This may be sophistry but I differentiate between sprinters taking drugs to win and cyclist taking drugs to survive, say, a Grand Tour.Originally Posted by Daletownrunner
The need to win at all costs, plus the age old perception that everyone is at it so they want to level the playing field, the doping issue will never ever go away, especially in Cycling, unfortunately it has always been the way, it's only the advent of the internet, where an athlete can't fart without it being reported that has changed things, perhaps it's time for some of the quiet 'old guard' in the sport to hold their hands up and say 'look this is what we were up to' certainly some of the Cycling stars from the 80s/ early 90s must have been hitting the medicine cabinet hard all be it on a less industrial scale, I can imagine some uncomfortable silences and shuffling of papers in the commentary boxes when the latest doping row explodes, late 70s early 80s the only cycling news I ever saw was weekly from the comic (all black and white photos) or once a year when Dickie Davis introduced the annual half hour slot on the Paris Roubaix
When the Tour started it was inhumanly hard and the RO said that ideally only one rider would survive the race (!) and whilst that might have been media talk it does encapsulate that the Tour was primarily about survival - and so naturally riders have taken whatever it took ever since.
No sensible rider is going to come out now and admit the misdoings of the past (unless they have a book to sell) because of the (hypocritical ) public reaction. IIRC Riis did and was then vilified because omerta applies not just to the riders but to all those in the media who depend on riders to pay their wages.
The official TdF DVD of the 1999 Tour when Armstrong won the prologue by a very wide margin was described by the live commentators (Sherwen & Ligget) as "astonishing" and "incredible" and in the post race interview their colleague says to Armstrong that the margin of victory was "so surprising" . In fact Armstrong looks a bit nonplussed as though his winning margin is a bit too good to be true and he knows it. Well well well.
But what happened next is that the commentators, instead of querying why Armstrong had changed from an average rider who then had cancer to turn into a Tour winner, bought into the "miracle". Did they really believe in "miracles" or did they collude to retain their good life?
Few media people come out of the EPO era with credit but the one who does is David Walsh. David has sold a few books about his campaign since but I do wonder if there are also guilty consciences amongst those in the media who decided to believe in "miracles" - despite the well document history of "extra help" in pro. cycling.
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