So, after a cycling career spanning three decades, hundreds of thousands of km’s, seven Tour de France wins and not a small amount of controversy, Lance Armstrong has finally pull the plug on his career for good (I hope). During a time when most of the cycling community is speaking about Contador’s case, Armstrong’s timing is impeccable, fading out with the white noise in the background of the media frenzy over the spaniard.
His timing is perhaps a hallmark of his early career. Bursting onto the scene in 1993 by becoming the youngest ever rider to win the UCI World Championship Road Race, he attacked and beat one of the best ever, Miguel Indurain, in a breakaway. In 1995, he took an emotional stage win after his team-mate, Fabio Casertelli, fell on the descent of the Col de Portet d’Aspet and was killed. At this stage of his career, he was a much bigger, stronger rider, having been a champion triathlete in his youth. He relied upon his strength to win him races, where his result rested upon a lucky break in his timing. Cancer struck in October ‘96 and it was feared he wouldn’t live, let alone ride again. Yet this only served to steel the young rider into a harder, tougher competitor. It also stripped the excess weight he was carrying. Returning in 1998, Armstrong finished 4th at the Vuelta a Espana before taking his first of seven Tours in ‘99. In the seven year reign, Armstrong became a master tactician, timing his efforts in time trials and attacks in the mountains to perfection.
However, I also think that his timing has let him down. After seven years at the top, he felt obliged to step aside from the sport despite still dominating the Tour de France in 2005. There was a feeling that he had been pushed out by a cycling community tired of his endless domination of the Tour, rather than gone out on his own terms. Had he continued, I firmly believe he would have won at least nine, if not, ten Tours de France. The competition at the race in 2006 was quite weak. Won initially by Floyd Landis before he failed a doping test, the Tour was handed to Oscar Perreiro, who was only in the position to win due to a freak day where the peloton let the gap blow out to over half an hour. He also benefited from a massive drop in form from Landis on Stage 16 before his drug-assisted breakaway heroics on Stage 17. In 2007, Michael Rasmussen looked set to win the Tour before he was sacked by his Rabobank team, gifting the win to a young Alberto Contador with Cadel Evans close behind. 2008 was also a relatively weak year with Carlos Sastre winning because of his ludicrously strong team and Cadel Evans losing from his ludicrously weak one. Had Armstrong been in any of these three races, he would’ve easily danced a merry jig all over the peloton.
Here’s the thing: almost no big name athletes who have come out of retirement to compete again have reached their expectations. A good example is Brett Favre, who has retired and comeback a number of times and got progressively worse and more injured over time. Michael Schumacher is another good example, spending even longer out of Formula 1 than Lance Armstrong spent out of cycling. With a strong car and a teammate who not infrequently broke onto the podium in 2010, he couldn’t do better than 4th. To a lesser extent, we’ve seen Ben Cousins take a year out of the sport due to drug infringements before rejoining at Richmond. No-one really knew what to expect from Cousins but he was very injury prone and, whilst he usually played well, inconsistency in terms of stringing games together was Cousins’ ultimate downfall.
Lance had the Tour all his own way: seven victories, most of them by comfortable margins, consistently held off one of the most talented riders ever in Jan Ullrich. I’m not really sure why he retired but I have a theory. He got spooked that, with the young talent on the rise, it wouldn’t be long until someone came and knocked him off. His ego at the time may not have been able to handle this. Hence, he decided to end it on his own terms before they were ended for him. Once he realised that the competition, with Alberto Contador as the exception, was not as strong as he thought, his large ego kicked back in again, hence the comeback. Ironically, he probably did his image and his ego more harm than good in his comeback. I firmly believe that, as I mentioned above, he would have gone on to win another 2 or 3 Tours had he not retired. Just look at the form of some of the golden oldies still going around and putting in great performances: Christophe Moreau has ridden better in the past 3 years than his entire career before that, George Hincapie has been part of one of the most successful lead-out trains of all time, Chris Horner is still chasing breakaway victories, Sylvain Chavanel won two stages and held the yellow jersey at the Tour last year and Koos Moerenhout finished off with a great showing in the World Champs time trial last year.
One thing you can’t take away from Lance though was his determination. Despite having to play the loyal teammate, recover from crashes and trying to piece together some form with limited racing, he still managed to take a podium on his return. He’s also been pumping up some of the young talent coming through, such as Jack Bobridge and Michael Mathews. Add to that a solid result in the Giro in 2009 and you could forgive him for making the right decision.
But we’re used to Armstrong winning. Not putting in good performances but just missing, not finding excuses for loss of form, just always on top of the pack. Its a pity that we had to see Armstrong, particularly in 2010, quickly realise that with age, speed begins to fall. Even with all his tactical nous and good decision making under pressure, he could not find a way to get back on to the winner’s step. And this, unfortunately, will be as much a measure of his career as his seven brilliant Tour victories.
Armstrong will long be touted as the greatest cyclist of the 21st century, having seceded Miguel Indurain as king of the bike. Best of all time though? As impressive as seven Tours is, it pales in comparison to 64 grand tour stage victories, 11 overall grand tour victories, winner of the yellow, green and polka dot jerseys at the 1969 Tour de France, three Paris-Nice victories, a three-times world champion, five Liege-Bastogne-Liege victories and 7 Milan-San Remo victories. In short, Armstrong was great, but Merckx is the greatest.
His timing is perhaps a hallmark of his early career. Bursting onto the scene in 1993 by becoming the youngest ever rider to win the UCI World Championship Road Race, he attacked and beat one of the best ever, Miguel Indurain, in a breakaway. In 1995, he took an emotional stage win after his team-mate, Fabio Casertelli, fell on the descent of the Col de Portet d’Aspet and was killed. At this stage of his career, he was a much bigger, stronger rider, having been a champion triathlete in his youth. He relied upon his strength to win him races, where his result rested upon a lucky break in his timing. Cancer struck in October ‘96 and it was feared he wouldn’t live, let alone ride again. Yet this only served to steel the young rider into a harder, tougher competitor. It also stripped the excess weight he was carrying. Returning in 1998, Armstrong finished 4th at the Vuelta a Espana before taking his first of seven Tours in ‘99. In the seven year reign, Armstrong became a master tactician, timing his efforts in time trials and attacks in the mountains to perfection.
However, I also think that his timing has let him down. After seven years at the top, he felt obliged to step aside from the sport despite still dominating the Tour de France in 2005. There was a feeling that he had been pushed out by a cycling community tired of his endless domination of the Tour, rather than gone out on his own terms. Had he continued, I firmly believe he would have won at least nine, if not, ten Tours de France. The competition at the race in 2006 was quite weak. Won initially by Floyd Landis before he failed a doping test, the Tour was handed to Oscar Perreiro, who was only in the position to win due to a freak day where the peloton let the gap blow out to over half an hour. He also benefited from a massive drop in form from Landis on Stage 16 before his drug-assisted breakaway heroics on Stage 17. In 2007, Michael Rasmussen looked set to win the Tour before he was sacked by his Rabobank team, gifting the win to a young Alberto Contador with Cadel Evans close behind. 2008 was also a relatively weak year with Carlos Sastre winning because of his ludicrously strong team and Cadel Evans losing from his ludicrously weak one. Had Armstrong been in any of these three races, he would’ve easily danced a merry jig all over the peloton.
Here’s the thing: almost no big name athletes who have come out of retirement to compete again have reached their expectations. A good example is Brett Favre, who has retired and comeback a number of times and got progressively worse and more injured over time. Michael Schumacher is another good example, spending even longer out of Formula 1 than Lance Armstrong spent out of cycling. With a strong car and a teammate who not infrequently broke onto the podium in 2010, he couldn’t do better than 4th. To a lesser extent, we’ve seen Ben Cousins take a year out of the sport due to drug infringements before rejoining at Richmond. No-one really knew what to expect from Cousins but he was very injury prone and, whilst he usually played well, inconsistency in terms of stringing games together was Cousins’ ultimate downfall.
Lance had the Tour all his own way: seven victories, most of them by comfortable margins, consistently held off one of the most talented riders ever in Jan Ullrich. I’m not really sure why he retired but I have a theory. He got spooked that, with the young talent on the rise, it wouldn’t be long until someone came and knocked him off. His ego at the time may not have been able to handle this. Hence, he decided to end it on his own terms before they were ended for him. Once he realised that the competition, with Alberto Contador as the exception, was not as strong as he thought, his large ego kicked back in again, hence the comeback. Ironically, he probably did his image and his ego more harm than good in his comeback. I firmly believe that, as I mentioned above, he would have gone on to win another 2 or 3 Tours had he not retired. Just look at the form of some of the golden oldies still going around and putting in great performances: Christophe Moreau has ridden better in the past 3 years than his entire career before that, George Hincapie has been part of one of the most successful lead-out trains of all time, Chris Horner is still chasing breakaway victories, Sylvain Chavanel won two stages and held the yellow jersey at the Tour last year and Koos Moerenhout finished off with a great showing in the World Champs time trial last year.
One thing you can’t take away from Lance though was his determination. Despite having to play the loyal teammate, recover from crashes and trying to piece together some form with limited racing, he still managed to take a podium on his return. He’s also been pumping up some of the young talent coming through, such as Jack Bobridge and Michael Mathews. Add to that a solid result in the Giro in 2009 and you could forgive him for making the right decision.
But we’re used to Armstrong winning. Not putting in good performances but just missing, not finding excuses for loss of form, just always on top of the pack. Its a pity that we had to see Armstrong, particularly in 2010, quickly realise that with age, speed begins to fall. Even with all his tactical nous and good decision making under pressure, he could not find a way to get back on to the winner’s step. And this, unfortunately, will be as much a measure of his career as his seven brilliant Tour victories.
Armstrong will long be touted as the greatest cyclist of the 21st century, having seceded Miguel Indurain as king of the bike. Best of all time though? As impressive as seven Tours is, it pales in comparison to 64 grand tour stage victories, 11 overall grand tour victories, winner of the yellow, green and polka dot jerseys at the 1969 Tour de France, three Paris-Nice victories, a three-times world champion, five Liege-Bastogne-Liege victories and 7 Milan-San Remo victories. In short, Armstrong was great, but Merckx is the greatest.
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