Nightmare For France - 7 Time Tour De France Winner

[LaoPo]

The Ultimate Nightmare For France - 7 Time Tour De France Winner Lance Armstrong's Comeback in 2009 - 37 years of age.

Report: Lance to return for '09 Tour de France

By The Associated Press – 58 minutes ago

Lance Armstrong will end his retirement and hopes to compete in the 2009 Tour de France, according to a cycling journal report.

The 36-year-old seven-time Tour de France champion will compete in five road races with the Astana team in 2009, the cycling journal VeloNews reported on its Web site Monday, citing anonymous sources.

Armstrong's manager Mark Higgins did not immediately respond to a voice mail left by The Associated Press.

The move would reunite Armstrong with Johan Bruyneel, now the team director for Astana.

VeloNews reported Armstrong also will compete in the Amgen Tour of California, Paris-Nice, the Tour de Georgia and the Dauphine-Libere.

The Astana team, however, was not allowed to compete in this year's Tour after Alexandre Vinokourov was kicked out of the 2007 Tour for testing positive and the team quit the race.

VeloNews, which said Vanity Fair will publish an extensive article detailing Armstrong's comeback, said the cyclist will race for no salary or bonuses and post his internally tested blood work online.

Christian Prudhomme, the Head of the Tour de France will have nightmares as will many other French people....

The man who beat cancer*, Lance Armstrong, and won the Tour de France 7 times

* "On October 2, 1996, Armstrong was diagnosed with nonseminomatous testicular cancer. The cancer had already spread to his lungs, abdomen and brain."

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lance_Armstrong

What an unbelievable sportsman

LaoPo

Edited September 8, 2008 by LaoPo

[mr_hippo]

What an unbelievable sportsman

Not many people have believed his clean image for years! Have you seen the trailer for the Larry King show?

Larry King: "Have you ever taken an illegal substance?"

Lance Armstrong: "I have never doped!"

That sounds similar to:-

Larry King: "Have you ever drunk alcohol?"

Mr Hippo: "I have never had a Budweiser."

Lance will 'race for no salary or bonuses and post his internally tested blood work online.' I think I have just seen a pig flying at about 2000 feet above my house! If he is now willing to publish internally tested blood work, why didn't he do that when the rumours were at their height? Has he found a different untraceable substance?

Yes, I know he won the Tour de France seven times but what about the Giro d'Italia, Veulta a Espagne and the Spring Classics? Compare his record with that of Eddie Merck - both active at the same ages. Would Merckx have won more TdFs if he only concentrated on that one race? Would Armstrong have won less TdFs if he entered more races?

[Who, me ?]

That's the end of it ! If such a mobile pharmacy can be 'again" on the "Grande Boucle", then the sport is really sick !

[Macx]

YEAH!

To hel_l with going out on top!

All us geezers are cheering for ya Lance

[el jefe]

YEAH!

To hel_l with going out on top!

All us geezers are cheering for ya Lance

Heras, Landis, and Hamilton, leutenants of Armstrong during his winning years, all later tested positive for doping. It's a team sport and Armstrong always had the strongest team. What are the odds that all the domestiques were doping but Lance wasn't? All of his wins are tainted. Now he's reunited with a DS and team that still have doping issues.

I don't consider myself a geezer yet but I'm certainly not rooting for Armstrong.

[dee123]

WHAT A SPORTSMAN.

[hanno]

Read elsewhere that the Astana Team is not aware of these news

Seriously: a sport that is riddled with doping and a 7-times Tour winner is supposedly clean? Yeah, right

[LaoPo]

Doubts and discussions about Lance Arnstrong will always be there, especially from the French side.

He was and is an absolute nightmare for the French and Le Tour de France. It was a long time ago France had a winner and it's very frustrating for them.

He wants to take away ALL discussions and doubts by putting ALL doping tests results they EVER took from him on the internet.

We'll see.

For the time being he has my support because I enjoyed watching him cycling and he was NEVER busted for taking -illegal- doping.

Let's be fair: does anybody doubt the legality of 8 Gold Medals by a single swimmer from the USA in Beijing ? I don't.

Does anybody doubt this JAMAICA racing MONSTER...running the 100 and 200 M in Beijing and showed the world a distance of METERS with his opponents AFTER he arrived ?

I don't.....but.....some US & European specialists claim that it is IMPOSSIBLE for ANY MAN in the world to win with such a LARGE DIFFERENCE; I don't know since I'm not a specialist....

Hmmmmm...time will tell.

LaoPo

Edited September 9, 2008 by LaoPo

[dee123]

He is in my opinion "something special"....to beat cancer then to achieve what he has achieved is quite remarkable .

[endure]

Doubts and discussions about Lance Arnstrong will always be there, especially from the French side.

He was and is an absolute nightmare for the French and Le Tour de France. It was a long time ago France had a winner and it's very frustrating for them.

He wants to take away ALL discussions and doubts by putting ALL doping tests results they EVER took from him on the internet.

We'll see.

For the time being he has my support because I enjoyed watching him cycling and he was NEVER busted for taking -illegal- doping.

Let's be fair: does anybody doubt the legality of 8 Gold Medals by a single swimmer from the USA in Beijing ? I don't.

Does anybody doubt this JAMAICA racing MONSTER...running the 100 and 200 M in Beijing and showed the world a distance of METERS with his opponents AFTER he arrived ?

I don't.....but.....some US & European specialists claim that it is IMPOSSIBLE for ANY MAN in the world to win with such a LARGE DIFFERENCE; I don't know since I'm not a specialist....LaoPo

There is a considerable difference between running 100 metres or swimming 400 metres and climbing onto a bike and cycling ~3500km up and down the Pyrenees and the Alps in 3 weeks. I've no idea whether Lance Armstrong is a doper or not but comparing sprinting and swimming with the hardest sport in the world is real apples and pears stuff.

[LaoPo]

Doubts and discussions about Lance Arnstrong will always be there, especially from the French side.

He was and is an absolute nightmare for the French and Le Tour de France. It was a long time ago France had a winner and it's very frustrating for them.

He wants to take away ALL discussions and doubts by putting ALL doping tests results they EVER took from him on the internet.

We'll see.

For the time being he has my support because I enjoyed watching him cycling and he was NEVER busted for taking -illegal- doping.

Let's be fair: does anybody doubt the legality of 8 Gold Medals by a single swimmer from the USA in Beijing ? I don't.

Does anybody doubt this JAMAICA racing MONSTER...running the 100 and 200 M in Beijing and showed the world a distance of METERS with his opponents AFTER he arrived ?

I don't.....but.....some US & European specialists claim that it is IMPOSSIBLE for ANY MAN in the world to win with such a LARGE DIFFERENCE; I don't know since I'm not a specialist....LaoPo

There is a considerable difference between running 100 metres or swimming 400 metres and climbing onto a bike and cycling ~3500km up and down the Pyrenees and the Alps in 3 weeks. I've no idea whether Lance Armstrong is a doper or not but comparing sprinting and swimming with the hardest sport in the world is real apples and pears stuff.

True.

It's the body endurance and explosions, or not, what makes a great sportsman but the Tour de France is no doubt one the of toughest endurance sports in the world together with triathlons etc.

LaoPo

[Buzby]

He is in my opinion "something special"....to beat cancer then to achieve what he has achieved is quite remarkable .

I agree. He was a very good rider (world champion and TDF stage winner) before cancer. I believe after his illness he had a much higher pain threshold.

[Mossfinn]

Whatever your opinion of Armstrong and there are few who sit on the fence, you cannot deny his undougted ability to ride a bike, did he take assisted substances during his career, 'you pays your money and you takes your choice'?

An awful lot of guys have tested positive around him, including the great climbers of recent years, Rasmusson, Virenque and the charasmatic Pirate Marco Pantani, but the jury may be out on Armstrong, but I am not sure how much drugs you can pump into your system and that can make you ride like him, particularly up hill, the infamous, ' Look', he gave Jan Ullrich on the Climb of Luz Ardiden before cycling away from him will be remembered as a great sporting moment.

I think he may be tainted, if only guilt through association and to come back with Astana can only be viewed in the negative, as Teams are now putting a lot of work into self testing regimes as well as the official ones, stay off the bike is my view.

Good Luck

Moss

[bonobo]

I hope he kicks ass.

The French tend to hate him, and so they assume he must be dirty. That is the only way an American can own their race for seven years. But despite numerous tests, he has always tested clean.

But I tell you who will ove him. Television. Even French television. The Tour has become a farce with plummeting world interest as team after team and rider after rider is disqualified. With Lance back in the picture, television ratings would skyrocket a both people who love him or hate him tune in.

[LaoPo]

I hope he kicks ass.

The French tend to hate him, and so they assume he must be dirty. That is the only way an American can own their race for seven years. But despite numerous tests, he has always tested clean.

But I tell you who will ove him. Television. Even French television. The Tour has become a farce with plummeting world interest as team after team and rider after rider is disqualified. With Lance back in the picture, television ratings would skyrocket a both people who love him or hate him tune in.

Good post and I fully agree

I love watching the Tour and it is spectacular at times.

Armstrong will show he is clean. He has been tested so many times never found dirty. As mentioned before he will publish ALL tests values on the Internet since he started. Those tests can be varified and the various test-labaratories if someone doesn't believe him......

The only thing I fear is some nutcase from the public will try to push him over or something in the mountains....

LaoPo

[lomatopo]

I personally don't think he ever doped; he has a number of unique physical attributes including a heart that is 30% larger than normal, which allow him to excel. Having said that, cycling is a team sport so if someone on the team is caught cheating/doping then the whole team should be disqualified. If any of his teammates doped during any of his seven TdF victories then he should give up that year's Yellow Jersey.

FWIW he ran this year's Boston Marathon in 2:50 and finished in the top 500.

[Mossfinn]

I am not saying he has doped, but an awful lot of his compatriots have, Astana are not guiltless, and whether you like it or not, there will always be guilt by association, when you throw all of these things into the melting pot, when the sport is desperately trying to reinvent itself, sometimes it is better to stay out of the firing line.

Good Luck

Moss

[el jefe]

Moss, I agree with most of what you say, but while Virenque admitted to doping, neither he nor Rassmussen ever tested positive. The accusations against them are the same as the ones against Lance. relatively few cyclists have ever tested positive and many of those were associated with Astana and Armstrong's former teams.

Whatever your opinion of Armstrong and there are few who sit on the fence, you cannot deny his undougted ability to ride a bike, did he take assisted substances during his career, 'you pays your money and you takes your choice'?

An awful lot of guys have tested positive around him, including the great climbers of recent years, Rasmusson, Virenque and the charasmatic Pirate Marco Pantani, but the jury may be out on Armstrong, but I am not sure how much drugs you can pump into your system and that can make you ride like him, particularly up hill, the infamous, ' Look', he gave Jan Ullrich on the Climb of Luz Ardiden before cycling away from him will be remembered as a great sporting moment.

I think he may be tainted, if only guilt through association and to come back with Astana can only be viewed in the negative, as Teams are now putting a lot of work into self testing regimes as well as the official ones, stay off the bike is my view.

Good Luck

Moss

[steveromagnino]

True.

It's the body endurance and explosions, or not, what makes a great sportsman but the Tour de France is no doubt one the of toughest endurance sports in the world together with triathlons etc.

I'm a former triathalete of 2 countries mid level (i.e. I was never the actual champion of either) Thailand and New Zealand...... there is no way you can compare Tour De France to a triathalon, I am not even sure you can compare an ironman to the tour de france, and my mates who have done great jobs of ironmen in NZ not sure they would compare their endurance effort to TDF. Triathalon at olympic level is more like a sprint these days; guys are swilling coffee shots before the race, knowing they will be done in 2 hours and a bit.

Ironman is a fair bit tougher for endurance...but we are talking 8 hours of one day that you prepare for vs. 8 hours a day at that same level with no variety for a month in one hit.

The tour is one of the events that I cannot even fathom doing recreationally; whereas I could do an ironman 6 months from now no worries despite my total lack of fitness now; an olympic or sprint tri I reckon I could probably do what I already did once already and show up with about 1-2 weeks of training and struggle through it. I've done olympic type length triathalons before still drunk from the night before; you could never even consider that for even a day or riding on the tour.

Those are some super tough MFs who do the tour.

[LaoPo]

True.

It's the body endurance and explosions, or not, what makes a great sportsman but the Tour de France is no doubt one the of toughest endurance sports in the world together with triathlons etc.

I'm a former triathalete of 2 countries mid level (i.e. I was never the actual champion of either) Thailand and New Zealand...... there is no way you can compare Tour De France to a triathalon, I am not even sure you can compare an ironman to the tour de france, and my mates who have done great jobs of ironmen in NZ not sure they would compare their endurance effort to TDF. Triathalon at olympic level is more like a sprint these days; guys are swilling coffee shots before the race, knowing they will be done in 2 hours and a bit.

Ironman is a fair bit tougher for endurance...but we are talking 8 hours of one day that you prepare for vs. 8 hours a day at that same level with no variety for a month in one hit.

The tour is one of the events that I cannot even fathom doing recreationally; whereas I could do an ironman 6 months from now no worries despite my total lack of fitness now; an olympic or sprint tri I reckon I could probably do what I already did once already and show up with about 1-2 weeks of training and struggle through it. I've done olympic type length triathalons before still drunk from the night before; you could never even consider that for even a day or riding on the tour.

Those are some super tough MFs who do the tour.

absolutely true and correct; I should have left out the last 3 words "...together with triathlons".

Question: is this endurance ? :

note: A guy named Richard Bottram from The Netherlands finished running a daily MARATHON on July 29th, 2007 for 365 days; So, he finished 365 marathons. He started on July 30th in 2006 and ran a marathon EVERY DAY in 14 European countries with a total distance of 15.401 km and 175 meters.

He did so in memory of his partner/girlfriend Elise Bila, who died of cancer when she was 37.

He raised more than € 200,000 for the Cancer Fund.

Truly amazing !

http://www.marathon365.org/

LaoPo

[mahtin]

I personally don't think he ever doped; he has a number of unique physical attributes including a heart that is 30% larger than normal, which allow him to excel.

So do a lot of people with chronic heart failure

[lawling]

It seems to me that Lance Armstrong has possibly more to lose than to gain by riding the Tour again.

At the moment he has his unblemished record of 7 successive wins. If he rides in 2009 and doesn't win he will lose his aura of invincibility.

On the other hand, winning an eighth will not won't make him any more famous - and no matter how many he wins, those who think that Eddie Merckx was the greatest ever are not going to change their view.

And regardless of how he performs, the focus, rightly or wrongly, will be back on the drugs/blood tampering issue. The media view will be predictable If he is winning, is he using something? If losing, then he must have been doing something when he was winning in the past.

I have always admired his achievements - though I found it difficult to continue liking him as a person after reading his two books - but I feel that neither his reputation nor the image of the Tour will benefit by his coming out of retirement.

[Mossfinn]

Moss, I agree with most of what you say, but while Virenque admitted to doping, neither he nor Rassmussen ever tested positive.

Although Virenque never posted +ive, his admittance was always going to be a sad day, as for Rasmussen, if you had to hedge your bets and put it on oil going up or down or alternatively, Rasmussen being clean or dirty, I know where I would put my money and it wouldn't be on oil, up or down.

As for the similarities between Ras and Armstrong, well it is just another reason for the press to keep their powder dry and for Armstrong, no real reason to be knocked off his pedestal.

Good luck

Moss

[SomchaiCNX]

It seems to me that Lance Armstrong has possibly more to lose than to gain by riding the Tour again.

At the moment he has his unblemished record of 7 successive wins. If he rides in 2009 and doesn't win he will lose his aura of invincibility.

On the other hand, winning an eighth will not won't make him any more famous - and no matter how many he wins, those who think that Eddie Merckx was the greatest ever are not going to change their view.

And regardless of how he performs, the focus, rightly or wrongly, will be back on the drugs/blood tampering issue. The media view will be predictable If he is winning, is he using something? If losing, then he must have been doing something when he was winning in the past.

I have always admired his achievements - though I found it difficult to continue liking him as a person after reading his two books - but I feel that neither his reputation nor the image of the Tour will benefit by his coming out of retirement.

I agree with your post, he has nothing to win only to lose

And YES, Eddie Merckx was the greatest.

[LaoPo]

Unbelievable!

After just 4 days into the 2009 Tour de France, 37 year old Lance Armstrong/USA (38 on Sept. 18th), 7 times winner of Le Tour, who didn't attend since he won in 2005, is #2 at the overall standing in time (equal on time with #1 Yellow Jersey rider Fabian Cancellara from Switzerland).

He leaves 178 riders, all -much- younger than him, behind.

Truly amazing.

http://www.letour.fr/2009/TDF/LIVE/us/400/...ment/index.html

Armstrong's team ASTANA (sponsored by Astana, capital of Kazakhstan of all places ) has 4 riders at the first five, overall; 5 at the first seven riders and 6 at the first 11 riders.

And....Astana has Manager Johan Bruyneel, the Belgian Mastermind behind Armstrong/Astana, a personal friend of Lance Armstrong.

Everybody expected that Alberto Contador, 2007 winner (also Astana team) would be the #1 rider and that Armstrong would ride in his service....

Contador is #3 overall.

What an exciting Tour de France !

LaoPo

[Texpat]

The Frogs will find a way to disqualify him.

Wrong color shoes.

Forgot to stand at attention during the national anthem.

Didn't shave on day 28.

[downtown]

Contador showed his true colours today, proving the dissent in Astana. Open season on him now, should be very interesting tomorrow.

[LaoPo]

Contador showed his true colours today, proving the dissent in Astana. Open season on him now, should be very interesting tomorrow.

What do you mean ?

You didn't like what he did in the final 1-2 km ? It wasn't very chique that he jumped and he didn't ride for some 222 km but that's the way La Tour is played.

Armstrong did the same in the past.

BUT, since Lance is back in the Tour there seems to be a revival and everybody is very excited.

Very interesting Tour this year...very interesting.

LaoPo

[Macx]

Yes, but could somebody tell that one commentator (a former tour rider) to stop mumbling and speak up a bit? He's putting me to sleep. The guy has a wealth of knowledge and experience, but I can't quite make out half of what he's saying.

Anyhow, been watching it on Eurosport while riding on my trainer (forgo my usual ride just to watch the tour). Pretty exciting stuff so far.

BTW, who are some of the other older riders in the tours? Why aren't they getting some attention too?

[T_Dog]

Anyone have any suggestions for video links that show the day's happenings? Tried a few but results were poor.