding our bikes fast, faster than the next guy, fast enough to win. We all take risks when we try to go to fast. No one ever said chasing dreams was safe.
If it isn't location, location, location, it's gotta be "timing, timing, timing", and Mr. Landis, you seem to have a history of neither.
You might have heard it, a far off poof? It was that small noise that might have registered on your audio Richter scale somewhere between the toaster popping up and the toilet flushing. Today Landis, via an ESPN interview, and The Wall Street Journal released a bombshell on the world - sit down for this - He doped!!! Unfortunately that small poof (the doping part) is growing into an atomic blast with an ugly mushroom cloud.
He also accused American riders Levi Leipheimer, George Hincapie, Dave Zabriskie and Armstrong's longtime coach, Johan Bruyneel, and half the current peloton of involvement in doping. Well, Mr Landis, let me help you out, here is a link to every rider who has ever ridden the Tour de France - most of them have used dope as well - and much of it well documented - http://www.letour.fr/2010/TDF/HISTO/us/index.html - go ahead, release all their names.
But Mr. Landis, this sucks, you lied, lied, lied, and now you want us to believe this? You asked for our money in support of your defense and you asked for our money to buy your book. Do we really think we don't think cyclists - yes, Lance Armstrong included - use(d) drugs? The truth is LA probably ingested (intravenously) more EPO than most - he had cancer! But he also came to the pros during the most elusive drug period, the early 1990's; EPO use before anyone knew how to test for it. And who is his longtime DS? Who also was a top pro during that period? Yes, Johan Bruyneel was a top pro, 4th in the Tour de France counts. But confessing now and saying your going to help others, you are going to help clean up the sport? By being a snitch? No, helping the sport of cycling is what David Millar and Jonathan Walters are trying to do. Did they dope? Hmmmm? They were cycling products of the '90s weren't they? (see Garmin’s Jonathan Vaughters on Floyd Landis allegations: We will win the Tour of California and win it clean)
Guilt isn't any longer an issue - we have (or should have) all pulled our collective heads out of the sand - it's about timing and actions. Landis' timing is perfect - if you want to screw the world that I think screwed me so under the deadline, in the middle of two big Tours, send this test balloon aloft and see how many other people's lives you can screw up when it bursts.
So is he a whistle blower or snitch - neither, he's a desperately sad person. One who need some anger management therapy. Hurting people isn't redemption. There is an old saying, "Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past". Mr Landis, your past is what it is, time to move into a better future. Unfortunately you may have just screwed that up as well.
My favorite quote of the day (so far), "He lied to his Menonite mother. I think he even swore to her on the Bible. These guys are definitely wired different."
Yes, some people are "wired different". I was hoping Landis was, but not like this. In a recent conversation with cycling journalist Samuel Abt, he said, he lost all respect for Floyd Landis when Floyd made public the very private conversation Greg LeMond had on the eve of Landis doping trial. Respect, ultimately we really don't care about your record or your doping, but we do want to have respect in those we admire.
According to the article Landis says he is speaking out now partly because World Anti-Doping Agency's statute of limitations for doping offenses of eight years meant his evidence would shortly become unusable. Sorry Landis, but YOUR lack of honesty and credibility have made your evidence unusable.
That show of defiance and will on Stage 17 in 2006 was awesome - and no amount of lying, doping, or stupidity will erase that. That is why a photo of you breaking away on that stage hangs on the wall next to my trainer for inspiration. It will forever be one of the greatest single stages of Le Tour de France. Sadly, it has had a giant storm cloud gathering over it. It won't rest in our memories of great racing, because you would not let it rest. For you I am so terribly sad. You have lost all credibility. For you, as a human being, I have lost all respect.
And if you just can't get enough of this soap opera check out VeloNews' laundry list of Landis related postings - including:
The day after Floyd Landis enters the nasty ring of accusations and denials, it appears clear Lance Armstrong is his sentinel opponent - and he has landed the first punch. Sure there are others, Hincapie, Levi, DavidZ, etc. including UCI head Dick Pound, but Landis came out swinging for the top step of the America podium of cycling icons and there's only one guy standing there - sorry Greg - it's Lance.
