Lance's Legacy: How Lance Changed Cycling

[indurain666]

You hate Lance, so you must be from Europe.

If you were a little bit older, mature, smarter and more involved in cycling you would realize that a lot of Americans dislike Armstrong with a passion

 

[Biffins]

what are you, 14 or something?

If you were a little bit older, mature, smarter and more involved in cycling you would realize that a lot of Americans dislike Armstrong with a passion

If you read the whole thread, you would realize it was a sarcastic response to his "You support Lance. You must be American" statement.

 

[180mmCrank]

Please try to steer clear of references to groups of people based on nationality (or anything else for that matter) - it nearly always throws threads off topic!

Thanks

Terry
Moderator

 

[dancing on pedals]

well lets sum up
for pro armstrong fans - he inevented cycling around 1993 whilst on a skiing holiday in Oslo - it was raining so he went out on his bike.
for non armstrong fans he has done nothing for the sport other than for himself.
The truth lies somewhere betweeen those boundaries - you be the judge.
One myth most certainly is the French hate Armstrong but love LeMond. For the second successive year Armstrong has recieved the most mail through the TdF postal system and when William Fotheringham did a study in 2004(i'm guessing here look it up on the Guardian website) 50% of USA flags on the roaside were waved by non USA nationals.
Ironic that Armstrong has played the "French hate me " card really especially as he has had particular favour this year promoting his own charity via the TdF organisers.
As also reported by Fotheringham there are no signs to tell punters what percentage of the takings from Armtrongs promotions actually go to the charity - in direct contrast par example to the Giro - whose excellent Girto starter kit (bag t shirt cap fridge magnets etc etc) cost 10 euros with 10% going directly to the chosen charity.
I have always been bemused by both LeMond and Armstrong who not content to win the Tour then make up myths of how they did it and how they revolutionised the sport (it gets a bit like the Specialised Ad with Contador and Schleck) I invented clipless pedals, I invented recon etc etc. Total nonsense from the pair of them -
Armstrong was a negative influence on the sport due to his obsession with the Tour, and I am not surprised that the Giro and Vuelta no longer want him or his teams. As the great Bill Nickolson wrote in 1974 "all great champions feel obliged to spread their influence and status by participating in the other major Tours and races" something that both LeMond and Armstrong failed to do when at the peak of their powers.
Thanks

 

[junkie]

Nicely said, DoP!

 

[clearhop]

When did teams introduce the lead out train on climbs? I don't recall teams doing it pre LA - i think that changed the tour/sport significantly. My memory might be playing tricks on me here but i don't remember seeing any other teams do this until after LA started winning. Did Indurain do it? His tours are blanked out in my mind from the sheer overall tedium.

 

[redtreviso]

When did teams introduce the lead out train on climbs? I don't recall teams doing it pre LA - i think that changed the tour/sport significantly. My memory might be playing tricks on me here but i don't remember seeing any other teams do this until after LA started winning. Did Indurain do it? His tours are blanked out in my mind from the sheer overall tedium.

ehhhh...In the Indurain and Pre Indurain era they tried and they did deliver their GC to the climbs..Having 1 or 2 team-mates was lucky though..On a true climb there would be 20 off the front...5 would not belong there and would pop. Of the 15 there might be a couple on the same team..Now a climb starts and there are 60 drilling it...Something different is happening here..Not sure if you want to be so eager to credit Lance Armstrong though.

 

[Horizon Deep]

Yaw, in da US, like it would matter anywhere else.

Lance's focus on the TdF and subsequent exposure in the US has change EVERYTHING about cycling. Before Lance Cannondale was the only US bicycling company with any committment to pro cycling. After Lance, you'g got Specialized, SRAM, Scott, Trek, more that I can't even think of right now.

The TdF will continue to be #1, but already the Tour of California has replaced the Giro as the second most important race in Pro Cycling.

Now that he's retired, expect Lance to have a hand in starting the Tour of Colorado, which will probably be schedule right smack in the middle of the Vuelta, leaving it to be contested soley by Portugese and Spanish Div II teams.

Major change fo-shure!!!!

The Tour of California is more important than the Giro,really? Did you watch the Giro this year? Probably the best G.T in the last 30 years.T.O.C with the exception of Peter Sagan was garbage.Poor route,boring racing they couldnt even televise stage 2 (?) cos it rained a bit.T.O.C the 2nd most important race in Pro Cycling? go lie down son,oh and try to stay off the drugs!

 

[Biffins]

The Tour of California is more important than the Giro,really? Did you watch the Giro this year? Probably the best G.T in the last 30 years.T.O.C with the exception of Peter Sagan was garbage.Poor route,boring racing they couldnt even televise stage 2 (?) cos it rained a bit.T.O.C the 2nd most important race in Pro Cycling? go lie down son,oh and try to stay off the drugs!

You need quality to make a great race. Giro was a competitive race but it didn't have 5 of the 10 best GC riders, if not more.

 

[Barrus]

You need quality to make a great race. Giro was a competitive race but it didn't have 5 of the 10 best GC riders, if not more.

And you are saying ToC was a better race when it did have some GC riders and other big riders there, solely to take a holiday?

Curacao is than even more important than the ToC, the Giro and the Vuelta combined.
You first need a quality course, a quality competition (which the giro obviously had) and these riders need to be willing to race

 

[Horizon Deep]

Sagan,Mick Rogers,Dave Z and some of the smaller american teams (hats off to them) were the only ones racing.No one else seemed to care and if you want the 2nd biggest race in the world you gotta have the riders racing!

 

[Nick C.]

You need quality to make a great race. Giro was a competitive race but it didn't have 5 of the 10 best GC riders, if not more.

TOC sucked be honest. Any race that always comes down to time bonuses is not exactly A-list material. It was little more than a stepped up Tour Down Under.

 

[Oldman]

TOC sucked be honest. Any race that always comes down to time bonuses is not exactly A-list material. It was little more than a stepped up Tour Down Under.

It was worse than that...it was one, very long commercial.

 

[outrage9]

It was worse than that...it was one, very long commercial.

Good or bad, that is what it is going to take for cycling to succeed in America. Cycling is where NASCAR was 20 years ago and needs real companies that are household names to get, and stay, involved beyond 2 year deals or until the first doping case.

 

[Mellow Velo]

You need quality to make a great race. Giro was a competitive race but it didn't have 5 of the 10 best GC riders, if not more.

Didn't take you long to drop the facade of sensibility. This statement is complete c0ck.
The TOC was a wash out of a race, regardless of the fact that your hero was there......
.........for a while.
It was lost to much of the cycling world, due to the immensity of the Giro's all action extravaganza.

In short, The TOC may have had Mohammed, but the Giro had the mountains.

 

[dancing on pedals]

When did teams introduce the lead out train on climbs? I don't recall teams doing it pre LA - i think that changed the tour/sport significantly. My memory might be playing tricks on me here but i don't remember seeing any other teams do this until after LA started winning. Did Indurain do it? His tours are blanked out in my mind from the sheer overall tedium.

when did teams start using trains? You are joking of course, from the start of cycling the champions had helpers.
Francis and Henri won the Tour together in 1924 par example..
What was surprising was that Armstrong had so many helpers late in the stage. Then again many of Armstrongs helpers have falled foul to tougher testing regimes in recent years.(please discuss in the clinic how a team that looks like ice hockey players can lead the peloton up a mountain)
thanks

 

[slimkay]

Biffins, I wouldn't bother trying to discuss Lance's legacy here. Cycling fans (here) are even more bitter than F1 fans (towards Michael Schumacher). While Schumacher lied, cheated the worst possible ways (and was caught), Armstrong has never been caught. Thus, no proof of him being a cheater, liar. Thus, no reason to hate.

For the life of me, I can't understand where this hatred come from.

Sore losers, I guess..

 

[Race Radio]

Biffins, I wouldn't bother trying to discuss Lance's legacy here. Cycling fans (here) are even more bitter than F1 fans (towards Michael Schumacher). While Schumacher lied, cheated the worst possible ways (and was caught), Armstrong has never been caught. Thus, no proof of him being a cheater, liar. Thus, no reason to hate.

For the life of me, I can't understand where this hatred come from.

Sore losers, I guess..

http://nyvelocity.com/content/interviews/2009/michael-ashenden
Riiight

 

[clearhop]

ehhhh...In the Indurain and Pre Indurain era they tried and they did deliver their GC to the climbs..Having 1 or 2 team-mates was lucky though..On a true climb there would be 20 off the front...5 would not belong there and would pop. Of the 15 there might be a couple on the same team..Now a climb starts and there are 60 drilling it...Something different is happening here..Not sure if you want to be so eager to credit Lance Armstrong though.

I'm not "eagerly crediting", I'm asking a question - personally i think the "enhanced" lead outs have ruined climbing stages - we still have some good ones, but no where near as many as we used to have. I realise trying to answer a question like this objectively is frowned upon here - but that's all i'm trying to do.

In terms of pre-Indurain - they might well have delivered them there, but I always saw it as a more protective delivery, not an attacking delivery as it is now?

 

[SilentAssassin]

His legacy won't change. The investigation will be over and life goes on. Lance maintains his 7 TDF wins, and will always be considered the best the TDF, and the 2nd best cyclist to ever race, right behind Merckx

 

[clearhop]

when did teams start using trains? You are joking of course, from the start of cycling the champions had helpers.
Francis and Henri won the Tour together in 1924 par example..
What was surprising was that Armstrong had so many helpers late in the stage. Then again many of Armstrongs helpers have falled foul to tougher testing regimes in recent years.(please discuss in the clinic how a team that looks like ice hockey players can lead the peloton up a mountain)
thanks

If i was joking I'd have said "2 fish in a tank, one says to the other - how do you drive this thing anyway?".

As mentioned in my previous post - the delivery to mountains was always protective before, or certainly seemed it. Now it's attacking all the way. I'm not bothered about discussing the "why" he had some many helpers - that's for the clinic, but Astana managed it pretty well in the tour this year - Saxo bank did it pretty well as well.

I'm happy to be wrong about this btw, but in my opinion Armstrong put more riders on the front than before, and rode to lose riders, rather than getting the GC guy onto the mountain safely.

 

[SilentAssassin]

Biffins, I wouldn't bother trying to discuss Lance's legacy here. Cycling fans (here) are even more bitter than F1 fans (towards Michael Schumacher). While Schumacher lied, cheated the worst possible ways (and was caught), Armstrong has never been caught. Thus, no proof of him being a cheater, liar. Thus, no reason to hate.

For the life of me, I can't understand where this hatred come from.

Sore losers, I guess..

It's coming from the ringleader Lemond himself, who has been using forums as a vehicle to perpetuate Lance Hate. It really doesn't work though, I mean not many people go on forums.

Lemond is 2nd class to Armstrong for sure. I think Karma will eventually kill Lemond off, and then all his troll minions on various forums will also die with him.

 

[Franklin]

In all fairness, lance hasn't pioneered all these things, but he and Johan were the most single minded machine tying all of it together cycling has ever seen. The ones who come closest to this are Miguel Indurain and José Miguel Echavarri, but they covered all three GT's.

On recon.. we all poohpooh this, but as in all myths there is a ring of truth. When in 2003 Jan Ulrich had to prepare for the last decisive TT it was raining, so they went to recon it by car. They met Lance who was reconning by bike. Jan fell that TT and finished 1 minute behind Lance overall.

But all in all Lance only has one surefire legacy: He is the first cyclist to win the TdF seven times. That should be enough for anyone. All these myths and stuff... *shrug*.

 

[Mongol_Waaijer]

In all fairness, lance hasn't pioneered all these things, but he and Johan were the most single minded machine tying all of it together cycling has ever seen. The ones who come closest to this are Miguel Indurain and José Miguel Echavarri, but they covered all three GT's.

On recon.. we all poohpooh this, but as in all myths there is a ring of truth. When in 2003 Jan Ulrich had to prepare for the last decisive TT it was raining, so they went to recon it by car. They met Lance who was reconning by bike. Jan fell that TT and finished 1 minute behind Lance overall.

But all in all Lance only has one surefire legacy: He is the first cyclist to win the TdF seven times. That should be enough for anyone. All these myths and stuff... *shrug*.

In 2004 (I think) Ullrich beat Lance in the long TT. It was very hot, and lance warmed up on rollers outside, and started suffering in the heat before the TT even started.

Ullrich took his rollers into an air conditioned shop, and warmed up in much cooler conditions, and blitzed the course.

But of course Ullrich was too lazy to recon the climbs that year, and we now know that the way to win the tour was to recon the climbs, and at the top have Dr. Ferrari chack your body fat % for $800k a year.

 

[dancing on pedals]

If i was joking I'd have said "2 fish in a tank, one says to the other - how do you drive this thing anyway?".

As mentioned in my previous post - the delivery to mountains was always protective before, or certainly seemed it. Now it's attacking all the way. I'm not bothered about discussing the "why" he had some many helpers - that's for the clinic, but Astana managed it pretty well in the tour this year - Saxo bank did it pretty well as well.

I'm happy to be wrong about this btw, but in my opinion Armstrong put more riders on the front than before, and rode to lose riders, rather than getting the GC guy onto the mountain safely.

no if you were joking you would have said Two fish in a tank, one says to the other - you drive I'll man the guns.
Pity you missed the Indurain era - I think the 1991 one would illustrate how strong his teams were Pedro Delgado, Jean-François Bernard and Abelardo Rondon were all superb in the Alps while the Pyrennes was very much a clash of the titans - with Chiappucci and Indurain coming out on top.
One reason Indurain lost in 1996 was that he had a comparitively weak team esp when compared to the Telekom team several of whom have since admitted using EPO (Bölts, Zabel, Aldag and Riis).
I would say that a direct comparison between Astana 2010 team and Banesto 1991 would be fair (Contador/Indurain, Vinokourov/Delgado, Navarro/Bernard and Tiralongo/Rondon). Of course any comparison between eras and teams is pretty much subjective.
thanks