Lance Armstrong will win stage 15...

[buckwheat]

Iv'e seen some dumb comments on here but this is right up there with them. Amusing how you name yourself after a rider who himself won his tours doped and yet you are happy to make Armstrong out to be some sort of monster.

7 time TdF winner not a champion? Not classy? I don't particularly care what you think about him as a person, sport is not a popularity contest and plenty of 'never were's' like yourself despised Merckx and Hinault in their day. But as a rider during his heyday Lance was the best rider in the worlds biggest race. The biggest winner of the biggest race and the most dominant rider in the world's biggest race. Tactically he and JB made other teams look like amateurs. Thats what makes him a champion...results.

To say that he is less of a champion because he may have been doping is total hypocrisy. even if he was doping he won against a whole bunch of other guys who were doping so the best rider still won. I know it rankles people like you that he won't admit to doping (has Jan ever publically admitted??) but he who asserts must prove and I haven't seen him being banned for failing tests so why should he.

May have?

 

[rxgqgxnyfz]

Berto's got his bags packed for the beach. He'll see us all again next spring for a spring roll and possibly something in June before going for #4

Berto plans to make a Giro-TDF double next year, and probably to catch a few classics along the way.

He started pretty good this year with classics, he seems to like the experience.
________
Montana Medical Marijuana

 

[rhubroma]

Ha ha you've got that right, Buckweat makes Lance look like a saint even when he's at his most nasty.

His big dilemma will be who he turns his poison on to when LA is gone. I'm picking Cav will be a good bet. Guys like Buck don't like winners, they remind them of their own shortcomings...the sad little man.

And this is the most idiotic response from people with a rather limited intellect. Though we have to hear it over, and over, and over again, because it's the only thing you guys can put up as a pathetic defense.

No it has nothing to do with not liking winners, (let me fill you in on something, nobody follows sport to never route for a winner - though not all winners are liked). It has everything to do with a man's personality who has thought that being a winner gives you the right to treat people like sh!t whenever they don't follow the orders, or dare to upset the program.

Just ask Simeoni. Lemond. Many a former domestique.

As for his palmarès: he was the most successful Tour winner, though in an age when the finance of doping has meant that the biggest budget teams got the best octain. He also went further than any athlete in the history of the sport to reduce the season to one event. I think we can be thus both suspect of the real merit of his so called results (that which is all that evidently counts for you), as well as the real benefit that his model had given to the sport as a whole. Then there are all the devious deeds he did to ruthlessly pursue his fame, which we only hope the Landis investigation will provide full confirmation.

I think, therefore, that the further cycling distances itself from what his entire career has represented (which pretty much means omertà and the "arms race"), the closer it will be to taking the first real steps in ending the corruption and fraud. So there's a human side to liking a person, winner or not. His public persona of thaumaturge on a mission to save humanity from cancer, does not conform with his private side as a real nasty and sinister guy. Simple.

 

[Iker_Baqueiro]

I think it will be stage 16 for sure


When I see all these (fanboy)haters I have a short message:
It must have been 7 very hard years for you. All the pressure comes out (now).
I am very sorry that you will lose your motivation after he, who saved the world, retires and that you pop off into the depth of the internet.
But the fanboys will still be here an follow CYCLING anyway. That makes the difference between the fanboys and the haters.

Correction fanboy, they will take away 3 or 4 tour de France titles after the truth comes out. haha!

 

[BroDeal]

Pardon me, I didn't read the rest of this thread. But just let me put my 2 cents in. LA ain't winning NOTHING in this, his last Tour de France. Or in any other european race for that matter.

Horner says Armstrong is fcuked along with most of the team. They are all killing themselves while fighting it out with Caisse for the team competition.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/horner/2010/07/tour_de_france_stage_12_chris.html

 

[Benotti69]

Horner says Armstrong is fcuked along with most of the team. They are all killing themselves while fighting it out with Caisse for the team competition.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/horner/2010/07/tour_de_france_stage_12_chris.html

Quite indicative of how far they have fallen. It is probably to save their jobs for next year. If the team win nothing at the TdF maybe Radioshack have a get out clause..

 

[editedbymod]

Quite indicative of how far they have fallen. It is probably to save their jobs for next year. If the team win nothing at the TdF maybe Radioshack have a get out clause..

I want the blue train to come back.

Just as we neared the finishing climb, Popo came up to me and said, “Klodi is up the road already, Levi will go hard to the finish for GC, but Lance, Dimi, Jani, Rast, Paulinho, and I are all (expletive), so you have to go 100 percent to the finish." Of course, I yelled back at him, “So am I!!!!” But, the team had done so much work to protect the team GC that I had to do what I could to finish it off. I took out my double caffeine gel that I had thought I’d be saving for another day, and swallowed it down with a Coke chaser.

When we hit the climb, I just let the front group go, settling into my own rhythm. Soon, I started picking off riders one by one that had gone over their limit and blown. By the top, I had caught up to what I thought was the last Caisse d'Epargne rider left at the front. Levi had done his job by staying near the leaders, saving his fight for the GC, and Klodi continued riding hard up the climb after riding all day in the break, finishing just ahead of me. It was a great team effort to take over the team classification lead, in a battle that took 100 percent from every rider.

Now it’s back to the Game Ready to keep working on the hamstring, since there are a lot of hard miles still to come!

 

[pedaling squares]

Lance already had his farewell procession, back when he retired the first time. Maybe Moreau could be allowed to go out first, given that he's retiring, and for several years was always the highest placed Frenchman on GC.

It would be nice to see this kind of tribute to Moreau.

...Armstrong was a freak of nature in his prime...

Um.. er... never mind.

 

[bobs nob]

his airness won 6 nba championships:
91, 92, 93, 96, 97, 98

no I'm not from Chicago I guess I'm just of the right age to care about MJ.

As for LA's legacy in the eyes of casual cycling fans, I don't think it matters. A nonfan I was watching today's stage with had to ask me what peloton meant... if his opinion defines one's legacy then I say legacy shmegacy.

I was wondering when someone was going to catch that. Yes 6 championships. Won 3. Expelled/suspended/retired due to gambling and then returned and won another 3.

 

[Pleadthe5th]

someone said this earlier, but im not sure how to quote it properly..still getting used to this format, so forgive me for not properly quoting the below:


This is the unglueing of Armstrong before our eyes. Yelling at the reporter, snapping at the heckler, crashing on his face in California, crashing all over France.... it is the end in slow motion.

^^
I am a recovering LAlcoholic. My brother is riding in the professional peleton and I can respond to some degree to the feelings of the peleton. They are a microcosm of the rest of the world. Some are true blue fanboys and some are haters. In the middle you have a group that feel they owe LA some homage simply because of the fact that their paychecks are larger now than before LA made his mark on the sport. They feel they do "owe" him something for bringing so many sponsorship dollars to their sport. Most do not care whether LA used PED or not. Most also assume that he exchanges his blood on a regular basis. As far as a gift of a stage? That will not happen.

 

[Benotti69]

I am a recovering LAlcoholic. My brother is riding in the professional peleton and I can respond to some degree to the feelings of the peleton. They are a microcosm of the rest of the world. Some are true blue fanboys and some are haters. In the middle you have a group that feel they owe LA some homage simply because of the fact that their paychecks are larger now than before LA made his mark on the sport. They feel they do "owe" him something for bringing so many sponsorship dollars to their sport. Most do not care whether LA used PED or not. Most also assume that he exchanges his blood on a regular basis. As far as a gift of a stage? That will not happen.

i wonder what they will feel when his return means the sport loses all those dollars. would they feel they should have not welcomed him back.

ask your Bro about the yellow wrist bands, why do riders wear them, is it a symbol of respect for LA or the cancer charity and those who don't wear them are openly anti-LA, be good to be able spot those who are and those who arent supporters. Levi did not have one on to today.

 

[ScottyMuser]

Ask your Bro about the yellow wrist bands, why do riders wear them, is it a symbol of respect for LA or the cancer charity and those who don't wear them are openly anti-LA, be good to be able spot those who are and those who arent supporters. Levi did not have one on to today.

What a stupid post. You do realise that the Livestrong set up is dodgy to say the least, and LA uses it to get himself more publicity and money, rather than the other way around? There are *hundreds* of charities, national or regional, cancer or otherwise, who do a better job than Livestrong at being a charity and promoting their cause(s). There are PLENTY of other causes just as important, AIDS in Africa is still a bigger killer than cancer GLOBALLY, then there's war, famine etc in Africa, child poverty, etc etc.

Maybe those other riders have other, more personal causes. Like Contador, whose brother is in a wheel chair and himself had a stroke and could have died whilst *on the bike*. Or feel that Livestrong isn't the greatest gift to mankind - much like some/a lot of music lovers don't feel that Bob Geldof and Bono aren't the greatest men alive for effectively uusing the charity causes as self publicity to claim they're better than everyone elsr./

 

[Darryl Webster]

^very good observation. athletes aren't good at the "off" button - see Michael Jordan.

Or the even more stupid Linford Christie,,,doping in exhibition races for retired champs....what a T Pot!.

Bet a shrink would put this type of personality more or less in the same catogory.

 

[HokieJoe]

Alberto says hi.

Like I said, the days of Merckx are over. The sport is too competitive now for someone to continuing peaking throughout the season for the GT's, Classics, etc.

 

[goober]

I am sure others are saying it (haven't read this thread) - Lance will win stage 17. Sit back and relax until then.

 

[scribe]

Like I said, the days of Merckx are over. The sport is too competitive now for someone to continuing peaking throughout the season for the GT's, Classics, etc.

Done and dusted. Too difficult to expect a team to gear towards 2 or more GT wins in a season on a regular basis. The emphasis on team is more important in a modern season than it was 40 years ago.

 

[La Pandera]

Berto's got his bags packed for the beach. He'll see us all again next spring for a spring roll and possibly something in June before going for #4

...and prior to winning #4 he will likely win another Paris-Nice, another Pro Tour week long stage race, likely win either L-B-L or Fleche Wallone all while coasting to another Dauphine podium. This will include his being competitive in virtually every other event he enters with a stage win or two mixed in somewhere. Oh and he just might repeat as Spanish National TT champ.

 

[scribe]

...and prior to winning #4 he will likely win another Paris-Nice, another Pro Tour week long stage race, likely win either L-B-L or Fleche Wallone all while coasting to another Dauphine podium. This will include his being competitive in virtually every other event he enters with a stage win or two mixed in somewhere. Oh and he just might repeat as Spanish National TT champ.

Stop living in the past. He aint entering many those things unless for tune up, and if he does, he isn't winning many of them. He is a bonafied GT animal that peaks for the best of the best in the modern age of le tour.

 

[Anonymous]

Lance has been given permission to start tommorows stage now. He is optimistic of a top ten place

 

[red_flanders]

Why do you watch cycling? Oh I get it you have a reason to complain about something!

When the myth is shattered, attack the messenger, eh?

Simple thing would be to ask Ed Rader to back up the claim he makes about Lance's statement. Then you could argue the content of the post, not just attack the person.

 

[red_flanders]

Stop living in the past. He aint entering many those things unless for tune up, and if he does, he isn't winning many of them. He is a bonafied GT animal that peaks for the best of the best in the modern age of le tour.

Paris-Nice is a stage race. He's said he wants to ride LBL to win. It will be no surprise if he does so.

The point of the preceding post is that in a return to the traditions of cycling, Contador rides to win most of the year. Sure is nice to have the giants of the sport competing in the races they enter.

 

[saganftw]

*saves space in case lance win stage 15*

 

[Moose McKnuckles]

I'd like to thank everyone for ignoring Captain Phil/BPC/Arbiter.

 

[red_flanders]

How is the myth shattered?

Ed Rader posted that Lance said he wasn't friends with Casartelli shortly after his demise, but later made a big thing about the relationship.

I don't know if that's true. I'd have asked for some verification of this claim.

Instead, because the statement questions the myth (probably a better way of putting it than "shattered"), flickr the fanboy attacks the person not the post.

 

[red_flanders]

I'd like to thank everyone for ignoring Captain Phil/BPC/Arbiter.

Oh, thanks. Hadn't noticed that yet. I'll be more wary.