The Armstrong Lie (Sports Documentary)

A very good 2-hour documentary of Lance Armstrong's rise and fall. I cant help but be a little sympathetic watching him simply because he went into a sport (TDF) in which everyone was doping and he just happened to set up a systematic program in which he did it better than everybody else.

Of course, in the end Lance went down was because of his hubris: the only reason he got caught was because he attempted a comeback after he was already home free, and if he stayed away from the race he would have kept his 7 titles.

In a way its classical Greek tragedy- the hero gets too proud after his victory, angers the gods, and goes down.

Riveting stuff. I would suggest you watch it.

I have no sympathy for him, I can't remember if it was this one or another one I watched, but yeah, of all he had done was dope, I wouldn't hold it against him considering everyone was doing it.

However the issue lies in how viciously he attempted to defend his lies.

He used his money and influence to viciously go after and try and crush anyone who accused him of doping, he hid behind his cancer and used it and his foundation as a shield against the allegations.

That's why I don't feel any sympathy for him.

Jetboogieman said:

I have no sympathy for him, I can't remember if it was this one or another one I watched, but yeah, of all he had done was dope, I wouldn't hold it against him considering everyone was doing it.

However the issue lies in how viciously he attempted to defend his lies.

He used his money and influence to viciously go after and try and crush anyone who accused him of doping, he hid behind his cancer and used it and his foundation as a shield against the allegations.

That's why I don't feel any sympathy for him.

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You bring up a good point. Yes, its true he used his influence to defend himself, but I think it was only natural because everyone was after him. Im betting if the other riders of the tour had his money and power and they were attacked too they might have done the same thing. Its a human trait to fight back.

What I found interesting in the documentary was the footage of the old TDF riders running into bars in France and grabbing beer to guzzle down in order to get the energy to make the mountain climbs. It seems all the riders were doing some sort of doping or cheating even back then lol.

That, and he apparently treated Sheryl Crow like dirt.

Doping or not, the best in the modern era.

PoS said:

You bring up a good point. Yes, its true he used his influence to defend himself, but I think it was only natural because everyone was after him.

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I get that, but the how viciously he went after those people shows it to be way more than just simply "defending yourself".

What I found interesting in the documentary was the footage of the old TDF riders running into bars in France and grabbing beer to guzzle down in order to get the energy to make the mountain climbs. It seems all the riders were doing some sort of doping or cheating even back then lol.

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Well I don't know if that documentary tapped on that one incident where in front of a crowd of people and the press, in a tinted bus window they doped because they wouldn't have been able to get into the hotel and get it all done in time.

Netflix Icarus is the newest documentary exposing the widespread doping problems in the sporting world.

The scale of the cheating Rodchenkov helps expose is clearest when Fogel meets with scientists and officials at WADA in 2016, and explains that they have spreadsheets detailing every athlete on the state-mandated doping protocol at the London Olympics, and how many of them were implicated. The faces around the table are dumbstruck: a perfect symphony of horror, anger, and glum acceptance.

https://www.theatlantic.com/enterta.../icarus-review-netflix/535962/?utm_source=twb

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PoS said:

A very good 2-hour documentary of Lance Armstrong's rise and fall. I cant help but be a little sympathetic watching him simply because he went into a sport (TDF) in which everyone was doping and he just happened to set up a systematic program in which he did it better than everybody else.

Of course, in the end Lance went down was because of his hubris: the only reason he got caught was because he attempted a comeback after he was already home free, and if he stayed away from the race he would have kept his 7 titles.

In a way its classical Greek tragedy- the hero gets too proud after his victory, angers the gods, and goes down.

Riveting stuff. I would suggest you watch it.

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He never should have been proud to begin with. He was an evil cheater the first time he started using and he is an evil manipulator for making all those around him be cheaters and liars for him. He perpetrated great levels and deception and he underhandedly tortured people for reporting the truth about him, costing them hundreds of thousands of dollars and their image and credibility, all for a effing cheat and liar.

And to hear him speak about the sports now is ludicrous, someone that wicked should not be allowed to comment on honest athletes today.

PoS said:

You bring up a good point. Yes, its true he used his influence to defend himself, but I think it was only natural because everyone was after him. Im betting if the other riders of the tour had his money and power and they were attacked too they might have done the same thing. Its a human trait to fight back.

What I found interesting in the documentary was the footage of the old TDF riders running into bars in France and grabbing beer to guzzle down in order to get the energy to make the mountain climbs. It seems all the riders were doing some sort of doping or cheating even back then lol.

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A lot of people cheated because they knew virtually everyone of them cheated and knowing he was a cheat, and knowing there was no way to catch him without the stuff, they mostly all did it (the top cyclist) but the issue with him was that not only he doped (Armstrong) he headed up an organized doping schedule for EVERY cyclist in his team and that level of wickedness and un-sportsmanship behavior was not present in other teams where riders cheated on their own and not as part of an organized cheating ring. Because while other riders were often reasonably close to Armstrong's level, because his entire team was doped up, no other rider could escape the clutches of Armstrong's men and when the other doped stars were tired out enough Armstrong would pounce and as the other doped riders did not have 3 or 4 equally talented doped up riders with them, they had to go after Armstrong and usually they were no longer able to do so (due to the ridiculous speed Armstrong's doped team could generate).

Also, Armstrong was under the treatment of a few masters of cheating (doping expert doctors) so even there he was in a devious and cheating league of his own.

Cheating has been part of the Tour for a long time, let's hope it gets a cleaner sport with every year going forward because there is no place in cycling for doping.

Also, the Tour de France is the most boring of the grand tours of Europe. The Giro this year was much more interesting but the best cycling "tour" still has to come, the Vuelta a Espana. The Tour of Spain usually is filled with great attacking riding, often results are not as expected/predicted and often the best rider wins rather than the most ruthless collective.

TobyOne said:

Doping or not, the best in the modern era.

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That is nonsense, he is a cheat, that makes him nothing and a nobody. He does not deserve the name "best in the modern era" if anything he was the "most doped cyclist in the most devious doped up team". Nothing to be proud of IMHO and of course not the best. The Best was the first non-doped up rider behind all those drug addicts in the Tour de France.

Everyone else was as doped as he was. The techniques were well known and doping was as common as drafting. If you didn't dope its because you werent good enough to start.

Best in the modern era

Peter King said:

That is nonsense, he is a cheat, that makes him nothing and a nobody. He does not deserve the name "best in the modern era" if anything he was the "most doped cyclist in the most devious doped up team". Nothing to be proud of IMHO and of course not the best. The Best was the first non-doped up rider behind all those drug addicts in the Tour de France.

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TobyOne said:

Everyone else was as doped as he was. The techniques were well known and doping was as common as drafting. If you didn't dope its because you werent good enough to start.

Best in the modern era

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Nonsense, he was not the best in the modern era, he was the most doped up. If anything any of the current large Tour winners are the best in the modern era.

Also, Armstrong did not win a lot except win the Tour, and just being a one trick pony does not make you the best.

Peter King said:

Nonsense, he was not the best in the modern era, he was the most doped up. If anything any of the current large Tour winners are the best in the modern era.

Also, Armstrong did not win a lot except win the Tour, and just being a one trick pony does not make you the best.

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Lance was a good one day racer. He won the international championships without doping. And yes, everyone was doping in the TDF and possibly the other races as well. Lance just did it systematically with doctors and all that while the others just did it by themselves- so if Lance was a cheater (and he was) then so was everyone else.

As bolt correctly says sport will die if this doping stuff is not brought under control soon. By participating in the Dark Side he being Lance Armstrong Cancer Survivor (Gotta mention that part of the brand dont we...Prob get sued if we dont) furthered the death of his sport.

Shame on him.

PoS said:

Lance was a good one day racer. He won the international championships without doping. And yes, everyone was doping in the TDF and possibly the other races as well. Lance just did it systematically with doctors and all that while the others just did it by themselves- so if Lance was a cheater (and he was) then so was everyone else.

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Except he was not a good one day racer. He did not win a lot of classics of cycling. And I should know, I have been watching cycling all of my frigging life as a Dutch person. Tom Boonen, Eddie Merckx, Gilbert, Valverde is also a great classic one day winner (even though he too had to sit out 2 years due to doping issues) but in the cleaner years he still won more classic cycling races than Lance did even with the doping races counted to his name.

He won few international championships without doping.

And in modern day cycling it is almost impossible to be good at both one day races and grand tours. That may have been possible in the days of Merckx, Zoetemelk but not in this day and age.

Lance may have been a good Tour de France rider, but that was it mostly in most years when it came to big victories. He concentrated mostly on the Tour de France and all other races where of lesser importance.

Peter King said:

Except he was not a good one day racer. He did not win a lot of classics of cycling. And I should know, I have been watching cycling all of my frigging life as a Dutch person. Tom Boonen, Eddie Merckx, Gilbert, Valverde is also a great classic one day winner (even though he too had to sit out 2 years due to doping issues) but in the cleaner years he still won more classic cycling races than Lance did even with the doping races counted to his name.

He won few international championships without doping.

And in modern day cycling it is almost impossible to be good at both one day races and grand tours. That may have been possible in the days of Merckx, Zoetemelk but not in this day and age.

Lance may have been a good Tour de France rider, but that was it mostly in most years when it came to big victories. He concentrated mostly on the Tour de France and all other races where of lesser importance.

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I followed Lance's career a lot since my friend's dad owned a bikeshop and I hung around amateur cyclists for two summers while I was in college.

TDF is (or was) the gold crown of racing. Im not making the claim that Lance was the best. My personal view is that all things are murky now, because we dont know if the old champions ever doped in some way.

Even before Lance started doping we have learned that many previous champions did: Marco Pantani, Richard Virenque, Lars Ulrich, Bjarne Riis, they all doped. I even think Miguel Indurain doped but he was smart enough to retire before it all blew up. Heck, they caught the entire Festina team doping before Lance even started.

Tanngrisnir said:

That, and he apparently treated Sheryl Crow like dirt.

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How did Armstrong treat Crow badly? Everything I have seen says the opposite. She wanted children, he didn't. They broke up and moved on.

PoS said:

I followed Lance's career a lot since my friend's dad owned a bikeshop and I hung around amateur cyclists for two summers while I was in college.

TDF is (or was) the gold crown of racing. Im not making the claim that Lance was the best. My personal view is that all things are murky now, because we dont know if the old champions ever doped in some way.

Even before Lance started doping we have learned that many previous champions did: Marco Pantani, Richard Virenque, Lars Ulrich, Bjarne Riis, they all doped. I even think Miguel Indurain doped but he was smart enough to retire before it all blew up. Heck, they caught the entire Festina team doping before Lance even started.

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You mean the Festina affair happened in the year Armstrong made his comeback? Because he had been a professional since 1992, 6 years before the Festina thing blew up. He had ridden in the tour de france in 1995 and was 36th (4th in the youth ranking). In 1996 he had to leave the tour due to what he thought was bronchitis but what in reality was his cancer popping up.

Sadly many things Armstrong has ever said comes under a cloud of suspicion, who knows when he started doping but fact is that he conspired to do wholesale team wide doping that that he sued people into destruction who claimed that he was using. That is the most evil of the things he did, lying so much and being vindictive in his lawsuits against people and companies.

Peter King said:

You mean the Festina affair happened in the year Armstrong made his comeback? Because he had been a professional since 1992, 6 years before the Festina thing blew up. He had ridden in the tour de france in 1995 and was 36th (4th in the youth ranking). In 1996 he had to leave the tour due to what he thought was bronchitis but what in reality was his cancer popping up.

Sadly many things Armstrong has ever said comes under a cloud of suspicion, who knows when he started doping but fact is that he conspired to do wholesale team wide doping that that he sued people into destruction who claimed that he was using. That is the most evil of the things he did, lying so much and being vindictive in his lawsuits against people and companies.

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According to his own admission Lance didnt dope up until after his cancer battle and the start of the 1999 TDF. And seeing his performance against everyone prior to it I am inclined to believe him- he admitted that all the big names were doping and he either had to go along with it or quit pro cycling. If he had been doping before then he would have done better in his previous TDF before his cancer struck.

And the Festina incident was merely the tip of the iceberg, its clear to anyone with half a brain that everyone was doping well before that affair happened so anyone who wins or in the top ten should be under suspicion as much as Lance was.

PoS said:

A very good 2-hour documentary of Lance Armstrong's rise and fall. I cant help but be a little sympathetic watching him simply because he went into a sport (TDF) in which everyone was doping and he just happened to set up a systematic program in which he did it better than everybody else.

Of course, in the end Lance went down was because of his hubris: the only reason he got caught was because he attempted a comeback after he was already home free, and if he stayed away from the race he would have kept his 7 titles.

In a way its classical Greek tragedy- the hero gets too proud after his victory, angers the gods, and goes down.

Riveting stuff. I would suggest you watch it.

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I know!! He was home free and tried a come back and got caught! :lol:

He still is in the Yellow Jersey on my winners charts for those races. I don't care what the International Cycling group declared.

Peter King said:

He never should have been proud to begin with. He was an evil cheater the first time he started using and he is an evil manipulator for making all those around him be cheaters and liars for him. He perpetrated great levels and deception and he underhandedly tortured people for reporting the truth about him, costing them hundreds of thousands of dollars and their image and credibility, all for a effing cheat and liar.

And to hear him speak about the sports now is ludicrous, someone that wicked should not be allowed to comment on honest athletes today.

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You are just angry because an American won your European sport... a sport most Americans care so little about but, we won it anyway. :lol:

Peter King said:

That is nonsense, he is a cheat, that makes him nothing and a nobody. He does not deserve the name "best in the modern era" if anything he was the "most doped cyclist in the most devious doped up team". Nothing to be proud of IMHO and of course not the best. The Best was the first non-doped up rider behind all those drug addicts in the Tour de France.

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Dude, they are ALL cheats... or at least were back then. That is why LeMond had to retire... he didn't dope and couldn't keep up with all those that did.

Peter King said:

Except he was not a good one day racer. He did not win a lot of classics of cycling. And I should know, I have been watching cycling all of my frigging life as a Dutch person. Tom Boonen, Eddie Merckx, Gilbert, Valverde is also a great classic one day winner (even though he too had to sit out 2 years due to doping issues) but in the cleaner years he still won more classic cycling races than Lance did even with the doping races counted to his name.

He won few international championships without doping.

And in modern day cycling it is almost impossible to be good at both one day races and grand tours. That may have been possible in the days of Merckx, Zoetemelk but not in this day and age.

Lance may have been a good Tour de France rider, but that was it mostly in most years when it came to big victories. He concentrated mostly on the Tour de France and all other races where of lesser importance.

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There is only one race Americans, and most of the world care about... AT ALL. The Tour de France.

PoS said:

I followed Lance's career a lot since my friend's dad owned a bikeshop and I hung around amateur cyclists for two summers while I was in college.

TDF is (or was) the gold crown of racing. Im not making the claim that Lance was the best. My personal view is that all things are murky now, because we dont know if the old champions ever doped in some way.

Even before Lance started doping we have learned that many previous champions did: Marco Pantani, Richard Virenque, Lars Ulrich, Bjarne Riis, they all doped. I even think Miguel Indurain doped but he was smart enough to retire before it all blew up. Heck, they caught the entire Festina team doping before Lance even started.

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Peter is arguing that because Navratolova focused on and won Wimbledon more than any other tournament it makes her less of a champion. :lol:

Bodhisattva said:

You are just angry because an American won your European sport... a sport most Americans care so little about but, we won it anyway. :lol:

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Nope, loved the real American winner Greg Lemond, shouted him to the finish to not let Fignon win.

Big fan of Tejay van Garderen, Tyler Farrar and Talansky. There is even an American riding for the Dutch team Lotto Jumbo (Alexy Vermeulen).

And if you need to cheat to win, you really did not win.