Difference between American and European fans

[Escarabajo]

Eh truth is sometimes weirder than fiction...

Well besides MicKKK my personal favorites are

Bobby The Muppet with this one




and fpcyclingn with this xenophobic little gem

When did Robert Merivel & fpcyclingn post that? I missed it. These posts are very offensive to a lot of the readers in this Forum.

 

[Sheltowee]

In the U.S., If an athlete gets busted, then admits to it, then apologizes, then serves his supension, they are given a second chance. Example: Manny

If they get busted, does not admit to it, doesent apologize, they are looked at differently and treated differently. Example: Barry Bonds, Roger Clemons, and Pete Rose.

Yeah, And if they get accused and not busted, they can still find themselves testifying before a congressional committee or grandjury and then being indicted for perjury if their stories don't jive.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

A Sports Illustrated article about it. It raises issues beyond doping that are interesting.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/the_bonus/07/07/tour/1.html

Pfff, some really bad passages there

"American teams -- first 7-Eleven, then Motorola, eventually U.S. Postal and Discovery Channel -- weren't likely to set up shadowy doping programs;"

Yeah right, if US Postal and Discovery Channel weren't systematically doping, than I'm the queen of England. Who in his right mand would believe such a chauvinistic statement.

 

[Zen Master]

When did Robert Merivel & fpcyclingn post that? I missed it. Maybe these two comments should have a sticky and be made an example of the perfect "ignorant" posters in this forum. It is very offensive to a lot of the readers in this Forum.

Bobby The Muppet and thread Floyd Landis 2006 TdF Champion

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showthread.php?t=55

Many thanks to Mellow Velo for paying attention on this crown jewel

fpcyclingn with " I spit on you damn foreigners " and thread “Alberto could not just be stronger, but could be a lot stronger" - Lance Armstrong

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showthread.php?t=1676

 

[hulkgogan]

The interesting thing for me is that it the first article I've read in a mainstream US publication that more or less takes for granted that Armstrong dopes.

That's pretty subversive and a bit of a breakthrough, no?

 

[Doug Laipple]

One difference between American and European fans is that American fans generally (assuredly, not always) dress appropriately, with little body paint, and wave the American flag in a manner which is unobtrusive to the riders.
European fans ... well ... you know.

 

[mr. tibbs]

Yep, with Religious Fundamentalists for forefathers what do you expect? God Bless America.

Now, where is my wallet???

Actually I think they were mostly agnostics.

@Doug: I certainly wanted to punch those flag waving imbeciles in the face yesterday. I think I saw Pellizoti actually get whipped with a flag by one of the orange-clad Basque fans. I think so far, though, the most obnoxious fans award might go to those Aussies with the bright wigs and flag capes who run along next to the riders with cameras, apparently filming them and often almost falling in front of them. (Not knocking Australians in general, just this particular group.)

The Borat swimsuit thing is getting old, too.

 

[LugHugger]

One difference between American and European fans is that American fans generally (assuredly, not always) dress appropriately, with little body paint, and wave the American flag in a manner which is unobtrusive to the riders.
European fans ... well ... you know.

Right. Like the guy with steer horns nearly knocking riders over last year? And, totally off topic, dare I mention the Ryder Cup?

I know that you said, generally, but generally most fans are respectful and well behaved

 

[workingclasshero]

re: clothing i'd say generally cycling fans aren't exactly your average casually dressed football fan

 

[mambo#5]

that SI article is pointless. Cheating (doping) in this case, it's not an American or European or Hispanic or African or Asian thing. It's a human thing. For as long as there has been humans walking the earth, there's been those trying to cut corners for an advantage. Spare me the ethnic or religious connotations.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Americans generally have no interest in cheating on others. These young riders come over to Europe, see what's going on, and after a long and hard-fought battle are finally pulled into the world of doping. This is just a very sad thing to happen, and I ask all young and hopeful American riders to please stay in this great country and not let themselves get corrupted on European turf. We can have a harder and more beautiful race than the TdF, generate genuine interest among American consumers, and simply block out the rest of the world, where nobody gives a d... about clean, fair sport.

Are you serious? Hahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahah
Bwahahhahahahahahah

Sorry.
That's just too idealistic and ignorant for words

 

[BikeCentric]

Americans generally have no interest in cheating on others. These young riders come over to Europe, see what's going on, and after a long and hard-fought battle are finally pulled into the world of doping. This is just a very sad thing to happen, and I ask all young and hopeful American riders to please stay in this great country and not let themselves get corrupted on European turf. We can have a harder and more beautiful race than the TdF, generate genuine interest among American consumers, and simply block out the rest of the world, where nobody gives a d... about clean, fair sport.

Cycling is never going to be big in the US. I did a "big" downtown crit yesterday where they shut down the whole downtown of a nice town near me and had a pretty good domestic pro field there as well. There was backed up traffic all around the course with a-hole motorists honking horns and yelling at the racers for having a race and backing up traffic. There was a huge fat d-bag on the side of the course eating a sandwich and heckling riders who got dropped in the Masters race before mine. Americans in general are just too big a bunch of douchebags to appreciate this wonderful sport, so f 'em.

 

[BikeCentric]

Professional sports is NOTHING else than entertainment!

It's also a profession and source of livelihood for its' participants and organizational people, so it's really a lot more than that.

 

[BikeCentric]

Jeez, Zen, I must have missed that fp post, it's a beaut!

It's too easy to pin labels on nationalities, aided by the stuff quoted above, but it just isn't true.

They may be a minority in their own country, but there are some seriously knowledgeable, hard core US cycling fans, here. I find them all the more exceptional, as their "access" to top flight racing, until recently, has been extremely restricted.
It can't be easy to remain as objective as these guys do, when they see themselves getting lumped together with the xenophobic ranters and the (I love this group name) "Pollyanas", such as the "Drivel".

I can only imagine their frustration, when they read these type of postings.

There are also a lot of subjective, starry-eyed Euro posters, to be found, In my experience.

Try to imagine our frustration when we go out for training rides and have fat a-holes in SUV's yell at us and throw stuff at us. Then when we stop for water people are like "you've been out riding for FIVE HOURS?! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU! YOU ARE INSANE!" And I say "no I'm not insane, I'm just a bike racer," they just stare at you like you're an alien. Ha ha ha ha.

 

[BikeCentric]

Obviously Alex 99's point was sarcastic, but the SI article did touch a little on the theme that the unhealthy aspects in Euro cycling only exist in Europe.

I never made it over myself, but I know quite a few ex teammates who went over to the States to race the occasional crits and stage races in the P-1-2- categories.

These were good Euro amateur riders, experienced in both crits (Dutch crits are really tough) and stage races.

They could not believe how fast American top level crits are. They were getting dropped early on, and average speeds nudging 50km/h were being recorded. They observed that a lot of prize money was on offer (sometimes a winner takes all prize) and a doping control was not a possibility.

Any rider with a brain knows what this means.

The stories I have heard are actually of naive young European riders being confronted with a racing culture of speed, speed and speed ;-)

But in our defense Mongo our crits are really short - usually an hour at most for the P/1/2 and 45 minutes for the 3's and 4's. I know the Euro crits are actually what we'd call "circuit races" and are usually 1.5 to 2 hours long.

So what I'm getting at is it's a much different kind of training. The US crit training and racing is way more anaerobic and above threshold kind of riding. Euro riding in general has way more tempo and threshold riding.

But yeah we don't have any dope controls whatsoever at US races, so take from that what you will. The guys here barely even get paid though so keep that in mind as well. Of course that could make them hungry wolves, I don't know I've never raced in the P/1/2 pack.

 

[BikeCentric]

What complete and utter bullshit. One clear example is Karting. The Europeans kick our asses handily whenever there is a race involving Americans. The reason? Their European kids use the spec karts spec with few exceptions. Our kids go over there from the states and the biggest winners (notice I didn't say best drivers) are the ones whose dads always find a way to get them a little more power here. Most of them cheat like hell in the states. Then they get to international competition where the karts aren't theirs and guess what? They get their asses handed to them. Cheating is in our blood and to suggest otherwise is just stupid.

Kaile Leogrande, ex-US Nats Crit Champion, EPO positive, busted and retired.

 

[BikeCentric]

The interesting thing for me is that it the first article I've read in a mainstream US publication that more or less takes for granted that Armstrong dopes.

That's pretty subversive and a bit of a breakthrough, no?

I think you're right Hulk, it's the first article published in an American publication with that tone that I've read as well and I pretty much read everything written in English about cycling. Sports Illustrated is extremely mainstream and mainly covers (American) football and baseball so it's going to hit a non-cycling reader base and will be informative to them.

 

[jaylew]

A Sports Illustrated article about it. It raises issues beyond doping that are interesting.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/the_bonus/07/07/tour/1.html

Not a big deal, but your link goes to the middle page of the article instead of the 1st.

 

[Alex99]

It's also a profession and source of livelihood for its' participants and organizational people, so it's really a lot more than that.

... and why do you think these people can make a living out of professional cycling? Maybe because the money they earn - comes from people like you and me, people who buy the products of the sponsors, etc.
If it went back to amateurs, that would be different story...

 

[Alex99]

Are you serious? Hahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahah
Bwahahhahahahahahah

Sorry.
That's just too idealistic and ignorant for words

Ok, what part of the message didn't you get? Oh, you didn't get ANYTHING? Too bad for you

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

The first sentence is already too hilarious for words. If you really think that..then I'm sorry for you.

 

[issoisso]

Ok, what part of the message didn't you get? Oh, you didn't get ANYTHING? Too bad for you

The guy's got a point. You're basically saying the good old US of A is populated by innocent people who care and don't want to dope who are corrupted by the evil euros who don't care about a clean sport and force the pure-hearted american kids to the side of darkness and deceit.

It's quite ridiculous, to be honest.

 

[issoisso]

Ok, what part of the message didn't you get? Oh, you didn't get ANYTHING? Too bad for you

The guy's got a point. You're basically saying our good old US of A is populated by innocent people who care and don't want to dope who are corrupted by the evil euros who don't care about a clean sport and force the pure-hearted american kids to the side of darkness and deceit.

It's quite ridiculous, to be honest. Sorry

 

[Nobody you know]

Luke, come to the dark side!

 

[BroDeal]

I think you need to look at two different things about the article.

First it assembles a damning case of the prevalance of doping in cycling in an easy to digest article for the general public. It is not written from the usual position that the dopers are a few bad apples, but presents a case that doping is integral to the sport and required to win. It also makes it clear that Armstrong's claims of being clean are about as credible as Barry Bonds claims of not using steroids. For a mainstream American publication, the biggest sports periodical in the country, this is revolutionary. Perhaps it is the story that can now be told after cycling has taken so many punches from the likes of Tyler Hamilton and Floyd Landis that the general public is suspicious of cycling.

Second it makes a case that there is a difference between American and European knowledge of how widespread doping is and acceptance of it. This probably would have best been left out of the article because it is such a sweeping generalization and comes off as a bit jingoistic. It also appears to be written from the perspective of those American riders (and the journalist himself) who went over to Europe in the mid 80s to early 90s and really did start out naive as to what the doping culture was like. It does not do a good job of distinguishing them from those that went over in the late 90s and beyond and must have known what they were getting into.

Anyway, I thought it would be an interesting article for the "three week fans," many of whom come from the U.S., to read.

BTW, fixed the link to point to the first page of the article. Thanks to the above poster for pointing that out.