Lance Armstrong on the argument that the 2025 Tour de France route doesn't favor Tadej Pogacar: "It's the Tour and 99 times out of 100 the best one wins"

I think you missed quite a few in your brief history. For example, Cadel Evans who not only won the tour but was frequently identified as top non-doper during the days of Lance by het Nieuwsblad's careful analysis of who would have won had Lance & co. not cheated? Some years it was a rider who shares the podium, other years they had to go fairly deep into the top ten to identify a rider who never has a question mark, but there were riders who were clean. Quit a few. You do realize in your biased sweeping view of history that you are accusing Bartali of doping?! I think it's interesting that you included Erik de Vlaeminck in the list. He was an interesting case that intersects with the mental health issues cyclists face and which can easily be amplified by doping, which at the time was amphetamines not genetically engineered cancer drugs, but were ubiquitous in European culture not just sport. In the zeitgeist of the maschinenmensch and better living through chemistry, amphetamines were a defining drug of the early 20th century that fueled both world wars and could be bought without prescription in Europe up until fairly recently. It wasn't shocking for a coach to give aspiring children amphetamines as part of their training regime just as it was common for children to be able to purchase and consume alcohol. However, we've come to understand and change societal norms for the better. Back to Erik. His was a shocking case that started people questioning the cultural relationship with drugs and what it can do to people if you feed it to children like candy. For those with ADHD it can be very helpful, but for people with slightly different genetics, such as Erik, it can lead to psychosis. If you examine his history, EdV was a great cyclist in many ways despite doping not because of it. Erik was spared the early grave that was his destiny, by Dr. de Joenkherre, who worked with him and other cyclists ravaged by drug abuse and showed there was another way to cultivate the confidence needed to win without being a junkie. This change of thinking is glacial and a difficult metaphor to extend in a time of global warming. This doesn't mean we have to surrender to an inevitable world of children being groomed to be junkie zombies who'd inject vitamin C into their eyeballs for a win just because Bruyneel, Armstrong, Wiggo or whomever claimed 'marginal gains'. Research into placebos strongly contradicts the claimed invincibility purchased in doping. Unfortunately, more people have a vested interest in the dope industry and perpetuating the myth to sell their wares to a fabricated market of gullible marks. It's not to surprising to see the Lance program adopted by the silicon valley pseudo-intelligensia. If you look at all the time and energy dopers waste doping those claimed margins go down the toilet of late night drops, secret hotel rooms, fraudulent doctors, threatening competitors, bribing officials, insurance fraud, and endless drug fueled carousing for the next hit, the next iconic LA FedEx ruffie relationship... Cutting that shite out, there's your marginal gains. It's easy to point out the dopers and cheats and see their extremes as norms. But don't let the easy heat scores allow you to surrender the glacier. Celebrate the clean riders. To quote a song from the 80's -- Inhale Einstein, Exhale Hitler... or in this case Inhale Bartali, exhale Coppi. My advice, listen to Cadel, hospitalize Lance. There will always be junkies, but their achievements should not be confused with sport or actual achievement and instead seen as mental and physical health issues. The real marginal gains I'm seeing is a growing abstinence from alcohol, better training methodologies and bio passports. We can evolve, but not if we continue to ignore the fact that cycling is supposed to be healthy and sport is a celebration of our humanity. It's easy to point out cheaters and make a false analogy that everyone who wins cheats or that everyone who cheats wins. Neither is true. Most people who doped are out good money that should have been spent on psychiatric care and quite a few dopers end up far worse off than better. We need to see doping for what it is: a serious mental health issue more likely to rob potential than deliver. The argument your making is merely the justification for the uniquely human pressing need to jump off the proverbial bridge. Mass suicide. You can't admire doped 'wins' without acknowledging the people mentored in Lance's mandated doping who had their lives destroyed, actually fucking died, or will die as a result. It kinda takes the edge off. Lance is a parriah backed by advertising driven junk science from an obscured network of the financially motivated. He cornered the high tech placebo market stealing drugs from cancer patients and very likely profited from this monopoly in meeting the demand he created. He didn't act alone and likely hasn't stopped given how his practices have been adopted in the greener pastures of the lucrative tech bros biopassport-free world he's moved. I don't find it a coincidence they have now embraced his ways and how it is glorified in the press as life extending. It's quite concerning. I imagine it's a rather lucrative market in young kids raised to believe in their exceptionalism and now expected to work 80 hours a week while expecting to live forever. The really sad irony of it being that if karma is real, people like them come back as themselves which has to be the worst imaginable hell. Well, aside from the hell waiting for those who slander Gino Bartali. You don't want to go there.

LOL - Hi Lance

Ha, maybe from a newcomer American pov, the TdF never needed anyone like him to be or stay popular. As for his legacy, apart from the TdF, what amazing « performance » did he ever impress the world with? Even in his known doped period his results outside the Tour are weirdly uninpressive. In any case bizarrely little for someone who managed to win the TdF so easily and often. Madoff and so many others also filled a lot of coffers until their house of cards came crumbling down. Why is it people like you focus on what they brought to those who gained something without any merit whilst ignoring all those who lost (probably a lot for some) through someone else’s misdeeds? Shall we start praising the guys coming to rob your home tonight too? Some no doubt will also gain from that, many kind of or completely unknowingly.

Right as Heaven's Gate.

That's pathetic🤦‍♂️

Also they tend to be wrong.

Please go. You and the rest of the crowd that makes these posts are more bothersome than the articles about Lance.

I mean, if that's what you want to look at in your private time that's on you! Not sure this is the right forum for that kind of thing though...

There's no evidence that they are ex-dopers. Given their level of hubris, I would wager they're all just one spectacular 99 Francs car crash away from finally entering AA on advice from their legal team and PR firm.

Clearly 7 won by the best rider. Like him or not Armstrong beat other doped guys. Which means it was pretty equal. However, not all of them broke a frame and won, got caught up in a feed bag and managed to make it to the finish in 1 piece and last bunnyhopped a ditch into a drainage ditch, ride through the grass and stay calm and cool. His bike handling skills should not be questioned. He was the best rider in the race. Had none of them doped he probably would have still won. Drugs didn't change his style, cancer did. It made him lighter and willing to expand his mind on cadence and food during a TDF. And it worked. I know they still dope so I personally don't care if they they did or didn't anymore. I just like to see a good race