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dope or no dope?

  • yup, he did.

    Votes: 6 27.3%
  • nope, he's cool.

    Votes: 4 18.2%
  • he did, but he beat the system

    Votes: 4 18.2%
  • don't care

    Votes: 4 18.2%
  • do care, but don't know

    Votes: 4 18.2%
101 - 120 of 394 Posts
Hmmm, didn't know that. Horrible how the cancer spread. I wonder if his physical state helped him survive. I think lesser, or older men, would have succumbed.
 
Discussion starter · #103 ·
you didn't know that about Lance? Haven't you seen those yellow 'livestrong' bracelets all over heck and back?

Maybe being in Texas helps, but I've seen those bracelets go global.
 
No, I haven't seen them and bike racing interest is almost non-existent here. And I don't pay attention to coloured "cause" bracelets since there are so many any one colour gets lost in the crowd.
 
Discussion starter · #105 ·
True. But.....they were the 'first' sport bracelet. And its also not confined to bikes. Ive seen them on about three quarters of f1 drivers at some point in time.
 
graydon carter (editorial / vanity fair 09/2012 issue) has a point:

Surrounded as we are these days by financial malfeasance on such an epic scale, the amount of time and money spend hunting down the facts as to whether...Roger Clemens and... Lance Armstrong took performance-enhancing drugs to gain an edge is something of a mystery. When an actor gives a cocaine-fueled, Oscar-winning performance, do we take his award away? Do we reclaim a singer's Grammy, or put an asterisk after it in the record books, when we discover that he was ramped up on illegal substances? Why all the outrage over athletes?...The [clemen's] case consumed more than two years of federal prosecutors' time, cost the government an estimated $2 million to $3 million...
assuming athletes are being held to different standards than entertainers (which could be biased), & while not condoning the performance boosts, lance shouldn't be stripped of his accomplishments.. unless someone decides to produce some type of evidence proving every single rider in the all competitions didn't have some type of chemical edge either.
 
Entertainment (the arts) are vastly different from sports. Sports is an environment where one competes in a very physical sense against others for top honours. Back in 1988 I lost faith in sports when Ben Johnson was stripped of his gold medal. From that point on I could never trust that an athlete won his honours fairly. It's like cheating out an ace in solitaire. It leaves an empty feeling. If Jimi Hendrix was whacked out all the time it does not detract from what he accomplished. His art came from within, not from any drug.
 
i agree the talent comes from within.. but where do you draw the line? i can focus more clearly & move faster when i drink coffee & tea (too much & that's a problem). so i'm enhancing my activities with the drug caffeine. if i was, say, a tennis pro, i'd probably drink coffee & tea too. would that make me an un-pure, dishonest athlete?

i don't think taking hormone-laden substances (or whatever these sports drugs are) is healthy or wise. but the basic principle of taking a substance to improve performance does seem to be over-scandalized with armstrong. i felt disappointed with him when this subject came up before, but i changed my mind. lance should be given a little slack, in the form of not stripping away every single blessed thing he did.

if they can't level the playing field to keep everyone off all these myriad substances, nor use the honour system, then they'll have to change the rules. it looks like the rules were already changed by the athletes themselves, whether anyone likes it or not..

i've got to hit the pillow, or i'll be brewing 2 carafes of coffee in the morning..!
have a goodnight :)
 
My point is that in sports you can cheat, as Ben Johnson did, and set a world record unfairly but when it comes to something like music it is not a competition! You either like the song or you do not. I have composed music, as has my good friend, under the influence of substances and also perfectly sober and if I played samples of both I bet my next paycheque that you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. But if an athlete shows up at a track meet suddenly muscle bound and shaves two tenths off the world record warning bells would go off immediately, as they did for me in '88.
 
Finally having nailed Armstrong down now isn't over scandalizing since drinking large amounts of coffee is not what he's has been found guilty of. As such, the equation sucks.

One can snort at the hypocrisy of an industry where it would be more honest to just make the taking of substances legal, but illegal by international cycling sports rules it remains.

Probably not thru taking the moral high road on cheating but more from the realization that there's a limit to what spectatorship will take, before turning completely away in disgust and thus depriving the sports industry of revenue.

I used to love watching Le Tour until it became abundantly clear that performances shown, and not just by Armstrong, were outside the realm of the humanly possible. Consequently I feel total disgust for the practice of banning a so called sportsperson (once found guilty) merely for a limited time span. These cheats have no place in what is still deemed sport and should be precluded forever and in every category, Olympics certainly included. In that the USADA is to be applauded and far more than the nilly willy world UCI or some of the other national (cyclist and other) organizations.

In fact it would benefit the whole sports concept, if the accompanying teams were banned alongside for at least up to and over the next event, in the case of Olympics for MORE than 4 years.

Otherwise the lying, cheating and prevarication will continue and the swamp remain damp.
 
The poll needs an additional category:

He did but the system works at least in parts. And thus got him.
 
Entertainment (the arts) are vastly different from sports. Sports is an environment where one competes in a very physical sense against others for top honours. Back in 1988 I lost faith in sports when Ben Johnson was stripped of his gold medal. From that point on I could never trust that an athlete won his honours fairly. It's like cheating out an ace in solitaire. It leaves an empty feeling. If Jimi Hendrix was whacked out all the time it does not detract from what he accomplished. His art came from within, not from any drug.
:up:
 
I still "don't care".
 
Discussion starter · #116 ·
Finally having nailed Armstrong down now isn't over scandalizing since drinking large amounts of coffee is not what he's has been found guilty of. As such, the equation sucks.
Last I checked, El Buffo, he's not been found guilty of anything. He got sick of the witchhunt and decided to move on with his life. It was heading for arbitration, which, in this case, is ludicrous.

furthermore, pretty sure the USADA doesn't have the authority to take his titles; not 100% certain, but I think it has to be the international cycling body.
 
Last I checked, El Buffo, he's not been found guilty of anything.
He's been found guilty of doping.
He got sick of the witchhunt and decided to move on with his life.
I'm not surprised:rolleyes: but what makes working on testimony of witnesses a witchhunt?
It was heading for arbitration, which, in this case, is ludicrous.
Aw heck, you know what hearings are about. He wasn't going to walk away from one unscathed. So he proudly proclaims he ain't going to participate. Yikes, Tim, that was the only way for him of getting a half win, at least morally speaking (if you'll forgive me using that term in this context). "This court (association) is unfair and conducting a witch hunt so I don't recognize its validity and won't defend myself anymore."

If, in the face of evidence presented by your ex colleagues, you don't go out there and challenge them as liars, providing substantiation, how are you gonna make anyone with half a brain believe that their evidence is false? Simply stating that there is no physical evidence and then telling them all to fly a kite is not sufficient. We know there is no physical evidence and that isn't the point. Witnesses count for something.

Years' old test samples, later on when detection methods had become more sophisticated, did indeed show traces of EPO but by UCI regulations the whole thing had expired by then

But nice work if you can get it.

That way you can maintain your innocence to all that still support you and die in the feeling that you're still the champ but try that one in real criminal proceedings.:rolleyes:
furthermore, pretty sure the USADA doesn't have the authority to take his titles; not 100% certain, but I think it has to be the international cycling body.
correct, they (USADA) don't and they (UCI) do.

The latter having applied to USADA to supply its findings and reasoning. So there's still hope, the UCI being as corrupt as the whole darn industry, even if in this case that will only be used to show how they can never be wrong. :rolleyes:
 
Discussion starter · #118 ·
who found him guilty?

The man has been tested over 500 times, never tested positive. He's the most tested athlete in history, not one positive test. He just got sick of the crap he and his family were going through, and I cannot say I blame him.
 
who found him guilty?

The man has been tested over 500 times, never tested positive. He's the most tested athlete in history, not one positive test. He just got sick of the crap he and his family were going through, and I cannot say I blame him.
:up:

That tends to be what I see also.
 
Discussion starter · #120 ·
I think the majority of people out there feel this way. Indurain himself stated he feels that Lance should keep his titles. Plus there was quite a spike at his charity sites in both donations and memberships........
 
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