Lance Armstrong Cheated to Win. Why is that Wrong? - Reason Magazine

[Ninety5rpm]

Don't sigh. This piece by Nick Gilespie makes some valid points. Especially the last one.

Imagine the unfair advantages a multi-millionaire celebrity like Lance Armstrong has over less-wealthy rivals: He can buy the best chefs, nutritionists, masseurs, physical therapists, movement specialists, physiologists, acupuncturists, chakra balancers, and ball tuggers. Lance could have a mountain chateau in Tourmalet, a climate-controlled bungalow in San Sebastian, a compound in Colorado for high-elevation training, and an oxygen-deprivation gym for cross training. He could have gadgets and gizmos to knead his sore calves when the servants retired for the evening, he could sleep in Michale Jackson’s old hyperbaric chamber (Bubbles is lonely!), he could extract the marrow of Heraclitus and spread it on toast points. With all the technology available in nutrition, medicine, components, bike frames, shoes, pointy, goofy racing helmets, and every other element of cycling,everything could be deemed unfair, or unnatural!

Money is an advantage, technology is an advantage, genes are an advantage (or disadvantage, in many cases!). None of it is fair.
...
What if “science” deems blood-doping and injectables as innocuous (and generally useless) as the creams and supplements they sell at GNC? With falling viewership and global loss of interest in cycling, it’s more than likely that the powers that be will expand the list of accepted drugs and practices. If the day comes when cyclists can finally emerge from the shadows and party-hearty with their testosterone, their EPO, even an ELO mixed tape, make sure you know why you hate Lance Armstrong. It’s not because he made his former teammate and defrocked Tour winner Floyd Landis babysit a mini-fridge full of Lance blood for a long, hot, Austin summer, or because he shrunk his weenis with hormone injections, or had better oxygen-uptake than you.

No, it’s because in the end, Lance refused to admit what was as plain as the saddle sore on your bu++ after a 115-mile ride: that he cheated to win, and nobody did it better. No man is a hero to his former personal assistant, but Lance Armstrong was an ahole until the very end.

http://reason.com/archives/2012/11/17/defending-lance-armstrong

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Don't sigh. This piece by Nick Gilespie makes some valid points. Especially the last one.



http://reason.com/archives/2012/11/17/defending-lance-armstrong

Sigh.
There are no valid points - particularly when they write nonsense like this...

Of all the techniques and tools in the cycling arsenal, this one I find totally inoffensive. It’s your blood! If you want to make yourself all sickly and anemic and shiver like a hairless cat when the refrigerated sanguine smoothie glugs back into your body, then have at it. As far as I’m concerned, if drinking your own urine somehow made you faster in a time trial, then bottoms up. It’s gross, and it’s weird, but it’s yours.

 

[ElChingon]

If they placed a GNC next to a WADA testing station everyone would test positive.

 

[BroDeal]

You have to realize reason.com is THE site for Ayn Rand nutters. Considering how one's decisions affect other people is not part of the ideology. It is a heresy.

“There are two novels that can transform a bookish 14-year-kld’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish daydream that can lead to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood in which large chunks of the day are spent inventing ways to make real life more like a fantasy novel. The other is a book about orcs.”

 

[mountainrman]

The first point is very valid.

Attacking the presumption that there is a level playing field to begin or that drugs distort a level playing field, it simply is not so - the playing field was never level to begin with.

On the way in to professional sport - the ability to train full time, at altitude with good medical backup (in short having money) is clearly a massive advantage over those who can only train at low level around a day job without medical backup - and that is the reality of the transition period into any pro sport or competing at lower levels.

The question of where an in which country you are born makes a big difference! Chinese athletes with "potential" are given full time 24/7 support from junior school age, which is why they dominate so many sports, like the eastern europeans of decades ago. I wonder when they will target cycling in a big way too.

Even your birthday matters. Read the book "outliers" and see how the oldest kids (so biggest on average) in any age group show better talent earlier, then are hothoused to pro, so in some national teams at various sports the birthdays of national class athletes are clustered in a single month!!!
About as unlevel as it gets!

Once in pro sport the resources of a team make a big difference too, the extent to which - for example - wind tunnel testing, top of the range bikes modified specially, physio and expensive medical backup, better support riders meaning less time catching wind, expensive rapid comfortable methods of travel over slower ones which make recovery harder and so on.

So drugs do not distort a level playing field, they distort an unlevel playing field.


There are measures to try to redress this, at least in some areas. I heard Chris Boardman interviewed a couple of months ago, saying that they were now obliged by the rules of cycling to make their (national) bike equipment technology available at a price to any other countries - and he was surprised that no other countries had taken advantage - since he said the technology makes a significant difference.

 

[mac220]

The problem with the argument in the quote from the article is there is a presumption that Lance Armstrong had more 'capital' to invest in his cycling preparation than others, whether that be to pay for diet or a chateaux at altitude.

Well, before Armstrong started winning big races, if remember rightly, he was from a very humble background with relatively little money.

So the question is where did all this money come from to support the premise of this article and the answer is very simple from doping, so the fundamental underlying point of the article doesn't hold water.

To address one of those arguments directly:

Lance could have a mountain chateau in Tourmalet, a climate-controlled bungalow in San Sebastian, a compound in Colorado for high-elevation training, and an oxygen-deprivation gym for cross training

It is possible to rent a small apartment in either the Pyrenees/Alp's at low altitude for a relatively small amount of money to allow you to train at Altitude. From the reading I've done (I may well be wrong on this) when performing altitude training you train at altitude, but rest as close to sea level as possible and from looking into buying somewhere in the Pyrenees/alps a few years ago you could get an apartment which is only a stones through from some nice high altitude for not very much money, its always the ski chalets at the top of the mountains which cost the earth. There is no need to have a chateaux to be able to perform altitude training affectively. But even if that was not the case and you needed to be living at altitude you can get an apartment at high altitude outside the ski season relatively cheaply or go to a less well known village/town for example Auris-en-Oisan which is the next village along from Alp D'Huez for a fraction of the cost of other famous ski destinations.

Of course its never a even playing field with some people having an advantage over other. The things mentioned may make a difference but I can't believe that it would equate to those made by using a highly sophisticated and professionally planned doping programme.

Sorry but 'D-, Could do better' in my opinion.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

The protocol typically followed is live high, train low. So you sleep / recover at altitude and train from sea level up. There are combinations of these, but above 1500m you lose power and cannot train as effectively.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

There are measures to try to redress this, at least in some areas. I heard Chris Boardman interviewed a couple of months ago, saying that they were now obliged by the rules of cycling to make their (national) bike equipment technology available at a price to any other countries - and he was surprised that no other countries had taken advantage - since he said the technology makes a significant difference.

Bahahahahahahahhahahaaaaaa

$600 (?)for a helmet and you repeat Boardman's surprise that noone's taken them up on the offer. A shame.

$XXXXX for a bike frame with a 6-12 month lead time.

Essentially they HAVE to make it available for sale, otherwise it's prototype and contravening the RULES. But bottom line, they are, like a number of things at olympics (dropping the bike at the start of the team sprint) doing the bare minimum to pass the RULES to the letter, and no more.

Win at any cost, all over again.

 

[mountainrman]

Bahahahahahahahhahahaaaaaa

$600 (?)for a helmet and you repeat Boardman's surprise that noone's taken them up on the offer. A shame.

$XXXXX for a bike frame with a 6-12 month lead time.

Essentially they HAVE to make it available for sale, otherwise it's prototype and contravening the RULES. But bottom line, they are, like a number of things at olympics (dropping the bike at the start of the team sprint) doing the bare minimum to pass the RULES to the letter, and no more.

Win at any cost, all over again.

Not so laughable. That is the problem.

The cost of wind tunnel testing and the people that know enough to interpret the results and can do computational fluid dynamics to improve the flow profiles are not cheap - I have no idea how much a cycling tunnel costs, but I have hired large tunnels for other purposes testing engineering structures and the price is many £000's a day - I once paid £30000 to use a tunnel for a couple of days.. So the helmets may be priced at $600 - they cost at least that and probably more by the time you absorb the development costs.

Which only goes to show the main point I made.

It was never a level playing field to start with.
Money can buy better results.

Is there really such an ethical distinction between the wealthier ones who can train at altitude on big climbs for months which stimulates EPO production- from those who are forced to train at low altitude who either reinject altitude blood, or use EPO to create similar? It is a moral maze. All that can be said is it is "against the rules of the day" , and the point I make is not that drug taking should be legalized, only that preventing doping DOES NOT create a level playing field.

 

[del1962]

Not so laughable. That is the problem.

The cost of wind tunnel testing and the people that know enough to interpret the results and can do computational fluid dynamics to improve the flow profiles are not cheap - I have no idea how much a cycling tunnel costs, but I have hired large tunnels for other purposes testing engineering structures and the price is many £000's a day - I once paid £30000 to use a tunnel for a couple of days.. So the helmets may be priced at $600 - they cost at least that and probably more by the time you absorb the development costs.

Which only goes to show the main point I made.

It was never a level playing field to start with.
Money can buy better results.

Is there really such an ethical distinction between the wealthier ones who can train at altitude on big climbs for months which stimulates EPO production- from those who are forced to train at low altitude who either reinject altitude blood, or use EPO to create similar? It is a moral maze. All that can be said is it is "against the rules of the day" , and the point I make is not that drug taking should be legalized, only that preventing doping DOES NOT create a level playing field.

Not really, if you have the natural talent and put the work in you will win local races and make you way up through the ranks, eventually getting on a world tour pro-team who will invest in you. All available to clean cyclists who will have pretty much a level playing field.

Your post is some sort of apologist for Lance by making a totally false comparison.

 

[FrankChickens]

@mountainrman your argument is nonsensical. If wind tunnels and helmets are so significant why go to the trouble of bribing the UCI, paying small fortunes to Ferrari, mucking about with blood transfusions, getting Hein to pop the competition and having the french president cut the AFLD's budget in half?

 

[taiwan]

About Lance: depends on the moral world you live in. If it's the wild west then ultimately anything goes and he did well for himself. If adhering to the rules is as or more important than success, he was one of the worst.

However if in the former case he cheated and got caught it's his lookout. You have to wonder why people would continue to defend/celebrate him when he was out for himself. If it's about victory by any means, there's no wider value in the achievement.

 

[Willy_Voet]

If it's about victory by any means, there's no wider value in the achievement.

And I think that just about wraps this discussion up.

 

[mountainrman]

@mountainrman your argument is nonsensical. If wind tunnels and helmets are so significant why go to the trouble of bribing the UCI, paying small fortunes to Ferrari, mucking about with blood transfusions, getting Hein to pop the competition and having the french president cut the AFLD's budget in half?

On the contrary - my argument make perfect sense.

My comment is without drugs it is and was far from a level playing field.

Money makes a difference, and every little helps

Who noticed on the womens worlds road race championship that emma pooley had all the vents on the front of her helmet blocked? It is because it has a measurable increase in performance

 

[ScienceIsCool]

And creating a level playing field is why the UCI regulates the equipment that can be used in competition. Setting weight limits, positional requirements (saddle setback, etc), frame dimensions, etc, etc prevent technology from becoming the focus rather than sportsmanship and competition.

This is one of the few things that the UCI does that I agree with.

John Swanson

 

[silverrocket]

Yes of course there are factors that give some people different advantages, like money (eg. some gifted endurance athletes can't afford any bike at all) and geography (eg. no cyclists up on the Canadian tundra), but the competition is ultimately a physical one, and that is where the playing field needs to be kept level.

The purpose of sport is to compete to see who is physically superior, but doping so distorts what the body is naturally capable of that it renders the competition moot. The biggest current and/or future threat to sports is genetic therapy that will fundamentally change a human's physical potential. It will make it nearly impossible for us "unmodified" humans to relate to pro athletes, and this will be the death knell for pro sports altogether.

People like sports because of the human element to competition. Part of this involves us seeing the professionals as extensions of ourselves: the zenith of achievement in a physical activity we participate in. When we see grotesquely "unnatural" performances we feel disconnected to the performance, and thus cheated, because not only is the physical playing field not level amongst the competitors, it's not level with us either.

 

[shawnrohrbach]

Don't sigh. This piece by Nick Gilespie makes some valid points. Especially the last one.



http://reason.com/archives/2012/11/17/defending-lance-armstrong

I've read Reason magazine a few times and it reminds me of a drunk father-in-law at a holiday dinner who argues just for the sake of being contrarian, beligerent and not necessarily right. The glitter in the old man's eyes is both from the strong drink and the glee he gets from making everyone at the table uncomfortable. IMHO.

 

[goggalor]

That video is, like, super edgy. Cannot be bothered to actually read the article.

 

[will10]

Bahahahahahahahhahahaaaaaa

$600 (?)for a helmet and you repeat Boardman's surprise that noone's taken them up on the offer. A shame.

$XXXXX for a bike frame with a 6-12 month lead time.

Essentially they HAVE to make it available for sale, otherwise it's prototype and contravening the RULES. But bottom line, they are, like a number of things at olympics (dropping the bike at the start of the team sprint) doing the bare minimum to pass the RULES to the letter, and no more.

Win at any cost, all over again.

The helmets were quoted at £3000 each.

 

[arjanh]

Plain and simple

This is all a load of croc. It's plain and simple: if you wanna play, you play by the rules. If you don't wanna play by the rules, get the f*** out.

It's never a level playing field, as some riders can push more Watts than others, some have better bike-handling skills, etc.

The rules set clear boundaries on some aspects (no doping, no auxiliary systems of propulsion, etc), vague on others (bike designs, for one), or none at all.

You can bicker about whether those rules make any sense, but that's a different discussion. And, yes, the rules are pretty arbitrary, but again, that's not the point.

The point is that they've agreed to play by those rules, and so they should.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

The helmets were quoted at £3000 each.

I just spotted your sig piece in your username- the quote is from Bill Stapleton, not Bob.

 

[gjdavis60]

The moment the first drop of chemotherapy entered his system, the natural progression of Armstrong's biology was fundamentally and permanently changed yielding an immeasurable advantage over competitors who did not have the same benefit. He should be disqualified from all results obtained since his diagnosis on those grounds alone, for if he had not taken chemo, he would not have been able to compete at the same level.

 

[Ninety5rpm]

The moment the first drop of chemotherapy entered his system, the natural progression of Armstrong's biology was fundamentally and permanently changed yielding an immeasurable advantage over competitors who did not have the same benefit. He should be disqualified from all results obtained since his diagnosis on those grounds alone, for if he had not taken chemo, he would not have been able to compete at the same level.

Are there any reliable sources that support your theory that "Armstrong's biology was fundamentally and permanently changed yielding an immeasurable advantage" from the chemotherapy?

 

[D-Queued]

Not so laughable. That is the problem.

The cost of wind tunnel testing and the people that know enough to interpret the results and can do computational fluid dynamics to improve the flow profiles are not cheap - I have no idea how much a cycling tunnel costs, ...

It was never a level playing field to start with.
Money can buy better results.

....

I know exactly how much a low-speed / cycling tunnel costs. I know how much the best cycling wind tunnel experts cost.

I know exactly how Armstrong's equipment, for example, tests out against a variety of commercially available equipment.

I also know that most cyclists can do pretty well with off-the-shelf, commercially available equipment. Most cyclists can do some of the simple roll-down-a-hill tests, for example, to get a good sense of aerodynamic drag.

And creating a level playing field is why the UCI regulates the equipment that can be used in competition. Setting weight limits, positional requirements (saddle setback, etc), frame dimensions, etc, etc prevent technology from becoming the focus rather than sportsmanship and competition.

This is one of the few things that the UCI does that I agree with.

John Swanson

And I disagree completely.

Have you ever watched amateur level races where UCI equipment rules are invoked with Cat 5/Novice cyclists.

Ever see the radical change in bicycle position that the UCI equipment rules require of a relative novice to TT'ing with TT extensions affixed to standard handlebars?

Firstly, TT extensions should be exempted because of their relatively modest benefit compared to specialized TT bars.

Secondly, even with the absolute best and most aerodynamic equipment, including the Nike Swift Suit and the best helmet ever made, the blob that is your body is overwhelmingly the critical element in aerodynamic drag.

The UCI rules are a disincentive to encouraging broader participation.

They - the UCI, their rules and the well-meaning umpires that try and enforce them - are all fundamentally stupid.

Dave.

 

[gjdavis60]

Are there any reliable sources that support your theory that "Armstrong's biology was fundamentally and permanently changed yielding an immeasurable advantage" from the chemotherapy?

Sure. Ask his doctor. He was dying. Would have died without the treatment. With the treatment, he rode a lot better than a dead guy, so I say he gave up his right to compete when he accepted the advantage provided by the chemo.

What's the difference between ifosfamide and EPO? Both are artificial. Both conferred an advantage to Armstrong over what he would have been naturally, and both were necessary for him to win the Tour.

As we have seen from the Armstrong affair, PEDs are not only illegal if you have them in your system at a race. They are illegal always and everywhere because their effects confer an advantage long after the drug is gone. So does cisplatin and etoposide if you have certain cancers.

He should have been retired in 1996. I'm sorry he got cancer, but if we really want a "natural" sport, well, that's the breaks.