Granville57 said:
While I don't disagree that JV is "selling" a product (his product), I don't think the above statement is entirely fair.
In that interview, he left it up to anyone with half a brain to read between the lines that his record performance up Ventoux was the result of doping. He didn't say it explicitly, but he sure as hell laid out the premise.
But I think we're in agreement overall.
Agree on the Ventoux insight.
Agree that JV is selling his product. And he should be.
Where I diverge from others is that I don't see JV as evil incarnate.
The best salespeople are those that believe in their products. I am not convinced that JV is trying to deliberately hide things or is making up fairy tales about non-doping.
I can begrudgingly acknowledge that he may have been overenthusiastic at times and history has undermined various comments.
Trying to imagin being in his shoes, though, it isn't clear how anyone else could succeed.
He has to believe in his team, its members, their mission, and their opportunity.
He also has to still like, or more appropriately love, professional cycling, even as 'cancer' riddled as it is.
He has to hang out with people, and even ride in the same car with them, that I can't be in the same building during Interbike with, and somehow not have to run for a cleansing shower immediately.
That has to be difficult.
He may not be perfect, but it is hard to imagine that if someone were running a clean program, or at least trying to, how they could actually be much better than he has been.
Dave.