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LeMond and Trek Settle

Looks like someone caved. Who knows what nastiness would have been brought in to a trial. For all you who had your doubts about Greg's willpower, here is your answer.

Just last week John Burke would have you believe Greg LeMond was a bike thief hell-bent on ruining Trek's pristine image. Today the song changed somewhat:

“Greg has a hard-won place in the Pantheon of bicycle racing, and we are proud of what we were able to accomplish together,” said Trek’s President John Burke. “Trek respects Greg’s efforts and commitment to the charitable foundation, 1in6.org, and Trek is pleased to lend its support to that very worthwhile endeavor.”

http://velocitynation.com/content/features/2010/lemondtrek-settle
 
Aug 13, 2009
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Given the overwhelming evidence of Trek's guilt and the judge's own questioning of the validity of what was left of their case Trek did the smart thing and finally quit their 8 year effort to smear Greg.

Nice to see the charity benefit. The check to Greg was certainly much bigger.
 
Am disappointed for my own selfish reasons. Would've loved to see Trek's dirty tricks out in the open. I accept that it was never going to come, but a public apology would also have been nice. Yeah, Greg has gone through hell, but this to me does not seem like the right resolution for him. Trek have gotten away lightly in my view - even allowing for the private settlement part which is no doubt very big. But if Greg is happy, I'm glad for the guy.
 
Aug 13, 2009
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BroDeal said:
I told you Lemond would settle. It always comes down to money.

Certainly Trek must have paid him a big sum but this is not always why people settle.

For years Trek has run a very aggressive campaign to smear Greg. Despite having no case Trek used every legal maneuver in the book to make sure Greg and his legal team worked their A$$'s off. There comes a time that the best thing to do is take a huge check and move on with your life. Despite what you see on TV trails are no fun.
 
Race Radio said:
Certainly Trek must have paid him a big sum but this is not always why people settle.

All it takes is a large check combined with the opportunity to put everything behind them and eliminate the risks of trial. No matter what people claim about doing it for principle, the sane ones always take the money.
 
Aug 13, 2009
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luckyboy said:
What was the story with this? I never really read up much on this. All I heard was that they accused him of stealing bikes..

Anyway, good for Greg

The stealing bikes part was an invention by Trek that was used to smear Greg. The judge recognized it was baseless and tossed it out along with most of Trek's case.

Trek was left with the the idea that Greg weakened the Trek brand by saying he was disspointed Lance was using Ferrari. The judge said that this part of the case was weak and he personally did not see it but would let it develop at trial.

Greg's side was that Trek stopped supporting the Lemond Bikes brand with years left on the agreement. He had plenty of evidence to support this so it was a no brainer for Trek to settle and give him a big check
 
Apr 9, 2009
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Certainly no surprise to see a settlement. We won't know the terms of the confidentiality provisions (which I'm sure are voluminous), but I wonder if there is anything that prevents Greg from speaking about Lance (or any Trek-sponsored rider) going forward?

Regardless, glad Greg can put this behind him, and the funding of 1in6 benefits society, not just the litigants.
 
Sep 25, 2009
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wasn't the key part that greg must keep his freedom of speaking out no matter the settlement? i wonder how that part concluded :confused:
edit: just saw an almost concurrent post by ken withthe same sentiment.
 
Feb 1, 2010
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Race Radio said:
The stealing bikes part was an invention by Trek that was used to smear Greg. The judge recognized it was baseless and tossed it out along with most of Trek's case.

Untrue.

First, no one ever claimed that Lemond "stole" bikes. Trek was obligated under contract to give Lemond 15 free bikes a year, and also allow him to purchase additional bikes at a discount. The contract also specified (explicitly or implicitly) how Lemond was allowed to use those bikes, basically for personal use.

Trek's claim was that Lemond went beyond personal use, and was selling these bikes for profit, undercutting Trek's own distribution chain.

The judge did NOT throw this out on the grounds that it never happened. It was thrown out because the judge said they basically waived this clause of the contract because they continued to provide him with free and discounted bikes. In other words, he ruled that if they had a problem with Lemond's contract fulfillment, they were obligated to withhold fulfilling their side of the contract.

So you can't claim that Trek simply invented this to smear Lemond. Maybe it was a specious argument on Trek's part. Or maybe the workers at the street level were unaware of Trek's legal interests and obligations. Or maybe both.
 
Aug 13, 2009
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The Crusher said:
Untrue.

First, no one ever claimed that Lemond "stole" bikes. Trek was obligated under contract to give Lemond 15 free bikes a year, and also allow him to purchase additional bikes at a discount. The contract also specified (explicitly or implicitly) how Lemond was allowed to use those bikes, basically for personal use.

Trek's claim was that Lemond went beyond personal use, and was selling these bikes for profit, undercutting Trek's own distribution chain.

The judge did NOT throw this out on the grounds that it never happened. It was thrown out because the judge said they basically waived this clause of the contract because they continued to provide him with free and discounted bikes. In other words, he ruled that if they had a problem with Lemond's contract fulfillment, they were obligated to withhold fulfilling their side of the contract.

So you can't claim that Trek simply invented this to smear Lemond. Maybe it was a specious argument on Trek's part. Or maybe the workers at the street level were unaware of Trek's legal interests and obligations. Or maybe both.

Hey look, Public Strategies is trying to spin their BS again. Trek certainly used it to smear Greg.

Armstrong's own words

This guy was getting bikes at a discount and selling them out of the back door of his garage. He was doing an end run around the dealers to the tune of two and a half million dollars

When a Trek employee, the employee that ran the program, gave a deposition that contradicted Trek's lie Trek then tried to hide the deposition until they were forced by the judge to submit it.

Trek went out of their way to smear Greg and their case fell apart in court. It is good to see they finally stopped the games.
 
Feb 1, 2010
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Race Radio said:
Hey look, Public Strategies is trying to spin their BS again. Trek certainly used it to smear Greg.

I simply read what you wrote, it didn't make sense, so I went to the source and read about what happened. It's not what you said, and I reported that here. If anyone is spinning BS to smear people, it would appear to be you.

Race Radio said:
When a Trek employee, the employee that ran the program, gave a deposition that contradicted Trek's lie Trek then tried to hide the deposition until they were forced by the judge to submit it.

Trek went out of their way to smear Greg and their case fell apart in court. It is good to see they finally stopped the games.

So where can I go to read about this detail to see if the facts match up with what you are telling us?

I'm also interested in your general theory here. What is Trek's corporate interest in smearing Greg Lemond?
 
Aug 13, 2009
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The Crusher said:
I simply read what you wrote, it didn't make sense, so I went to the source and read about what happened. It's not what you said, and I reported that here. If anyone is spinning BS to smear people, it would appear to be you.



So where can I go to read about this detail to see if the facts match up with what you are telling us?

I'm also interested in your general theory here. What is Trek's corporate interest in smearing Greg Lemond?



Trek was trying to keep Armstrong happy. The cranky baby wanted Greg to stop asking the same questions everyone in the sport was asking.

It is no surprise that Trek hired Armstrong friendly PR firm (located in the same building as Armstrong's CSE) Public Strategies to not only develop the "Smear Greg" Campaign but also the Powerpoint presentation they presented to the media. The fact that little of that Powerpoint held up in court didn't matter as their goal was to ruin the reputation of the guy who dared question the myth.
 
red_flanders said:
You don't really think someone who shows up posting today could have some kind of connection to the case do you? Someone who is quite well informed on the issue and splitting legal hairs?

That doesn't sound like a PR move at all. Nope. No way.

Yup. It's suspicious posters like that which convinces me that there is a decent chance that nutters like Carboncrank are paid trolls.
 
Yeah. I can't imagine what Trek's interest in smearing LeMond would be, seeing as how they were in a huge lawsuit with him, where they just obviously got pwned. In hindsight it must seem like Trek wasted a lot of time, effort and money smearing him.

They certainly lost me as a potential customer when this nonsense started.
 

flicker

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Aug 17, 2009
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I hope LeMond finds satisfaction in the pay-off.

I also hope he apologizes to Lances' ex-wife. Bringing the ex into the lawsuit showed no class on Gregs' part.
 
Jul 22, 2009
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flicker said:
I hope LeMond finds satisfaction in the pay-off.

I also hope he apologizes to Lances' ex-wife. Bringing the ex into the lawsuit showed no class on Gregs' part.

The funny part is all of the speculation regarding this will just go on. For all we know, Greg agreed to keep quiet going forward regarding anything Trek or it's brands because he knew he was crapping money away with a frivolous lawsuit.
 
scribe said:
The funny part is all of the speculation regarding this will just go on. For all we know, Greg agreed to keep quiet going forward regarding anything Trek or it's brands because he knew he was crapping money away with a frivolous lawsuit.

Yep, that's why Trek is paying off his charity in a big way and obviously paying him a ton more. Because it was frivolous.
 
May 18, 2009
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I sure do remember alot of you saying on that other thread GL wouldn't settle, it was about principal and he was gonna take Trek down, etc. I need to go back and read it so I know who to fark with. :D

If it was all about principal and it was such a slam-dunk case against Trek, then why settle?
 
May 18, 2009
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red_flanders said:
Yep, that's why Trek is paying off his charity in a big way and obviously paying him a ton more. Because it was frivolous.

He would have won alot more if he had won in court. So why settle a slam dunk case?
 
ChrisE said:
He would have won alot more if he had won in court. So why settle a slam dunk case?

I missed where I called it a slam dunk case. I simply mocked the idea that it was frivolous. Fairly different. Strawman much?

If you're going to get paid a large sum for your incurred losses, why go to court and incur more loss? Obviously no one wanted to go to court. There are a lot of ways that makes sense. That the lawsuit was frivolous isn't one of them.
 

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