Dear Bobby,
"I would like to preface this statement, by saying that while I don't expect all of you to believe some of the things that I am about to say,"
you're right!
"I don't want to insult anyone’s intelligence any longer"
hmm...I sense my intelligence is about to soon be insulted...
"I made the decision to use EPO several times from August 1996 until July of 1998"
WOW! what's next, the earth isn't actually flat?? Anyway, go on...
"During the 1998 Tour, my fiancé (now wife) found out what was going on from another rider's wife. She confronted me on it and it was one of the most dreadful experiences of my life. She was never a part of this and I put her in a very difficult situation. She told me right then and there that if it ever happened again, our relationship would be over. That was motivation enough and I knew I had to stop."
I can see that. You started sucking pretty badly right after that race.
"My return to the top level of the sport coincided with signing at Team CSC in 2004 and I want to briefly explain my side of the story"
hmmmm....why do I feel you're about to renege on that earlier promise??
"At no time was I offered or did I receive any sort of blood manipulation nor did I witness any systematic doping within the team. I found that I could compete without it and my results during that period were achieved clean."
let me quickly put this into "googletranslate.BS" and see what comes out:
"I really don't want my wife to kill me, lose my Olympic medal or be completely ostracized from working in the sport. Living in the real world would totally SUCK!".
OK, that's better. I hear ya.
"I know I cannot change my past, however, I do wish to remain in the sport of cycling in some capacity. I love it with all my heart and I hope that even though I made some poor decisions a long time ago, that I can continue to help contribute to the positive changes in this sport"
Do you, really?? I mean, like really really?? or do you just love having a job in cycling? Because from where I'm sitting, the latter really seems to be the case.
Bobby, I know you're reading this, so I'm gonna make it simple: either you're the most talented guy to ride a bike, probably EVER, or the drugs don't actually work that well. This is evidenced by the 2004 Olympic TT, the Paris Nice and Criterium International wins and some other results, against some absolutely top-fueled competition. If you got those results clean, then you should be very, very angry--because you would have won several Grand Tours with that sort of ability...because I KNOW that the doping methods available at the time were and are extremely effective. Or, that leaves us with one other option: that you're not being truthful.
So, help me out here and try to explain to me where I've fallen off of logic bus here? I'll be waiting.