Tag: lancearmstrong

Reading list: Lance Armstrong

Reaction to USDA release
Lance Armstrong’s team ‘ran most sophisticated doping programme ever’ [Guardian] “”I was in the doghouse and… the only way forward with Armstrong’s team was to get fully on Dr Ferrari’s doping program,” said Vande Velde.”

Lance Armstrong: doping denials flushed away in Usada’s flood of detail [Guardian] “Vaughters says that Armstrong complained to him that (teammate) Celaya was much too conservative with the use of doping products.”

Details of Doping Scheme Paint Armstrong as Leader [New York Times] “Zabriskie, a five-time national time-trial champion, recalled serenading Johan Bruyneel, the longtime team manager, with a song about EPO, to the tune of Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Purple Haze’. “EPO all in my veins; Lately things just don’t seem the same; Actin’ funny, but I don’t know why; ’Scuse me while I pass this guy.”

Dark Turn in the Tale of a First Title [New York Times] Just before the 1999 Tour de France, a teammate pointed out that Lance Armstrong had a bruise on his upper arm caused by a syringe. According to a doping investigation, Armstrong cursed and said, “That’s not good.”

How Armstrong Beat Cycling’s Drug Tests [New York Times] “The most conventional way that the U.S. Postal riders beat what little out-of-competition testing there was, was to simply use their wits to avoid the testers,” the report concluded.

George Hincapie’s confession will hurt Lance Armstrong the most [The Independant] “Hincapie had already retired at the end of this season, but his confession is a bombshell that isolates Armstrong in his insistence of innocence to a point which is almost pitiful.”

INTERVIEW-Cycling-Perception will take time to change-Vaughters [Yahoo! News]


Raw data
The 200-page USDA ruling in full.

Infographic: Top Finishers of the Tour de France Tainted by Doping [New York Times]

A review of The Secret Race [Red Kite Prayer]


Flashback
Big interview: Donald McRae meets Lance Armstrong [Guardian, 2008]

Lance Armstrong Rides Again [Vanity Fair, 2008]

Say It Ain’t So, Lance [The New Yorker, 2011]

The Long Ride [The New Yorker, 2002]


If all this is too depressing
Some hipster-fixie types travel to Austin to ride with Lance

Riding with the Blue Train

Red Kite Prayer has part one of two guys’ story of training with the US Postal Service team in 2002 – this was @lancearmstrong’s ‘Blue Train‘ team at the start of his seven  tour titles.

No matter how long the ride was, there he was—at the front, leading his team. Headwind, tailwind, uphill and down, Lance set the pace and rode like a motorcycle. He lead some of the smoothest, fastest five hour rides of my life.

The hotel and surrounding resort community sit atop a steep, mile-long climb. This simple “driveway” served to bring already broken men (Bill and me) to a state of groveling at the end of each day’s training ride.

Links on Friday – Cycling

Lance Armstrong is the big story in this year’s tour – here he is battling it out on the Mount Ventoux moonscape with Matrco Pantini, before letting him cross the line first, giving Jan Ullrich ‘the look‘, and getting all narky at Paul Kimmage (while not *actually* answering the question)

Tour newbies would do well to track down Hell On Wheels, it’s a great intro to just what the hell is going on. Then watch  Breaking Away, the Footloose of Cycling films

If your collar bone is still unbroken after the London Alley Cat race, don’t push your luck on the track

Cycled to work a few times? Think you could have a go? Read an amateurs’ experience on the Alpe D’Huez, and ex-pro Kimmage taking on the incline. And here’s Duncan Deadball’s live report from France. sportreview = jealous

Lance Armstrong new bike pics

@lancearmstrong twittered his new bike:

More here, here and here.

A new Lance Armstrong bike release is usually accompanied by the kind of fanfare and careful media management a David Beckham fart attracts in the UK. But LA has simply taken a few snaps with his Blackberry and uploaded them into cyberspace himself. Having him on Twitter is awesome, his media handlers must be having kittens.