THE CASE AGAINST LANCE ARMSTRONG

In my never ending quest to besmirch the reputation of one of the great stories in the history of sport, I direct you to this

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/more/01/18/lance.armstrong/index.html?xid=cnnbin&hpt=Sbin

From the summary in the article it seems like an awful lot of smoke, but no indisputable fire that I can see.

Bicycling has been, for the past two decades the dirtiest of sports. There literally hasn't been a single top rider who hasn't been caught using SOMETHING, except Armstrong.

Here's the question that troubles me.

Given the context that everyone else is using, how likely is it that one guy is better clean than everyone else dirty for seven consecutive years?

It beggars belief.

You got to be in denial to not think he hasn't taken some kind of shit through his career.

I'm at the point where, if they are all taking shit, who realy gives a fuck. Especialy when you know that all the people you are competing against are using some kind of junk to get an edge

You have my brother's attitude. He says "I don't care if they die at 30, I want to see a 110 mph fastball, an 8.5 hundred and a 700 pound clean and jerk."

It really is too bad though that sport is morphing from something where values were affirmed to what is in many ways now an engineering contest.

GrantZilla wrote:You got to be in denial to not think he hasn't taken some kind of shit through his career.

I'm at the point where, if they are all taking shit, who realy gives a fuck. Especialy when you know that all the people you are competing against are using some kind of junk to get an edge

You have my brother's attitude. He says "I don't care if they die at 30, I want to see a 110 mph fastball, an 8.5 hundred and a 700 pound clean and jerk."

It really is too bad though that sport is morphing from something where values were affirmed to what is in many ways now an engineering contest.

You and my brother are on the same page. His attitude is "I don't care if they die at 30, I want to see a 700 pound clean and Jerk, an 8.5 hundred meters and a 110 mph fastball."

I think it is sad that sports is leaving (or has left) the realm of human competition where specific values are affirmed to what is in many ways an engineering contest.

I dont really get what all the dispute is about, cause they give you forms of steroids and supplements when you have cancer, in my opinion ive always thought he took something, but he had cancer so i can understand that, I also think Bonds is a hall of famer and the best player of the last 25 years though.

bird wrote:I dont really get what all the dispute is about, cause they give you forms of steroids and supplements when you have cancer, in my opinion ive always thought he took something, but he had cancer so i can understand that, I also think Bonds is a hall of famer and the best player of the last 25 years though.

Either rules mean something or the concept of sport goes out the window.

There is no middle ground I can think of.

marbleheadmaui wrote:

bird wrote:I dont really get what all the dispute is about, cause they give you forms of steroids and supplements when you have cancer, in my opinion ive always thought he took something, but he had cancer so i can understand that, I also think Bonds is a hall of famer and the best player of the last 25 years though.

Either rules mean something or the concept of sport goes out the window.

There is no middle ground I can think of.

well in my opinion Bonds was batting against roided up pitchers and Lance was racing dirty dudes. No ones has still flat out proven they did steroids in a court of law like they are about to do with Clemens. ... and they've been trying for a long time.

bird wrote:

marbleheadmaui wrote:

bird wrote:I dont really get what all the dispute is about, cause they give you forms of steroids and supplements when you have cancer, in my opinion ive always thought he took something, but he had cancer so i can understand that, I also think Bonds is a hall of famer and the best player of the last 25 years though.

Either rules mean something or the concept of sport goes out the window.

There is no middle ground I can think of.

well in my opinion Bonds was batting against roided up pitchers and Lance was racing dirty dudes. No ones has still flat out proven they did steroids in a court of law like they are about to do with Clemens. ... and they've been trying for a long time.

Maybe not. But governing bodies have suspended hundreds of people and many have later confessed. Bonds cheated. It's no more complicated than that. That someone else did it to doesn't do ANYTHING to absolve Bonds. It just means others were scumbags too.

That defense is like letting aq bank roober walk because someone else robbed banks too.

Athletes have always cheated and bent the rules to get an edge. You should know Marlb, you're a Pats fan. The video taping The Pats got busted for every team does.

There are performance enhancing surgeries now I'd call cheating. Re-shaping a pitcher's shoulder. Lazer surgeries that improve eye sight.

Golfers and baseball player been known to do this even when they already got good vision. Shit, speaking golf. Clubs and equipment they use I'd say is fucking cheating compared to the shit golfers use to have to play with.

GrantZilla wrote:Athletes have always cheated and bent the rules to get an edge. You should know Marlb, you're a Pats fan. The video taping The Pats got busted for every team does.

There are performance enhancing surgeries now I'd call cheating. Re-shaping a pitcher's shoulder. Lazer surgeries that improve eye sight.

Golfers and baseball player been known to do this even when they already got good vision. Shit, speaking golf. Clubs and equipment they use I'd say is fucking cheating compared to the shit golfers use to have to play with.

Yup. But rules are rules. Some stuff is legal or borderline and then there's stuff like steroids.

I agree. It's a risk. You take the shit and get busted, you pay the price.

The drugs that he was administered to get over cancer has made him superhuman. He's like a sports X Man. Some sort of something altered his DNA and he became Super Cycle (That's his X Man name).

hardcorebee24 wrote:The drugs that he was administered to get over cancer has made him superhuman. He's like a sports X Man. Some sort of something altered his DNA and he became Super Cycle (That's his X Man name).

Coming soon to a theater near you!

i think the problem is with the governing bodies in sports. Like Marble said, Cycling is the dirtiest sport going for PEDs. you would have thought that with Armstrong winning everything like he has, he would have been tested vigorously but it's always easy to pick on those that achieve greatness. i understand though that the problem is that the testing is flawed in the sense that the manufacturers are always a step ahead of the tests. i believe that boxing is flawed in its testing procedures and it needs random WADA style controls (that means i agree with Mayweather, yes i said it). UFC wouldn't survive if that was the case for their sport. Performance enhancers are a form of cheating so if cheating is acceptable in competition then i'm on a different page to a couple of people here. Lionel Messi had a serious growth deficiency when he was younger, FC Barcelona paid for all of his Growth Hormone treatment from a young age up until his teens by which time he had become professional for them. do i think that this has contributed majorly to him become the best footballer in the World today? damn fucking right i do, but he was being medically administered with it so it's kinda been completely forgotten now. I think blood-spinning is wrong. it's basically like taking EPO but without using an actual drug but it seems to be common practice now for recovery. but you have to undergo a surgical procedure to aid that recovery and thus your performance, so i see that as a form of perfomance enhancing. If Lance Armstrong did use PEDs, and i'm not saying this like it doesn't happen in sports, then he got away with it and we'll never know the truth.

But Marble, as long as we agree that what transpires in your imagination is far less important then what ACTUALLY happens then we're good

dbudge wrote:i think the problem is with the governing bodies in sports. Like Marble said, Cycling is the dirtiest sport going for PEDs. you would have thought that with Armstrong winning everything like he has, he would have been tested vigorously but it's always easy to pick on those that achieve greatness. i understand though that the problem is that the testing is flawed in the sense that the manufacturers are always a step ahead of the tests. i believe that boxing is flawed in its testing procedures and it needs random WADA style controls (that means i agree with Mayweather, yes i said it). UFC wouldn't survive if that was the case for their sport. Performance enhancers are a form of cheating so if cheating is acceptable in competition then i'm on a different page to a couple of people here. Lionel Messi had a serious growth deficiency when he was younger, FC Barcelona paid for all of his Growth Hormone treatment from a young age up until his teens by which time he had become professional for them. do i think that this has contributed majorly to him become the best footballer in the World today? damn fucking right i do, but he was being medically administered with it so it's kinda been completely forgotten now. I think blood-spinning is wrong. it's basically like taking EPO but without using an actual drug but it seems to be common practice now for recovery. but you have to undergo a surgical procedure to aid that recovery and thus your performance, so i see that as a form of perfomance enhancing. If Lance Armstrong did use PEDs, and i'm not saying this like it doesn't happen in sports, then he got away with it and we'll never know the truth.

But Marble, as long as we agree that what transpires in your imagination is far less important then what ACTUALLY happens then we're good

ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!!!!! (and VERY well played sir!)

dbudge wrote:i think the problem is with the governing bodies in sports. Like Marble said, Cycling is the dirtiest sport going for PEDs. you would have thought that with Armstrong winning everything like he has, he would have been tested vigorously but it's always easy to pick on those that achieve greatness. i understand though that the problem is that the testing is flawed in the sense that the manufacturers are always a step ahead of the tests. i believe that boxing is flawed in its testing procedures and it needs random WADA style controls (that means i agree with Mayweather, yes i said it). UFC wouldn't survive if that was the case for their sport. Performance enhancers are a form of cheating so if cheating is acceptable in competition then i'm on a different page to a couple of people here. Lionel Messi had a serious growth deficiency when he was younger, FC Barcelona paid for all of his Growth Hormone treatment from a young age up until his teens by which time he had become professional for them. do i think that this has contributed majorly to him become the best footballer in the World today? damn fucking right i do, but he was being medically administered with it so it's kinda been completely forgotten now. I think blood-spinning is wrong. it's basically like taking EPO but without using an actual drug but it seems to be common practice now for recovery. but you have to undergo a surgical procedure to aid that recovery and thus your performance, so i see that as a form of perfomance enhancing. If Lance Armstrong did use PEDs, and i'm not saying this like it doesn't happen in sports, then he got away with it and we'll never know the truth.

But Marble, as long as we agree that what transpires in your imagination is far less important then what ACTUALLY happens then we're good

Well said...apparently there are acceptable forms of enhancement [like a Dr. performing it] and the unacceptable [trainers or athletes injecting them].
When I was a kid my friend's brother was tiny. In his early teens they took him to a specialist that prescribed HGH. His transformation was amazing. He grew & filled out to the point where we didn't recognize him. He became one of the top teen tennis players in the state after that. Now, should he have been disqualified?

flapanther2001 wrote:

dbudge wrote:i think the problem is with the governing bodies in sports. Like Marble said, Cycling is the dirtiest sport going for PEDs. you would have thought that with Armstrong winning everything like he has, he would have been tested vigorously but it's always easy to pick on those that achieve greatness. i understand though that the problem is that the testing is flawed in the sense that the manufacturers are always a step ahead of the tests. i believe that boxing is flawed in its testing procedures and it needs random WADA style controls (that means i agree with Mayweather, yes i said it). UFC wouldn't survive if that was the case for their sport. Performance enhancers are a form of cheating so if cheating is acceptable in competition then i'm on a different page to a couple of people here. Lionel Messi had a serious growth deficiency when he was younger, FC Barcelona paid for all of his Growth Hormone treatment from a young age up until his teens by which time he had become professional for them. do i think that this has contributed majorly to him become the best footballer in the World today? damn fucking right i do, but he was being medically administered with it so it's kinda been completely forgotten now. I think blood-spinning is wrong. it's basically like taking EPO but without using an actual drug but it seems to be common practice now for recovery. but you have to undergo a surgical procedure to aid that recovery and thus your performance, so i see that as a form of perfomance enhancing. If Lance Armstrong did use PEDs, and i'm not saying this like it doesn't happen in sports, then he got away with it and we'll never know the truth.

But Marble, as long as we agree that what transpires in your imagination is far less important then what ACTUALLY happens then we're good

Well said...apparently there are acceptable forms of enhancement [like a Dr. performing it] and the unacceptable [trainers or athletes injecting them].
When I was a kid my friend's brother was tiny. In his early teens they took him to a specialist that prescribed HGH. His transformation was amazing. He grew & filled out to the point where we didn't recognize him. He became one of the top teen tennis players in the state after that. Now, should he have been disqualified?

In my mind that's medicinal, like using Cortisone.