Lance Armstrong thinks he'll be banned from Tour de France

If they ban him, I'll not be watching it. They can stick their race, I'll watch the Giro and Vuelta instead.

I admire the persistence of the French here. They've been after Lance for a decade or more. Normally, you'd think they'd have surrendered by now.

I think they will ban him if they think they can get away with it. If they think they'll get too much flak, they'll let him stay. It certainly won't be based on fairness. They aren't capable of it.

no lance in tdf, well dont think so, come on people lets makea voices be heard,

Armstrong is acting very suspiciously and smarmily, I might add. He is using sophisticated PR leaking techniques to get in front of his disastrous AFLD encounter where he left the line of sight of the surprise tester against the rules. He is most likely a sophisticated doper who is seeing his dreams of a massive $100 million payday crushed. At this point, he is simply trying to hold onto his credibility and to smear France before they release the bad news about the Tour de France.

The French officials have shown themselves to be petty and vindictive and are becoming an embaressment to their nation. No one interested in the sport can respect them.

If he violated the rules then they have to ban him, they cannot keep making exceptions for Lance, just because he pulls crowds. The rules are the rules, and Lance knows them very well. He knew the risk he was taking and you have to ask yourself 'why did he??'

I think they are the most egregious group of professional sports monitoring groups. They dont want him back and any american who rides in the tour will have a bullseye on their back . Hello Levi.

for the french and all you other player haters.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIl5RxhLZ5U

go lance.

Mary,
Your comments about Armstrong being a 'sophisticated doper' are ridiculous!! Could it be he has finally had enough of being questioned year in year out about being a doper only because he is an extraordinary athlete? Why would someone like Armstrong need to dope, honestly? He isnt expected to win the tour after being out of it for so long, he is riding it to promote cancer awareness again, and you have the audacity to ridicule him? What contribution have you made lately to cancer research? Tell me how much money you have raised for it? It is very easy to get swept up into the media hype and criticize someone like Armstrong, especially from behind a computer screen!

It is really sad to see people like Mary and DPhillips leave posts like they have. It is always very sad to see there are such bitter people in the world for no apparent reason other then their jealously of someone else's success. Clearly they don't have any idea what they are talking about. I couldn't agree with you more Jason your comment to Mary was spot on. Secondly DPhillips if you came home and one person was waiting for you at your door and said I need your blood, hair and urine sample would you give it to them without verifying who they were first? Would you do it if you were a professional athlete that someone would just love to frame for doping? All the tests were totally negative anyways! What exceptions have they ever made for Armstrong? If there are so many why didn't you mention one of them. All this for a non-issue they had to wait 20 minutes to verify who the person was they were giving samples to sounds like a completely sane and rational thing to do.

The people in charge of the Tour are hideous. Lance is easily the most tested athlete in any sport, ever, at any time, anywhere in the world. It's completely ridiculous to think he would dope...and isn't that the point of it all? They could just test him more and let him ride rather than ban him. It's incredible the grief he gets when the only thing he ever does is win fairly, represent the sport impeccably, and help the sick and disadvantaged from around the world. These insecure, pathetic morons should be celebrating and welcoming Lance, not persecuting him. Disgusting.

"I admire the persistence of the French here. They've been after Lance for a decade or more. Normally, you'd think they'd have surrendered by now. " LMFAO

It's funny how the French in particular (or is it really one guy who has it out for Lance and is using the resources at his diposal) go after one guy so persistantly, yet the sport is rife with dopers and cheaters.
If I were Lance, I'd be having my food tested and drink nothing but bottled stuff. These guys are so hard over to nail him, I wouldn't put it past them to dope his food, then have a guy standing by to pop a test on him. How much money are these people spending on trying to get ONE guy?
Here's a suggestion: Suck it up Frenchies, no-one from your country will ever be the Icon for cycling that Lance is. You are too pompous in victory and too sore in defeat. Take what you get and ride on the shoulders of Armsrtong's popularity. Tehn again you're never one to take anyone's advice, huh?

They clearly don't care about growing the sport, if they did they would celebrate his attendence. It's like when Tiger Woods is not in a Major golf tournament... veiwership drops by probably 80%.

Lance defenders - do some research. For example, read David Walsh's latest. There is a huge amount of evidence, including one actual positive dope test for EPO (tdf 1999) that Armstrong and his teams have doped all along, and that it was a standard part of their strategy. Chris Carmichael, for example, is an expert in blood-doping, which he exploited when coaching Olympic teams. His doctor, Ferrari, is an expert in EPO. (His teams were by no means atypical!). Armstrong has been able to suppress a lot of this stuff via legal intimidation and exploitation of silly American patriotism and anti-French bias, but the story is coming out. It has nothing to do with France via the US - it is about cheating and doping. I would wager 100 to 1 that Armstrong has doped all along. His latest avoidance of a surprise drug test was not surprising. Check out Walsh's book where he quotes Lance's teammates chat about how the blood for doping was brought into the team via refrigerated motorcycle panniers!

I really have little patience for druggies in general but the conduct of the testers and lab people has
been unprofessional and has made me fear ANY ENTERPRIZE that requires drug testing. The Titanic
had less in the way of leaks and if you are sloppy with that well correct science in the lab is far far
more difficult and yet no one questions if these labs are OK based on their conduct that we can see.

if I was lance I would be having bllod drawn in tandem and sent blind to a PRO LAB as a control.
Nothing like trying to prove you didn't do X or Y in this world.
That is the reason our justice system requires the prosecution prove a case against the accused.

Mike - you're speaking enough truth mixed with lies to try and manipulate the common, uninformed reader.

The fact is that Armstrong has NEVER tested positive. In 1999 a test showed _trace_ amounts of corticosterodin - but was NOT nearly a high enough amount to call for a Positive Result. It was later shown that the substance was from a medical prescription he had for saddle sores as it was present in an APPROVED SUBSTANCE.

The fact is that as of March 2009, he's been tested 24 times in the past year. 24! The most of any prospective TDF cycler. And every one was Negative. This whole thing about leaving visual range is BS. It's just being cooked up to discredit him and prevent him from wearing the yellow jersey again.

Looks like there is a way to safely increase body EPO levels naturally. See www.EPOBOOST.com

Just one thing to say.

T O U R D E L A N C E .

And for the french people get a croissant lay back and relax.

There's one thing that 'll always make me laugh.
That is the amazing gullibility of the American public.
Nobody in France cares about if Lance wins the Tour or not.
Nobody even cares who wins the Tour.
Why ? Because everybody knows (and has always known) why the 1st 10 riders are in the top 10.
Nobody is watching that crap anymore.
There is one thing that we all agree in: Lance in a genius in his way.
One thing he outclasses anybody in: that's his ability to how could i put it .... to tilt the odds in his favour.

I mean EVERYTHING. (understand what you want :-) )
For instance, Ullrich's team was fighting both for the general classification and the the green jersey (best sprinter's jersey (Zabel)). That's stupid. At this level, going after 2 things is a waste of resources.

Also, Lance had the best riders, the biggest budget, etc etc etc...
Lance's biggest edge was the organization and the biggest amount of financial and organizational resources.

Wich is not a bad thing at all. You can't win the tour alone. (as lance often said)

I have not watched the TDF this year because of Lance Armstrong. While racing the TDF in the past we heard him say "If I can't win I won't race"

What a poor sport. What a poor loser.