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Tags: Bike, cycling, doping, Floyd Landis, Lance Armstrong, Tour de France
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Will Lance Armstrong Show at the Leadville 100?

July 30th, 2008

Update: Lance finished 2nd in the 2008 Leadville 100. See videos of Lance and Dave Wiens at the Leadville 100.

In January Lance Armstrong did the Miles of Discomfort mountain bike race. He dropped out from cramps 43 miles into the 52 mile race. The word was that he was training for the the Leadville 100.

In March Biking Bis reported that Chris Carmichael, Lance’s long time coach, said Lance was planning to do the Leadville 100. Since then I haven’t been able to find anything about Lance doing the Leadville 100 until today.

Today Ken Chlouber announced that Lance has entered the Leadville 100. Early last year, it appeared there would be a battle between Lance and Floyd Landis. Soon after Landis announced he’d be racing, Lance said he had a scheduling conflict. In July Lance rode part of the course and it seemed he would be racing. In the end Lance didn’t show but Landis did race and finished 2nd to Dave Wiens.

Ricky, one of the very few that have finished every Leadville 100 MTB race, has posted on the Leadville 100 Yahoo group that Ken had also told him about Lance racing. Lance told Ken he wasn’t in that good of shape but thought he could still finish in the top 10. Of course he’ll have to actually show up.

I doubt we’ll see a race between Lance and Landis this year. Although Landis was going to be racing the National Ultra-Endurance Series this year, he hasn’t done any of them since CAS ruled against him in his 2006 Tour de France doping case.

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Tags: Colorado, Floyd Landis, Lance Armstrong, Leadville 100, mountain biking
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Greg LeMond’s Air Force Academy Speech

April 20th, 2008

Greg LeMond spoke at a fundraiser at the Air Force Academy last night. It was only $15 for USA Cycling members. I was considering going but with everything else I have going on I decided not to.

Did anyone else go? The only thing I’ve found about it was an opinion column in The Gazette.

I used to be a big fan of LeMond. When he was winning the Tour de France, was when I was really getting into cycling. I dreamed of becoming like him.

The last few years, LeMond seems to have become bitter. He’s squabbled with Lance Armstrong and accused him of doping. He accused Floyd Landis of doping. LeMond tries making it sound like he won everything clean. Cycling has a long history of doping even much farther back than LeMond. I’d like to think he won clean just like I’d like to think Armstrong and Landis were clean. Unfortunately with all the doping scandals of the last few years, I don’t think many if any top pros raced clean. There’s also the fight between LeMond and Trek.

LeMond was in town training and checking out the velodrome for a possible hour record. I think it was 1991. My friend figured out he was staying at the Broadmoor hotel. He saw him leave on his bike mid morning one day. The next day we just happened to be casually riding around the hotel about the same time.

LeMond came out and headed out for a ride. He kept messing with his shoes and we caught up to him and never let on we knew who he was. After riding with him for to the edge of town, he explained that the he was going to use the motorcycle in front of us to do some motor pacing. He said he’d be going very fast and would be riding very close to the motorcycle. He asked us to not stay with him.

Later that day, we found him at the velodrome. After he was finished training, I was able to get a picture with him. I haven’t seen it in a while. He also autographed my foam helmet. I still have the helmet in a box.

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Tags: cycling, Floyd Landis, Lance Armstrong, Tour de France
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Floyd Landis to do 2008 National Ultra-Endurance MTB Series

January 25th, 2008

Floyd Landis has announced he will be racing the 2008 National Ultra-Endurance MTB Series. The NUE consists of 8 100 mile mountain bike races. It starts with Cohutta 100 on April 19th and finishes with the Tahoe-Sierra 100 on September 6th.

This news created a big storm over at MTBR about letting a doper race. Others didn’t mind him racing and support him. I still don’t understand how he can race since at least some of these races are NORBA races. I believe pretty much all the top pros on the road are doping or at least have been. I’m all for the sport being cleaned up. Landis may very well have doped but the lab work was so sloppy that I have trouble with it being used.

The complete NUE schedule is:
April 19 – Cohutta 100, Tennessee
May 31 – Mohican MTB 100, Ohio
June 14 – Lumberjack 100, Michigan
July 19 – Breckenridge 100, Colorado
July 26 – Wilderness 101, Pennsylvania
August 16 – Fool’s Gold 100, Georgia
August 31 – Shenandoah Mountain 100, Virginia
September 6 – Tahoe-Sierra 100, California

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More about his comments at Biking Bis.

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Tags: Floyd Landis, mountain biking, NUE Series
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Lance Armstrong Turns Back on Cycling

September 26th, 2007

It seems that Lance Armstrong has turned his back on cycling. He has better things to do now. When asked about the Landis doping decision, he said

“I’d love to answer the question but unfortunately I’m out of that business. I’m here to fight cancer. I haven’t looked online. I still love the bike and ride all the time but on the competitive side I’m just not engaged.” Found via Biking Bis

I agree fighting cancer is more important than cycling but it gave him the platform to fight cancer. A lot of the LAF fund-raisers involve cycling. He isn’t at the top end of competition but that’s what partly feeds recreational cycling. He should use his champion status to help the sport but he’s not.

He’s not out of that business. He just doesn’t want to answer the tough questions about the state the sport is in. Several of his teammates have tested positive for performance enhancing drugs. He used a doctor that was associated with doping. I believe there are doping issues but as we’ve seen with the Landis case, the anti-doping bureaucracy is also corrupt. Cycling isn’t the only sport with doping problems, other sports have them too.

Update: Lance has now made a comment on the Landis verdict.

“When you are giving someone the death penalty, which they essentially did, you cannot tolerate shoddy work, which they clearly did. I don’t understand that type of rationale. I don’t understand the verdict.

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Landis Loses Fight to Keep Tour de France Title

September 20th, 2007

The arbitration panel released their decision in the Floyd Landis doping case today. It ruled 2-1 against Landis. He can appeal the decision to Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland.

He will lose his Tour de France title and be banned from racing through January 29, 2009. USADA had wanted the 2 year suspension to start today. Landis had wanted it to start from when he was fired by Phonak last year. The arbitration panel ruled he had voluntarily agreed to not compete internationally on January 30, 2007 and used that as the start of the 2 years.

USADA has posted the decision. It’s 84 pages and full of legalese and technical details of the testing. Although they agreed that the T/E testing was sloppy and didn’t prove Landis doped, they ruled the more complicated IRMS was reliable. Christopher Campbell, the desenting arbitrator disagreed. Even the 2 arbitrators that ruled against Landis issued a warning that they had concerns about the French lab that did the testing. Trust but Verify has a few posts with more details of the ruling.

I’m not surprised by the ruling. Although I think doping is common in cycling and other sports, I think the anti-doping establishment is corrupt. They have rules that make it hard for one lab directory to point out errors made by another lab. The French lab leaked Landis’s positive tests and have leaked other results. In the US you have to agree to arbitration to race. USADA chooses the acceptable arbitrators. Not surprisingly this case makes USADA 35-0 in cases brought to arbitration .

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Shenandoah Mountain 100 Results

September 2nd, 2007

The only thing I’ve been able to find on results for the Shenandoah Mountain 100 is the top three posted on MTBR. It has that Floyd Landis was 3rd.

1. Jeff Schalk (7:06)
2. Harlan Price (Don’t know the exact time but it was about 5-10 min later)
3. Floyd Landis (Another 5-10 min after Harlan)

Update: TBV has posted a link to a SM100 report on CyclingNews. Jeff Schalk set a new course record of 7:06:13. Landis was 18:42 back. Chris Eatough DNF’d early with a mechanical but he still won the National Ultra Endurance MTB Series.

Sue Haywood set a new women’s record in 8:12:36. Danielle Musto was 5th and ended up tied for the National Ultra Endurance MTB Series with Carrie Lowrey. Since the SM100 was the tie breaker, Lowrey won the series overall.

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Wiens Wins Leadville 100 #5 in Record Time, Landis 2nd

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Landis Racing Shenandoah Mountain 100 Tomorrow

September 1st, 2007

Floyd Landis is racing the Shenandoah Mountain 100 tomorrow. In a post on MTBR, someone, who has done both Leadville and Shenandoah, says Shenandoah is harder.

The Leadville 100 is jeep road and doesn’t really have anything technical so it wouldn’t be hard to have a tougher course. The other Colorado 100 milers all have tougher courses than Leadville. The Durango 100 is still looking for its first finisher under 9 hours compared to Dave Wiens breaking 7 this year at Leadville. In 2003, the first year the Durango 100 was held was the year I did 8:18 at Leadville. Durango was the next weekend so my legs weren’t fully recovered. I did a 10:55 which was still good enough for 4th place. There were 66 starters and 15 finishers.

Even though the 24 Hours of Adrenlin Solo “Worlds” is also this weekend at Laguna Seca Raceway, a lot of the big name endurance mountain bike racers will be at Shenandoah. Chris Eatough and other big names versus Landis should be interesting. Bloggers Danielle and Harlan will be there.

In other Landis news, the arbitration ruling on his positive test from last year’s Tour de France is expected later this month.

Related Links: Shenandoah Mountain 100 Results

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Tags: Chris Eatough, Floyd Landis, Leadville 100, mountain biking, Shenandoah Mountain 100
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Leadville 100 MTB Pictures from Bottom of Powerline Inbound and at the Finish

August 26th, 2007

I now have uploaded the Leadville 100 pictures for Powerline inbound and the finish. You can see the pictures from earlier in the race by going to 2007 Leadville 100 mountain bike picture page.

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