“When is it right to forgive a cheat?”
fascinating article in today’s The Times. At the unveiling of the route for next year’s TDF Armstrong was written out of the narrative. Yet Virenque was there who was “central to the Festina affair”. If I could post a link here I would. (Admin – here is the Article)
Though I guess Festina are not too chuffed that it is still referred to as The Festina Affair…..
Hmm – challenge for the day is to find why/where the site flipped that photo on its side! Weird if you open it its correct way on – must be a setting to look for……..
But they still keep sponsoring cycling, which is incredible when you think about it. They must have some real cycling nuts on the board or something!
I’ve not read the article and I’m not going to try to answer the actual question in the headline, but it seems quite fair to me that Virenque should be somewhere ahead of Armstrong in the queue back in from the cold. The offences of individual Festina riders, while very serious, were still more or less “normal” doping violations and even if their cases had been adjudicated with today’s standards their bans would be over by now (at least for Virenque, some of the others might have been on second or third? Too lazy to check…). Armstrong went rather beyond… Read more »
At least he showed some remorse at the time too……..(Photo by AFP)
That certainly helps. Unless I’ve misunderstood completely Virenque was and is more or less considered a nice guy by most people, while Armstrong…
I think at this point nobody really thinks that Lance was treated the way he was just because he cheated. It was a different time. He was a total dick and tried to destroy anyone who got in his way. It was his ego that caused him to be cast out in the cold the way he was. Maybe a true “lifetime” is too much if he does exhibit any sense of remorse for the way he treated his colleagues at any point (rather than just the doping part). Otherwise, if he continues to think that being a bully is… Read more »
This ^^^
Some people were chatting on Zwift today saying they still appreciated Lance and he just got busted as an example for what everyone else was doing.
I felt obliged to point out that nobody else had set out to systematically ensure their entire team doped, personally hounded any riders or journalists who threatened them and set out to ruin the careers and reputations of people who didn’t fall into line.
I don’t think he even tries to make that case himself anymore, outside of court that is. With the alternative there being utter financial ruin, on top of the humiliation of the last several years, he kind of has to try everything.
Indeed, it’s the latter part that is utterly unforgivable for me, not the personal use of drugs.
Virenque is French. Does that explain it?
Hmm – good point re links. I’ll look at that.