Outside Online on Lance Armstrong
Posted December 6th, 2005 in Race, The Desk, Dope
There’s a comprehensive chronology and examination by Joe Lindsey in Outside Online that looks at the high stakes legal and political challenges facing Lance Armstrong as he attempts to defend himself from ongoing allegations of a drug fuelled ride into history.
Knowing what’s at stake, there are four possible outcomes to Armstrong’s legal maneuvers: His lawsuits backfire, and, through the trials, perhaps more allegations of doping come forward; Armstrong loses on legal technicalities, and no further allegations come to light; he wins on narrow legal grounds, but new allegations arise in testimony; or, in the last scenario, Armstrong conclusively proves that he was libeled and is totally vindicated, and he can put these suspicions to rest and move on to the next chapter in his life, as a newlywed, a father, and a fundraiser for cancer-research programs.
For Armstrong, his reputation, his earning power, and the future success of the Lance Armstrong Foundation, which has raised more than $85 million on behalf of cancer survivors, may hinge on evidence unearthed by these trials. Forbes ranked him as the third-most-powerful athlete in the world in 2005, behind only Tiger Woods and Shaquille O’Neal, with earnings of approximately $28 million a year. Sports Illustrated has estimated that more than $17 million of his earnings come through endorsements, including his post-retirement agreements with Nike, Oakley, and Trek.
It’s an important read for anyone interested in LA and the tangled issue of drugs in cycling. However it’ll all probably end in a stalemate of sorts with mud sticking to everyone….the Lance Armstrong story is not over by a long shot, expect a couple more years of this.
What others have to say…
December 6th, 2005 at 10:07 am
True Tim, clearly though LA is a tough guy and is more than prepared to fight the good fight, yet I suppose now that he’s a corporate entity and no longer a cyclist as such, public relations imperatives means that he has no choice but to seek some kind of resolution to the allegations made against him.
As to your last question, I suspect that it is a bit of both, let’s face it LA and Bruyneel are people who left nothing to chance and were masters of specificity and team tactics.
It’s this aspect that cemenmts their place in cycling history as far as I’m concerned. If we assume that all things were equal on the doping front it’s clear that Postal/Discovery were the business as far as pure tour racing went.
Can someone provide a bit of a braindump for me on the Armstrong thing. What are they saying they detected in his system? Was it before his health issues cropped up or after?
I may be showing my ignorance here but what has always perplexed me about LA is that he would most certainly have needed some testosterone supplementation in the last few years and surely that must have come up somewhere.
For cyclists, I guess it’s more about the oxygen maximising performance enhancing gear than the traditional test supplements.
Hey Darp, you’re alive mate!
It’s alleged that Armstrong supplemented post illness and during his 1999 win with EPO, what is also really interesting about this incident is how the unnamed samples came to be identified as LA’s and then leaked.
Can you say intrigue, skullduggery and vendetta’s?
More interesting stuff to come that’s for sure.
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You are absolutely right; this is far from over and there is no clear answer for LA. It would appear that almost anything he does will be received with more negative press. Like him or not, believe he is clean or not, the guy has a very tough battle ahead of him.
Big question that has been batted around for a while; riders who were caught doping were unable to beat him, so what does that say about his wins? Was he simply the best doper in the peloton or does training hard and dedicating your entire existence to a single purpose actually work?
I have a feeling that the debate might never go away.
Tim Jackson- Masiguy