Lance Armstrong To Lose All Tour de France Medals...

[ArmorPierce]

So what do all those people that were doubting the accusations against him and doubting that there could be ways to circumvent the blood testing and such think now?

Cycling is far from the only sport that doping is prevelant. Bodybuilding is very guilty of it, both professional and the supposedly amateur level. The culture of denial is mind boggling (unless you're one of the steroid buddies) where people will deny deny deny and will stick up for other steroid users and deny their use as well. It's so prevalent that people have lost sight of what is actually realistically possible for most people to physically obtain with steroid using bodybuilders making random and supporting random claims of how they got there leading people astray. The biggest lie is the 'perfect diet' that these guys supposedly have. A good amount of these guys stuff their face with anything in sight but the steroids allow them just to turn it all to muscle.

[Crown]

Cycling is far from the only sport that doping is prevelant. Bodybuilding is very guilty of it, both professional and the supposedly amateur level. The culture of denial is mind boggling (unless you're one of the steroid buddies) where people will deny deny deny and will stick up for other steroid users and deny their use as well. It's so prevalent that people have lost sight of what is actually realistically possible for most people to physically obtain with steroid using bodybuilders making random and supporting random claims of how they got there leading people astray. The biggest lie is the 'perfect diet' that these guys supposedly have. A good amount of these guys stuff their face with anything in sight but the steroids allow them just to turn it all to muscle.

I'm confused about this; steroid use in Bodybuilding is an open secret. Why do you think there are 'Natural' titles that Mr Olympia winners aren't competing in?

I mean, I use bodybuilding in my analogy to explain my view on steroids in sports; if you're a bodybuilder and competing in the IFBB and not juicing up, you are gimping yourself. If you are a bodybuilder and competing in then WNBF and are juicing, you should be cast out as a cheat.

[mr friendly guy]

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wir ... c-18254583

J.J. Abrams to Produce Lance Armstrong Biopic

By CHRISTY LEMIRE AP Movie Critic
LOS ANGELES January 19, 2013 (AP)
He's already gotten the Oprah treatment. Now Lance Armstrong is headed for the silver screen.

Paramount Pictures and J.J. Abrams' production company, Bad Robot, are planning a biopic about the disgraced cyclist, a studio spokeswoman said Friday.


AP
FILE - In this Feb. 26, 2012 file photo,... View Full Caption
They've secured the rights to New York Times reporter Juliet Macur's upcoming book "Cycle of Lies: The Fall of Lance Armstrong," due out in June. Macur covered the seven-time Tour de France winner for over a decade.

No director, writer, star or start date have been set.

Armstrong is in the midst of a two-part interview with Oprah Winfrey in which he admits to using performance-enhancing drugs to reach his historic victories, something he'd defiantly denied for years. The International Olympic Committee stripped him of his 2000 bronze medal this week.

Well I was wondering how long until someone decides to make a television series / movie about this. Answer, not very long.

[ArmorPierce]

I'm confused about this; steroid use in Bodybuilding is an open secret. Why do you think there are 'Natural' titles that Mr Olympia winners aren't competing in?

I mean, I use bodybuilding in my analogy to explain my view on steroids in sports; if you're a bodybuilder and competing in the IFBB and not juicing up, you are gimping yourself. If you are a bodybuilder and competing in then WNBF and are juicing, you should be cast out as a cheat.

My understanding is that all the top guys and winners of these natural titles are steroid users that skirt around testing. The only difference is how much the steroids and other drugs are abused. I personally know of one guy who competes in these natural competition but actually dopes based on former gf attestation and I believe his seller named him (seller doesn't care about people knowing that he takes and sells to other individuals).

The problem is that bodybuilding is so riddled with drugs that people don't actually have an understanding of what the human body is actually naturally capable of.

I'll give you an example

http://www.muscleandstrength.com/articl ... rview.html

http://www.muscleandstrength.com/sites/ ... odyfat.jpg

This guy is a supposedly natural bodybuilder. He is equivalent to size to Arnold Schwarzenegger, who was considered the father of modern bodybuiding, amazingly genetically gifted, and a HUGE JUICE MONKEY... albeit amounts that seem small to what most of the professional guys do today.

The natural limit for the vast majority of people without steroids is probably around 170-180 pounds (with low body fat below 10%) is my guess. After that any additional strength gain would be correlated with large increases in fat.

[mr friendly guy]

So what do all those people that were doubting the accusations against him and doubting that there could be ways to circumvent the blood testing and such think now?

Cycling is far from the only sport that doping is prevelant. Bodybuilding is very guilty of it, both professional and the supposedly amateur level. The culture of denial is mind boggling (unless you're one of the steroid buddies) where people will deny deny deny and will stick up for other steroid users and deny their use as well. It's so prevalent that people have lost sight of what is actually realistically possible for most people to physically obtain with steroid using bodybuilders making random and supporting random claims of how they got there leading people astray. The biggest lie is the 'perfect diet' that these guys supposedly have. A good amount of these guys stuff their face with anything in sight but the steroids allow them just to turn it all to muscle.

here is an Australian piece mocking Armstrong by Tracey Holmes. Now read the comments.

Exactly. Drugs wont make you or me win at cycling. We have to already be suburb athletes and druges just give an edge which itself can only be exploited correctly by supurb athletes.

To me Lance is still a champion.

Tracey, not so much.

Actors, Pop Stars, musicians, Artists, Politicians, Scientists, Soldiers, You name it! All have done and are doing the same thing as this man on a push bike have done.
Are we going to ban all the music produced and all the performances. Remove all the famous paintings on the museums walls. Remove all the films produced...and so on and so on. Return all the Oscars and Nobel Prices...
This media frenzy about a one single cyclist will work in the opposite direction, it will promote the drug use. "Just look how you can reach the Stars" and the heaven of news media.
Close the case and forget it!

The fact still remains that this man survived a serious cancer and went on to success in spite of it.
Drugs don't create champions, they simply give an unfair edge to those with the talent and drive. Never forget that this man had the capacity within himself, and trained harder than most.
I have admired him for his achievements, and now feel that yet another icon has been shown to have feet of clay.
I don't like the vigilantism being currently displayed.
Tracey Holmes, well this is lightweight stuff isn't it. She was one of those who lionised this man, and now lines up with the other pathetic herd to get her kick in whilst he's on the ground.
Tracey is as a part of the problem. The media installs these people (mostly from a young age) as "role models" and then rips them apart because they fail to live up to the standards we set.
Lance is still a champion in my eyes, his achievements justify it. He's not my role model, he's not my hero, he was just good at riding a bike.

Yep, Lance can say - "Yeah I took drugs" and these guys would still say he is a champion, and make up some other excuse.

I'm still not sure why this is such a big deal. Why do we really care as much as we appear to about drugs in sport? It's just light entertainment afterall.

Lance hasn't let anyone down for his cheating, certainly his behaviour afterwards, but even that is understandable. He has simply become a PR issue for his sponsors because of the moral hypocrisy forced upon him by those wishing to see him succeed at all costs, so he can sell their product. If it wasn't him it would be, and has been, someone else.

Perhaps we should be a bit more realistic with our expectations of sportstars who offer little more than light entertainment.

I see they still didn't get the memo about Lance intimidating people who knew he was cheating, even when he admitted doing so on Oprah.

[amigocabal]

There is more to this sad saga.
Lance Armstrong describes lifetime ban as 'death penalty'

"When you see the punishment – I would go back and say you are trading my story for a six-month ban so I got a death penalty meaning I can't compete. I'm not saying that is unfair but it is different.

[aerius]

Way back when this started I hoped that cycling organizations were finally getting serious on doping, and not just making a token example of Lance. I still hope this is the case but when I start reading shit like this I'm not so sure anymore.

http://singletrackworld.com/2013/01/end ... g-scandal/

Enduro’s first doping scandal.

It had to happen – enduro gets its very own, Fisher Price-style, ‘my first doping scandal’.

The French cycling federation (FFC) have released a statement regarding a formal doping violation in an enduro event. (You can read it here via ffc.fr if your French is better than ours.)

It concerns an unnamed, French-licensed rider who tested positive for prohibited masking agent hydrochlorothiazide during the Megavalanche on Reunion Island in November 2011. The rider received a six-month suspension effective from 20th September 2012, so will be free to race again as of 20th March this year.

So a short ban which neatly ends just as the new season begins, for a rider who maintains their anonymity? Seems rather lenient to us but nothing about it is particularly surprising, either – with the bike industry’s hopes pinned on enduro as the saviour of racing (whether or not it actually needed rescuing in the first place), it was inevitable that doping would appear here, too. After all, even the brightest newest thing isn’t going to stay bright and new for very long when podium placings and sponsorship dollars are still the end game.

As your mum said when you got caught smoking outside the sixth form common room – we’re not angry, we’re just disappointed…

So to summarize. The rider got busted for a banned substance, and not only does he get to stay anonymous, he only gets a 6 month suspension which conveniently coincides with the sport's off season. Tell me, why the fuck wouldn't I dope if that's all that's going to happen?

If I keep seeing these types of stories come up, I'm going to be seriously pissed and disappointed. Because it would mean that cycling is as corrupt as ever and the various federations don't give a shit about running a clean & fair sport. And they pissed away a golden opportunity to fix it. And worse yet, it would mean the Lance apologists are right; they just went after him because he pissed off too many people and they needed to make an example of him.

[weemadando]

It needs to be pretty simple, we either accept that we can never stop it and cease all testing for anything ever.

Or we can have a requirement that all professional athletes pay a certain levy (.01% of their contract earnings would probably be more than enough across all athletes) to fund the expansion of an organisation like WADA to do multiple random tests on every athlete each year. Fail a test, fail to show up for a test, fail to pay your dues? Banned for life from all professional sports.

There's no acceptable middle-ground here given how endemic doping is and how pathetic and weak most penalties are.

[Alyeska]

It needs to be pretty simple, we either accept that we can never stop it and cease all testing for anything ever.

Or we can have a requirement that all professional athletes pay a certain levy (.01% of their contract earnings would probably be more than enough across all athletes) to fund the expansion of an organisation like WADA to do multiple random tests on every athlete each year. Fail a test, fail to show up for a test, fail to pay your dues? Banned for life from all professional sports.

There's no acceptable middle-ground here given how endemic doping is and how pathetic and weak most penalties are.

I would add another component. Sufficient sampling so that material can be retested well into the future so that athletes using hard to detect substances can't slide so easily.

[amigocabal]

So to summarize. The rider got busted for a banned substance, and not only does he get to stay anonymous, he only gets a 6 month suspension which conveniently coincides with the sport's off season. Tell me, why the fuck wouldn't I dope if that's all that's going to happen?

If I keep seeing these types of stories come up, I'm going to be seriously pissed and disappointed. Because it would mean that cycling is as corrupt as ever and the various federations don't give a shit about running a clean & fair sport. And they pissed away a golden opportunity to fix it. And worse yet, it would mean the Lance apologists are right; they just went after him because he pissed off too many people and they needed to make an example of him.

If that is how they will treat doping, why do they not just lift the rules against doping?

Having a rule against doping and failing to take appropriate action only breeds contempt for anti-doping rules, but other rules as well.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

There is more to this sad saga.
Lance Armstrong describes lifetime ban as 'death penalty'

"When you see the punishment – I would go back and say you are trading my story for a six-month ban so I got a death penalty meaning I can't compete. I'm not saying that is unfair but it is different.

This is the most infuriating part of it for me- he admits doping for years and years; the only thing that's dead is his reputation/career, which he's done a nice job of ruining all by himself. Stupid bastard!

[mr friendly guy]

Its not over yet.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-26/d ... th/4485610

US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) chief Travis Tygart says Lance Armstrong lied in his confessional interview with Oprah Winfrey, and the shamed cyclist has until February 6 to "cooperate fully" if he wants to lessen his life ban.

In an excerpt of an interview with CBS network to air in full on Sunday, Tygart said Armstrong lied about several key points - including his claim that he raced clean in his comeback in 2009 and 2010.

Tygart said he has written to the disgraced cyclist and offered him a deadline of February 6 to "cooperate fully and truthfully" in exchange for a possible lessening of his lifetime ban from sports.

"His blood tests in 2009, 2010 - expert reports based on the variation of his blood values from those tests [say it was a] one-to-a-million chance that it was due to something other than doping," he told 60 Minutes.

Armstrong admitted to doping during his seven Tour de France victories between 1999 and 2005, but told Winfrey he did not dope during his comeback in 2009 and 2010.

Tygart says Armstrong would lie about his comeback because under the statute of limitations for criminal fraud, he would still be open to prosecution for fraud.

Armstrong told Oprah that he deserved to be punished for doping but did not deserve a life ban, which he likened to a "death penalty".

"I am not saying that's unfair - I'm saying it is different," he told Winfrey.

"I deserve to be punished but I am not sure I deserve the death penalty.

"Would I love to run the Chicago marathon when I am 50? I would love to do that but I can't."

Tygart responded immediately after Armstrong's first confession aired last week, saying Armstrong had to testify under oath about his doping to have any hope of reducing his sanction.

"His admission that he doped throughout his career is a small step in the right direction," he said.

"But if he is sincere in his desire to correct his past mistakes, he will testify under oath about the full extent of his doping activities."

'Truth and reconciliation'

Cycling's world governing body says there is a need for a "truth and reconciliation" hearing following the Armstrong doping scandal, in a shift from its previous position.

International Cycling Union (UCI) president Pat McQuaid said after a hearing of an independent commission set up to examine the Armstrong affair that it wanted to work with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).

"We want a truth and reconciliation commission with WADA," he said, adding: "We cannot do it without them."

The independent commission meeting in London was forced to suspend its work until January 31 after it emerged the UCI had yet to submit a single document to the hearing.

Commission chairman Philip Otton, a former judge in England's Court of Appeal, said it was "with considerable reluctance" that he was suspending the hearing in the hope the adjournment would allow all those involved to reach agreement on an amnesty.

Last week WADA and USADA were among those who said they were withdrawing from the hearing because of the lack of an amnesty.

McQuaid said the governing body had taken note of those concerns.

"We have listened carefully to the views of WADA, USADA and cycling stakeholders and have decided that a truth and reconciliation process is the best way to examine the culture of doping in cycling in the past and to clear the air so that cycling can move forward."

So several people have noted Armstrong's account differs from what USADA accuses him of, and people have speculated its due to a statute of limitations strategy. Well USADA isn't having a bar of it and is calling Armstrong out to come clean on the other things such as him doping when he returned.

Of course Armstrong also denied being the ring leader in the interview, one of the more severe infractions he is accused of. For those who missed the interview, he phrased his answer in such a way to imply that he might have had the power to compel other riders to dope for the team, but he never really used that power. They chose to go along with it. USADA haven't asked him to come clean in this aspect, although Betsy Andreu did. I suspect this one is a little bit harder to prove, especially with the way Armstrong behaved. He could have used a veiled threat against the other riders, and depending on how he phrased it, it might be hard to say definitely he would have had the rider sacked if they didn't comply with his wishes.

[Scrib]

Well, he's caught between a rock and a hard place. He can't admit it without being liable and he can't not admit it without losing the (pipe-dream) chance of playing again.

I almost feel bad for him/

[Aaron MkII]

Does he need to? Other then for himself, I mean. Assuming he is already well off, he's probably looking at a lifetimes worth of speaking gigs (especially if he reinvents himself), book deals, tv interviews and other entertainment.

That's why I don't really feel bad for him. I don't care if he doped or not but he's got opportunities still, that most people will not get.

[Scrib]

I think that he'll need to come clean before he can reinvent himself. With this lie hanging over him I don't see him being as successful at speaking gigs. People like remorse, not someone you know is more or less going to lie to your face to avoid prosecution,

[Aaron MkII]

Yeah but I don’t expect that until he figures he can admit everything without getting charged.

[Scrib]

Which is not going to happen any time soon. And the longer it takes the more people will be aware of just how cynical his decisions were.