Monthly Archives: February 2014

Lance Armstrong – Another Divisive Subject

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I wasn’t all that pleased with my ability to write down my thoughts on talking to Lance yesterday. I have a ton of opposite and contrary views floating around in my brain and trying to be unbiased on any subject is not something that I’ve ever especially been good at.

I think my views on many subjects are strong. And as strong as my views are, I was really surprised to see how venomous some of the comments on yesterday’s post are. I guess Lance is just one of those subjects that people have a real strong opinion about.

If you’ve read some other of my posts on the doping issue, you’d realize that I don’t have much of a tolerance for the whole thing. And, of course, I’m outraged by the whole polluted mess.

I’m sick of these guys justifying why they did what they did. I can’t believe the audacity of these guys to actually believe that they were the chosen few. All these guys act like they were the best before taking drugs and that they would have been the best anyway, and that it just made for an even playing field. That is completely delusional. I’ve personally witnessed many riders going from being pack filler, at a domestic level, to bringing in 100’s of thousands of dollars in salary. Many of the current pros that doped, then miraculously quit doping all at the same time, were those very people. Young guys that didn’t pay their dues in the sport, and jumped past a ton of guys that were doing it the right way. It is screwed up on a multitude of levels.

Yeah, some of my views are because I’m pissed off personally. These guys screwed up a good part of my career in the sport. I don’t race bicycles for money. I race bicycles because of the lifestyle and life experiences the sport offers. When I can’t get those life experiences because some hack has stolen from me, for sure, I’m angry.

My views have always been that the rules are not strict enough. Lifetime bans for high potency drugs. Lifetime bans for the enablers. Repayment of salaries and prize money for all involved. Draconian punishments for the foreseeable future in the sport. If there is a way to make drug usage in sports a crime in the United States, then I think criminal punishment should be included also, but that is going to take a long while.

But, none of these punishments have been in place. When Lance first started his career, back in the early 90’s, I’m pretty sure that it was less than a month suspension for a doping positive. The Festina guys only got 6 months in 1997. It is only been since around 2000, that USADA, WADA and the rest of the drug enforcement part of sports have even existed.

Lance has got me thinking a lot about what is fair and what is cheating. Breaking the rules by doping is more than cheating, in my book.

It’s not like you know the speed on the interstate is 65 mph and if you drive faster, you know what the penalty is. I usually drive over the posted speed limit on divided highways. In Kansas, the law is that if you drive 10 or less over the posted limited, then it is classified as a non-moving violation on your license. Same as a muffler violation. I drive a lot and feel that the risk of breaking that law is worth the penalty.

But, fairness is another issue. And maybe Lance thought of doping the same way. He weighed the risks and the rewards and deemed the rewards outweighed the risks, by a large margin, so justified the actions. I can understand this. He doesn’t take into account the effect on other people’s lives at this point, he is just thinking about breaking the rules and the ramifications.

So, when Lance feels he is caught doing the exact same thing as these other guys and gets a death sentence, a lifetime ban, and USADA offers many of the guys that testified “against” him zero, yes, absolute nothing as a penalty, then I can understand why he feels the system is unjust and broken. He’s looking at it from a personal perspective, just as I’m looking at it from mine. Lance can’t really address a lot of what he’s done, because he’s in an indefensible position, so he is going to have to latch on the the unfairness of it.

And I agree, it isn’t fair. Many people are so mad at Lance for his lying, manipulation, and all the other things that make us view him as morally unacceptable, they never get past it. We think that he deserves his lifetime ban because of a long list of things he’s done that repulse us so, that we have no sympathy. But, there isn’t a rule in cycling for being an arrogant prick. Absolutely no suspension for it.

We also think that Lance deserves a lifetime ban because of what he attained through doping. He got the most and should fall the hardest. He won 7 Tours and made a gazillion dollars. But again, there isn’t a rule that says you get a harsher penalty because you are better at doping than the other guys.

And he was better at doping than the other guys. He was smarter at it, had more options at his disposal and thought it through a lot more than many others. But again, if you look at the rules, they aren’t any different for Lance than they are for an individual guy like Dewey Dickie.

Lance got the book thrown at him for many reasons. USADA says it is because he failed to come in and testify. But, in the US, when we are charged criminally, we have the right, through the 5th amendment, to not testify against ourselves. Protection against compelled self-incrimination is implicit in the Miranda rights, which protects the “right to remain silent.” I understand that doping in sports, isn’t the same as our criminal system, but I do think that we, as individuals, should have the ability to not incriminate ourselves by keeping our mouths shut.

And the statute of limitations deal is another one of Lance’s sore spots. He wonders how he “lost” all his Tour titles when the majority of them fall outside time frame of the statute of limitations of the sport. Seems like a valid point.

Don’t get me wrong here, I don’t think that Lance got a harsh penalty. I think these other guys got gifts. But, I don’t like unfairness any more that the next guy. I can now look at it from Lance’s point of view and think, wow, what a fucked up system?

I, personally, want a fair system. A system that really discourages athletes from doping. An unfair system isn’t going to do that. Unfair systems encourage people to break the rules.

As you can tell, I have been yin-yanging back an forth about a multitude of things concerning his call. He has his points. And I can’t blame him for trying to do what he thinks is best for him, at this point. I don’t really have any idea what is best for Lance.

I told him that I don’t think that throwing rocks at each other will help anybody here. And that is what I thought George was doing with Frankie, throwing rocks for no reason, which I think is what precipitated the call in the first place.

Okay, that is why I got up early this morning. For me, it isn’t worth losing sleep over, and I did. After reading all the harsh comments, my views are more screwed up and it was just bugging me.

Angel and devil copy

Early Season Form Uncertainty

This entry was posted in Comments about Cycling on by .

I was talking to Catherine Walberg before she left Topeka and headed back to Seattle. She got in 3 pretty good rides with us here in Topeka, but is worried that she is behind, even though it is just mid-February. I think it is strange how we now judge our form and dedication to the sport because of what we now know others are doing at the same time. I blame, or credit, media for this phenomenon. I think it is more of a hindrance than a tool, this comparing what we are doing to what others are.

Don’t get me wrong here, I think there are valid reasons to research how others train, trying to allow ourselves to progress forward in the sport. But the day to day competition that athletes are doing in training, really isn’t a great way for anyone to control his form, thus get to an ultimate goal.

This time of the year, the weather controls most of what a lot of us can do training. That, and of course, the amount of daylight. I’m a big fan of the moving up of daylight saving time in the spring and back in the fall. The more useable hours of the day of daylight is a good thing for people who like to spend their extra time outside.

The more I use a power meter, the important I believe its information is to me. I don’t sit there and stare at my Garmin all day, but I do look at the Power curve number on Strava and compare those numbers to previous rides I’ve done. I don’t do much structured training, so I am not comparing workout to workout, but I do think that general numbers do indicate a positive trend upward in fitness or a negative trend.

I try to get fit and then do races when I think I have good form. I try to get to the best race I can when I think I’m riding well. Of course there are many, many times when an important race falls during a time when I’m riding like shit. That seems to be happening more often nowadays, but we all hope to avoid those days as well as we can. But, I have been surprised many a time, when I think I’m riding very poorly and have a stellar race.

I’m still on the fence about racing up here, a local training criterium, the Spring Fling, on Saturday and then the season opener road race, Frozen Toes, in Columbia Missouri, or heading down to Austin and doing Walberg Road Race and Pace Bend. My recent historic races have been in Texas. There are more riders down there and the field is a higher quality. But, there is the 10 hour drive each way. If I went to Texas, I’d probably feel obligated staying there next week and then race the next weekend.

The next weekend would be a quandary. If my formed improved, I’d like to do the Mellow Johnny’s MTB race. I haven’t done a big MTB race in a long while and would like to get back into it a little again. I’m just not sure I’m anywhere near the form to do something as intense as that. These MTB races have gotten so short, under and hour and a half, that I have to imagine that the effort is closer to a hard cyclocross than a “normal” MTB race. Plus, I haven’t ridden a MTB bike in months, so I’d have to spend some time on it before. There are always the Lago Vista road races the same weekend, which are very hard, and fun, races.

I’ve been riding alright the last two weeks. Yesterday I got in 108 miles. It was really about a 95 mile ride, but Bill and I had to do some junk miles to get to 100. Then I just kept going until it was really dark, so got in another half hour. I felt pretty unbelievably good for riding in the wind for that long. We road back from Lawrence on gravel, which was harder, but kept us out of a stiff headwind.

I’ve been using a foam roller to try to help my left leg work better. The area where I had shingles a few months ago isn’t back up to speed yet and I think it is helping. At least I seem to have more power than before. I like to use new techniques, but am a little lazy when it comes to doing them on a daily basis.

Okay, I’d like to get some good miles in again today. It is only going to be in the 40’s, and windy of course, but it is supposed to be raining/snowing tomorrow, so I guess I’ll rest then.

Early season is just that, early season. Don’t stress about keeping up with others, do what your lifestyle allows. One of the coolest thing about our sport is that there is always another weekend, another month to race, so if you can’t participate now, there is always tomorrow.

The gravel road back from Lawrence to Topeka was in pretty bad shape the first half. We were on our road bikes, sans extra tubes and air, so we were riding gingerly.

The gravel road back from Lawrence to Topeka was in pretty bad shape the first half. We were on our road bikes, sans extra tubes and air, so we were riding gingerly.