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Keith Lane

Keith Lane

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Keith Lane
http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/26609987/

Lance Armstrong will end his retirement and hopes to compete in the 2009 Tour de France, according to a cycling journal report.The 36-year-old seven-time Tour de France champion will compete in five road races with the Astana team in 2009, the cycling journal VeloNews reported on its Web site Monday, citing anonymous sources.
 
Keith Lane said:
http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/26609987/

Lance Armstrong will end his retirement and hopes to compete in the 2009 Tour de France, according to a cycling journal report.The 36-year-old seven-time Tour de France champion will compete in five road races with the Astana team in 2009, the cycling journal VeloNews reported on its Web site Monday, citing anonymous sources.
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Why can't athletes just retire and stay retired any more?

But, I suppose Armstrong's un-retirement will be better received than Favre's...


Trapper John
 
Don't mean to send this to Spin, but he is better off staying in retirement than to reinvite scrutiny...
 
That's amazing but not surprising...

He's been doing other sports and I think he misses cycling.

Considering the relatively weak field in this year's TdF he has a good shot in '09.
 
Wow he couldn't have joined a "cleaner" team. ASTANA was un-invited from the last TDF due to the whole spanish blood doping scandal of '07.

That team is now managed by Johann Bruyneel who was Lance's manager with Postal/Discovery. I wonder if that has anything to do with it.
 
It could be a good thing, if he does what Dara Torres did. Invite total scrutiny: random frequent drug tests, the works. Make his Tour preparation an open book. If he wants to dispel the rumors for once and for all, it's the only way.
 
vontresc said:
Wow he couldn't have joined a "cleaner" team. ASTANA was un-invited from the last TDF due to the whole spanish blood doping scandal of '07.

That team is now managed by Johann Bruyneel who was Lance's manager with Postal/Discovery. I wonder if that has anything to do with it.
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I am sure that has a lot to do with it. But also the Astana of 2007 is not the Astana team of 2008. Almost all the riders are new and they have one of the msot stringent testing regimes in pro-cycling.

That being said; while I enjoyed watching Lance dominate the Tour in ways that had never been done before it got, frankly, boring watching him. He cracked the code on winning the Tour. I fail to see what he has to prove with that race any longer. If he were to come back I would have much preferred to see him become a one day classics rider or even try to master the Giro. Which in my opinion is a much harder race than Le Grand Tour.
 
;)He came to RAGBRAI and we kicked his ass so he's running back to the Tour. What a *****.
 
wby0nder said:
;)He came to RAGBRAI and we kicked his ass so he's running back to the Tour. What a *****.
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I'm very certain RAGBRAI riders have faster times to each food stop, but can they hang during 27 MPH average speed, 120 mile stages over Hors cat climbs in the Alps?
 
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Now if they had a Beer Slide, and Mr Pork chop at the top of Alpe d'Huez Some RAGBRAI riders might be able to beat Lance to the top.....:D:D:D

Now If Lance were to put in a racing calendar like Eddie Mercx did I'd respect him more. I'd love to see him in the classics, and the Giro, but I am not hoding my breath to see that.
 
vontresc said:
Now if they had a Beer Slide, and Mr Pork chop at the top of Alpe d'Huez Some RAGBRAI riders might be able to beat Lance to the top.....:D:D:D

Now If Lance were to put in a racing calendar like Eddie Mercx did I'd respect him more. I'd love to see him in the classics, and the Giro, but I am not hoding my breath to see that.
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That criticism has been leveled for a while, and it started with Indurain.

But the fact is the peleton is so much more competitive and generally faster than when the Cannibal was racing. The average TdF racer would take a few months off in winter.

No more. It's hard core life 365 days a year (except for Jan Ulrich).
 
tonycondon said:
yea i think i Chris Jones rode more miles on RAGBRAI this year than he did lol
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Wow.. I never thought about that, but you're right! I kicked Armstrong's ass! WOOHOO!!

(and I have ridden exactly 2.4 miles SINCE RAGBRAI.. ha!)
 
dmccormack said:
I'm very certain RAGBARI riders have faster times to each food stop, but can they hang during 27 MPH average speed, 120 mile stages over Hors cat climbs in the Alps?
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A colleague of mine was riding the Alpe D'Huez a few years back. He is a good cyclist and was making a steady rate up the mountain. This was 6 weeks before the tour d'France and as he climbed up he came upon a guy in full bike racing kit. He started drafting the guy and thinking this guy must be a big fan to have all the gear. After about 5 miles and working his butt off to stay with the guy the person in full riding uniform looked behind saw him drating and then punched it a took off up the steep grade at a breath taking pace. My colleague could not keep up no matter how hard he tried. They met at the top and the person in front of him was Lance Armstrong.
 
smigaldi said:
A colleague of mine was riding the Alpe D'Huez a few years back. He is a good cyclist and was making a steady rate up the mountain. This was 6 weeks before the tour d'France and as he climbed up he came upon a guy in full bike racing kit. He started drafting the guy and thinking this guy must be a big fan to have all the gear. After about 5 miles and working his butt off to stay with the guy the person in full riding uniform looked behind saw him drating and then punched it a took off up the steep grade at a breath taking pace. My colleague could not keep up no matter how hard he tried. They met at the top and the person in front of him was Lance Armstrong.
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I raced against Floyd Landis in a road race when he was still an unknown kid.

We were all Cat 3/4 road racers with the latest in lightweight sub-20 lb road bikes, and here he comes, to this one hill up, one hill down 1 mile loop crit on a Mountain Bike.

On the fourth mile he was threatening to lap the field.

We found out later he rode the 30 hilly miles or so down to the race, won, then rode the 30 miles back home.

The riders on the Lance level are nearly super-human.
 
dmccormack said:
I raced against Floyd Landis in a road race when he was still an unknown kid.

We were all Cat 3/4 road racers with the latest in lightweight sub-20 lb road bikes, and here he comes, to this one hill up, one hill down 1 mile loop crit on a Mountain Bike.

On the fourth mile he was threatening to lap the field.

We found out later he rode the 30 hilly miles or so down to the race, won, then rode the 30 miles back home.

The riders on the Lance level are nearly super-human.
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Wow. That's some story! A mountain bike?? LOL! Talk about making you feel inconsequential.
 
Back when I was a fast RAGBRAI rider in the early 80s I met a guy named Gary on a fixed gear track bike that no one could touch. He had no identifying marks on his frame and wasn't wearing bike clothes. Occasionally cat I and II racer draft lines would come along and Gary would toy with them for a couple miles by pacing them in the other lane then just pull away and drop the whole group. I never saw anyone stay with him. He was a very quiet but friendly guy. He told me his mom made his shirt with pockets in the back and "normal looking" bike shorts. He had the first version of clipless pedals and his shoes were wrapped in little bands of webbing which he said were to keep the soles from pulling off. I don't think he ever raced much. He didn't want to be part of the racing culture. Sure was fun drafting him and seeing the hot shots humbled.
 
I used to ride with a group in Lancaster (47 mile loop for me each night starting at 3:30 and home by 6).

The ride leader was racing in the 50+ group at the time. Every once in a while some young hotshot would come out and push the pace. If Scott didn't feel like pushing that night, he'd pull the pack up onto the kid's wheel and let him know "you're not dropping me, anytime, and where."

The speeds averaged 32-35 on the flats, and never below 20 on the climbs (and there are some steep and long climbs in southern Lancaster County along the river).

It was a killer ride but made you strong and fast in a hurry.
 
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