Armstrong charged and banned

[ufkacbln]

All of this comes to a single point which was shouted down previously.

With no legal trial in a court of law there was always going to be the possibility of the stalemate we have now.

There was an article at the start of all of this suggesting that Armstrong should simply refuse to play along with USADA

The Haters would still hate, the Fans would still be Fans and the ones who wanted unequivocal proof of the truth would still have to rely on the opinions and claims of the two extreme groups and their claims.

The present position does not do the Sport any good at all, and the longer it runs, the more the Sport will suffer.


This article is perhaps a fair summing up of the position of a journalist with a foot in neither camp:

There were no winners here, and a lot of losers.

 

[Crankarm]

$500 million Lance has raised for his Foundation to help the fight against cancer. This is where he says his work continues not fighting the "nonsense" allegations against him.

$500 million ...................... pretty impressive really.

 

[Crankarm]

It is. Nothing to do with him being the main proponent in a structural cheating ring though.

All this reminds me of the Stephen Lawrence enquiry somehow.

Errrr ..........how?

 

[albion]

albion, your posts are getting increasingly pointless.

And pointlessness quite sums up how the any real discussion has evolved.

That 'fingers in ears' posting also sums everything up nicely.

It would be worthwhile to abandon the discussion, at least until USADA releases all of its evidence.
Putting it all into the public domain is best all round.

 

[Crankarm]

And pointlessness quite sums up how the any real discussion has evolved.

That 'fingers in ears' posting also sums everything up nicely.

It would be worthwhile to abandon the discussion, at least until USADA releases all of its evidence.
Putting it all into the public domain is best all round.

For me the thing that makes USADA look like total clowns is that they gave LA a life time ban. The guy is 41 years old retired from Pro bike racing for several years save for his foray into triathlon. He doesn't need the money. If anything the ban is pure spite. How about when he made a comeback running the Shack, will his 2nd place finish in 2007 be expunged too?

 

[Red Light]

]This article is perhaps a fair summing up of the position of a journalist with a foot in neither camp:

That's no more neutral than the article SJ linked to IMO.

Anyway she misses out that the whole of the drugs testing industry were in on the Armstrong conspiracy and falsified all his results.

 

[Chuffy]

For me the thing that makes USADA look like total clowns is that they gave LA a life time ban. The guy is 41 years old retired from Pro bike racing for several years save for his foray into triathlon. He doesn't need the money. If anything the ban is pure spite. How about when he made a comeback running the Shack, will his 2nd place finish in 2007 be expunged too?

Quite right. Following the guidelines laid down by the WADA Code? Assclowns, they should be running a zoo, not cycling.

 

[thom]

For me the thing that makes USADA look like total clowns is that they gave LA a life time ban. The guy is 41 years old retired from Pro bike racing for several years save for his foray into triathlon. He doesn't need the money. If anything the ban is pure spite. How about when he made a comeback running the Shack, will his 2nd place finish in 2007 be expunged too?

The way I see it is Armstrong looks like a guy who'd prefer to live the rest of his life as the idol of a gullible minority rather than a man with some sense of humility as perceived by the rest of the world. In other words, a conman and a coward.
I think the UCI probably will look like clowns.
I think USADA pretty much look like the only ones with a backbone.

What kind of sanction do you think a guy should get if from a legal/quasi-legal point of view he has accepted charges that place him at the center of the most spectacular sporting fraud in history ?

To quote Paula Radcliffe on the matter "Drug cheats out".

 

[Alun]

What I find incredible is that Armstrong has been offered 5 of his TdF wins back.

Giving Armstrong a lifetime ban, is about as meaningful as banning Ullrich, 5 years after he had retired anyway, and then giving him another 3 TdF wins whilst he's still serving his 2 year ban. No wonder they've want to give them back to Armstrong!

 

[albion]

Any idea what 1704 is about? I'm baffled, unless he's replying to Ignored Member.

Sorry, I stupidly thought I was member 1704 and you had me on ignore.

Mr 4 books is that Walsh guy who has authored 4 books on Armstrong. He also paid Emma the masseur for her story.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/aug/26/lance-armstrong-doping-whistleblowers

 

[Chuffy]

What I find incredible is that Armstrong has been offered 5 of his TdF wins back. Giving Armstrong a lifetime ban, is about as meaningful as banning Ullrich, 5 years after he had retired anyway, and then giving him another 3 TdF wins whilst he's still serving his 2 year ban. No wonder they've want to give them back to Armstrong!

Had he cooperated with USADA (and he refused to do so, of his own volition) then he might well have been allowed to keep the wins that were outside of the statute of limitations. I suspect he'd still have been given a lifetime ban though. Of course, cooperation would mean throwing a lot of people under the bus so it's no wonder he felt too tired to do so. Personally it would have been better if he had cooperated, but a lifetime ban means he can't have anything to do with cycling. Remember when he and Verbruggen were planning to buy the TdF? He's where he belongs, well away from cycling. People like Crankarm don't get this...

 

[Chuffy]

Sorry, I stupidly thought I was member 1704 and you had me on ignore.

Mr 4 books is that Walsh guy who has authored 4 books on Armstrong. He also paid Emma the masseur for her story.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/aug/26/lance-armstrong-doping-whistleblowers

Oh, the guy who played a huge part in revealing all this stuff? The guy without whom little or none of this stuff would ever have come out? That guy?
And this would be Emma the masseuse who was paid (at her standard hourly business rate iirc) because she ended up spending so much time checking that what Walsh and Ballestre wrote from her interviews was accurate?

If you want to have a go at someone who deserves it, why not try Sally 'two books' Jenkins?

 

[smutchin]

That's no more neutral than the article SJ linked to IMO.

It's possibly the most idiotic piece I've read on this subject yet. This is what passes for journalism at the Washington Post? Egads.

Anyway she misses out that the whole of the drugs testing industry were in on the Armstrong conspiracy and falsified all his results.

On which subject, here's an interesting statement from Don Catlin in January this year in response to suggestions by Sports Illustrated that he was in on the conspiracy, specifically on his reasons for not providing certain test results when requested...
http://www.antidopingresearch.org/Catlin-Armstrong-Roberts-Sports Illustrated-p1.php

Sounds plausible to me - not quite the "highly unusual" scenario depicted in that cavalierfc piece. There's a lot of misleading reporting on both sides - it's just less of a story if Catlin didn't continue testing Lance for purely logistical reasons...

On the other hand, Catlin doesn't deny the old positive tests were Armstrong's. He only says he doesn't know one way or the other. Which seems fair enough.

So, who would be doing the covering up and why?

As they say in The Wire: follow the money.

Doctors do indeed risk their career by engaging in doping activities. If they get caught. If...

d.

 

[albion]

"What I find incredible is that Armstrong has been offered 5 of his TdF wins back"

So he could be another of their reformed characters I guess.
It is the very first time I have heard this.

 

[DogTired]

$500 million Lance has raised for his Foundation to help the fight against cancer. This is where he says his work continues not fighting the "nonsense" allegations against him.
$500 million ...................... pretty impressive really.

Its very impressive - but raising a load of money is not the same as doing worth with it. The Foundation sits on a pot of $110million yet in 2011 did not fund a single research grant. Quite incredible, that. It seems to produce reports to try and influence policy-makers. Yada.

It does spiffy stuff like this:
"LIVESTRONGTM at School - Offers a curriculum of online lessons for grades K–12 to help school professionals talk with students about cancer in a way that is age appropriate, inspiring and empowering."

Also, lots of other stuff about media impressions, Facebook 'likes', awareness courses etc. Its a bit odd, yep, it undoubtedly does some good but has a parochial view and I'd be interested in what the other $360million achieved.

If talking and 'awareness' cures cancer then this is definitely the right way to spend $470million.