Updated 8/21: Alberto Contador, Lance Armstrong & Johan Bruyneel Tour de France 2009

8/21 update. I've been asking the question since the announcement of the creation of Team Radio Shack, and finally saw the answer this morning in an article at Cycling Weekly. Johan Bruyneel, like Alberto Contador, has a contract with Astana that runs through 2010. They didn't fire him as they had threatened. If he doesn't have a buy-out clause in his contract, forget the hubris, he could be there next year. If he is, and he allows Radio Shack to raid his riders and staff, and hasn't been hiring the absolute best replacements available, he could have a really interesting year. First he let Armstrong come between Contador and the team; now he could let Lance come between himself and what had been a quality organization. It's like a soap opera, but without the hot women.


August 17 update. According to his twitter account, Neal Rogers of Velo News got a copy of the Tour de France edition and was impressed with everything from the front cover to an article Andrew Hood wrote about Alberto Contador. I asked Rogers by tweet how in-depth the Contador story is, and he said just that article alone is worth the cover price. I don't know when it hits news stands, but hopefully the truth will be out there, and the cycling press can re-think the sensational headlines and tweets. Fingers crossed that he did the research, spoke to a number of riders, and wrote an unbiased account.

Also, kudos to Steve at steephill.tv to use his website to call out the English-speaking press for sensationalistic headlines and, as I said, character assassination. A few dozen people have found this blog post - Steve has a lot of traffic to the website, and his stand may have cost him some revenue.





I'm adding new information and article links at the bottom of the page as I find them. Legendary cycling photographer Graham Watson captured Lance Armstrong intercepting a bottle of water Jose Ivan Guttierez was handing to his buddy, Alberto Contador on the climb up Mont Ventoux. This link will take you to Graham's stage 20 gallery - you have to hit "next image" a bunch of times to get to the right picture.


I undeleted this blog to post one entry about the Team Astana / Lance Armstrong / Johan Bruyneel / Alberto Contador situation. I feel that Contador is a victim of character assassination, at least here in America. Someone in the media apparently chopped up the translation of Alberto's press conference after the Tour de France, and it made his statements sound much more controversial and inflammatory. I've heard translations from The BBC & Reuters, and I trust those. Unfortunately, perhaps in an attempt to continue the controversy and website hits from the Tour de France, sentences have been altered to change the meaning, and sensationalist headlines followed.

Frankly, I've never seen so much propaganda and spin in my life. And since there are so few sources of unaltered and unbiased information out there, I have no clue if Armstrong, Bruyneel and their twitter army of zealots saw Alberto's actual comments before posting tweets that would reach hundreds of thousands of people online (twitter is known for spammers and fake followers) and would be repeated in thousands of websites and publications around the Globe, from the New York Times to Perez Hilton.

I trust the BBC to make the effort for an honest and accurate translation. Here's the link

And here's my transcription of the translation:

"Well, my relationship with Lance is zero. My relationship with him is zero. I think that independently of what his character is, he's still a great champion. He's won seven Tours and played a big part in this one, too. But it's different to speak at a personal level. I have never really admired him that much, or will ever, but of course as a cyclist, he is a great champion."

It's hardly incendiary, and in my mind doesn't deserve the response it received from people willing to pass judgment based on a snippet of a sound bite of a translation.

In case you're skeptical, and what pro cycling fan isn't these days, you can hear the pretty much identical translation from Reuters here.

There were other bits as well, about the hotel being the toughest part, and the dynamics between the two affecting the rest of the Astana team and staff. All of it was more harmless than things Armstrong said or tweeted during the Tour.

Someone posted a translation and a link in a comments section of an article about Contador/Armstrong, and what Alberto probably meant about problems at the hotel. Here's the link to the article, which is in Spanish. And here's the Babelfish translation of two paragraphs - Contador translates into English as "Accountant".

History of a solitude. Thursday happened, hours before the race against the clock of Annecy. Accountant lowered to the lobby of the Palace of Menthon, the luxurious hotel of the Astana. The Tour followed in game. It watched the right, to the left. Nobody, nothing. Neither aids nor cars. Cold sweat. Watched the clock. But, where they are? The hotel is of the exit several kilometers. And the leader of the Tour, in chanclas, stock market in hand and only. Then he entered ' hall' , he looked for an answer he found and it: Armstrong had ordered the aids to go to gather his wife, her children and their friendly to the airport. Accountant under the last one because he was going to be the last one in leaving in the race against the clock. Armstrong had cleared him the car. It was the overflow. Hot sweat. The one of the rage. It called to his Fran brother. It came to look for to him and it took to him, in a vehicle deprived, until Annecy. It left the last one and it arrived first. Its better victory. In crono. Alone. Since its second Tour has won.

The story said that Astana had stayed in a fancy hotel supplied by the Tour the night before the final Time Trial. Contador, who led the race and so had the final start time, went down to the lobby looking for his ride to the race, and there was no one around. The story said that Armstrong had sent the available cars to the airport to pick up friends and family, leaving Alberto stranded. He had to call his brother, who got a car picked up Alberto and rushed the race leader to the start. At about that same time, the world was reading an article by Greg LeMond where he strongly suggested that Contador was cheating. For the Time Trial, Bruyneel elected to ride in the follow car behind Lance, where he could give him feedback, offer assistance, and help him to the best performance possible. Contador had others follow him, and his ear piece went quiet fifteen kilometers into the ride. He had no input as to whether the rain was falling along the course, how his split times compared to others, and he had no encouragement except from fans lining the road. He raced anyway, quite alone, and won, defending the yellow jersey proudly by beating all comers in the long Time Trial. Instead of congratulations, he was questioned by a reporter from the same publication LeMond that published the LeMond accusations, wanting to talk about doping. Then Armstrong stole his rightful attention by announcing on that day the formation of the new Radio Shack team, just as he had announced his comeback while Alberto was poised to win the Vuelta a Espana.



I saw the same story related briefly here, along with documentation of other problems between Contador and Bruyneel. Johan apparently read it on July 29, before he posted this tweet:

Just read a piece about LA and me in a spanish sports newspaper called AS. I'm really convinced they need a double S now...

Here's the Google Translation of that piece. "Equipment" is "team".

Benjamin Noval. Contador asked Noval in the team but was excluded. "Bruyneel has created a very bad atmosphere in Tselinograd Armstrong since he arrived," said Benjamin.


Press. Bruyneel on Contador only accompanied the news of the departure of Monaco.
Then he was not at his side or in two days of rest, or in the conference final. Argues that the technician did not take questions focus on attracting Armstrong.

Range. Armstrong became a fan (3rd stage). Zubeldia and Popovych Bruyneel threw order, although it was behind Contador. Yielded 41 seconds.

No hotels. Jacinto Vidarte and Fran Contador, Alberto's press chief, could not stay in some hotels Tselinograd because there was a gap of Lance Armstrong friendships.

Always bus. Contador riding the bus to the hotel in the team. Armstrong did it in a private car.

Champagne. When Armstrong decided to celebrate the victories, as the day of the team time trial. When Contador won and became a leader in Verbier (15th stage), not considered necessary.

Twitter criticism. Contador attacked in Colombière (Stage 17) and stopped off to Klöden. Despite the apology at the finish line, was criticized by Twitter. Leipheimer wrote: "If Klöden lost the podium for two minutes, we already know why." And Armstrong: "I'd rather bite the tongue."

Without a car in Annecy. Contador hotel went out of the time trial in Annecy in the car of his brother Fran. The team had no vehicles available, some still the stage and other guests gathered for Armstrong. Mont Ventoux the day happened again: Contador dropped to the press room with Fran and Jacinto, because the team's cars were already gone.

New equipment. Armstrong announced the formation of a new team, which will not be Contador, coinciding with the crucial final week of the Tour. Will promote more division in announcing names Tselinograd cyclists Iran with Texas.

Trial. Bruyneel Armstrong chose to follow in the time trial. With the leader of the Tour were two other technical equipment, and Gallopin Ekimov. At kilometer 15 the radio was broken and Counter stopped receiving referrals.

Sheepskin. Contador suffered severe abrasions due to sheepskin. Their environment had to solve the problem yourself with a Spanish company, and Alberto ran in Mont Ventoux with a different culottes.

Here's the original Spanish:

| 29/07/2009

Benjamín Noval. Contador pidió a Noval en el equipo, pero fue excluido. Benjamin Noval. "Bruyneel ha creado muy mal ambiente en el Astaná desde que llegó Armstrong", dijo Benjamín.

Ruedas de prensa. Bruyneel sólo acompañó a Contador en la rueda de prensa de la salida de Mónaco. Luego no estuvo a su lado ni en los dos días de descanso, ni en la conferencia final. El técnico argumenta que no quería quitarle foco acaparando preguntas sobre Armstrong.

Abanico. Armstrong entró en un abanico (3ª etapa). Zubeldia y Popovych tiraron por orden de Bruyneel, a pesar de que Contador iba detrás. Cedió 41 segundos.

Sin hoteles. Fran Contador y Jacinto Vidarte, jefe de prensa de Alberto, no pudieron pernoctar en algunos hoteles del Astaná porque había que hacer hueco a las amistades de Lance Armstrong.

Siempre en bus. Contador viajaba al hotel en el autobús del equipo. Armstrong lo hacía en un coche privado.

Champán. Armstrong decidía cuándo se celebraban las victorias, como el día de la crono por equipos. Cuando Contador ganó y se puso líder en Verbier (15ª etapa), no lo consideró necesario.

Críticas en Twitter. Contador atacó en La Colombière (17ª etapa) y dejó descolgado a Klöden. A pesar de que pidió disculpas en la meta, recibió críticas a través del Twitter. Leipheimer escribió: "Si Klöden pierde el podio por dos minutos, ya sabemos por qué". Y Armstrong: "Prefiero morderme la lengua".

Sin coche en Annecy. Contador se desplazó del hotel a la salida de la crono de Annecy en el coche de su hermano Fran. El equipo no tenía vehículos disponibles: unos seguían la etapa y otros recogían invitados de Armstrong. El día del Mont Ventoux volvió a suceder: Contador bajó a la sala de prensa con Fran y Jacinto, porque los coches del equipo ya se habían ido.

Nuevo equipo. Armstrong anunció la formación de un nuevo equipo, en el que no estará Contador, coincidiendo con la decisiva última semana del Tour. Se fomentó más división en Astaná anunciando nombres de ciclistas que irán con el texano.

Contrarreloj. Bruyneel prefirió seguir a Armstrong en la crono. Con el líder del Tour fueron otros dos técnicos del equipo, Gallopin y Ekimov.En el kilómetro 15 se rompió la radio y Contador dejó de recibir referencias.

Badana. Contador sufrió serias rozaduras por culpa de la badana. Su entorno tuvo que solucionar el problema por su cuenta con una empresa española y Alberto corrió en el Mont Ventoux con un culotte diferente.

Let's look at Johan Bruyneel for a minute, as his Astana team is about to be dismantled a hundred percent due to his allowing Armstrong to do as he liked with the team. Here's what he had to say about the situation to the world press during the Astana team camp in Tenerife last December:

"If Lance is not the best, he will become the best teammate Alberto could ever have dreamed of,"

Astana held a second training camp in Santa Rosa, California in February. Lance arranged for the Trek-Livestrong Under 23 team to be there at the same time. He spent most of the early days training with them, generating publicity for those organizations rather than Team Astana. Lance left camp early to go to the San Diego wind tunnel one day, and the velodrome in L.A. the next, before skipping the final days of camp and going home. Bruyneel lives in Madrid, and when he tweeted that he was flying to the U.S. I assumed he'd be going to the camp where all of his riders, mechanics, soigneurs and other staff were gathered for the last time before the main racing year. Instead, he went straight to hang out with Lance. Imagine the head of your organization behaving like that, choosing to hang out with a friend who isn't under contract instead of getting rare face time with every real employee he has.

Bruyneel announced during the Tour that he had "heard whispers" and would leave Team Astana at the end of the season. While he may have heard whispers, the rest of us heard before the Tour started that Astana was ready to fire his ass and take back the team he had allowed Armstrong to use as his personal plaything.

Here's a quote from a July 4 Tim Maloney Universal Sports article, which can be found in its entirety here.

But Nikolaï Proskurin, the vice-president of the Kazakh cycling federation, had harsh words for Bruyneel in L'Equipe after non-payment of team fees caused the Astana team to ride without team logos on their jerseys at the Giro d'Italia.

"We were not happy with (Bruyneel's) behavior as it caused major embarassment to Kazakhstan, and we have more than enough reason to fire him. Contrary to what most people think, (Bruyneel) works for (the Kazakh cycling federation) not the other way around.”

The President of Kazakhstan was also involved, as you can see in this Cycling Weekly article by Andrew Canning posted July 3:

These comments could be largely dismissed as posturing but a statement from the Kazakh President no less seem to add weight to the rumours of a Kazakh take-over at Astana.

According to L’Equipe, President Nursultan Nazarbaiev proposed re-structuring the team around Alberto Contador without Lance Armstrong and Bruyneel.

“We are going to approach Alberto Contador and propose lengthening his contract,” said Nazarbaiev.

“He will be our sole leader for the years to come, he will have every liberty to choose the riders that he wants to have at his side.

“In our mind, the team will be made up of Spanish and Kazakh riders, amongst those Alexandre Vinokourov”.

Lance and Bruyneel had hoped during the Giro that Astana would fail to meet their financial obligations and they could step up, take over the license and the parts of the team they wanted, and win Lance the Tour de France for both their greater glory. You can believe that riders devoted to Lance, like Chris Horner, would have made the team.

Lance has recently accused Alberto via twitter to be an ungrateful teammate. Here's what Lance had to say about Astana during the Giro, this from ABC News:

"I've already said all I know about Kazakhstan, Astana, Borat. I don't know anything more," Armstrong said when last asked about the issue. "It's not my team, it's not my sponsor. I've got nothing to say about it."

Armstrong clearly meant to use the Astana team and staff for the Tour and then move on. The Vinokourov return was meant to be the symbolic final straw that got Bruyneel fired, but once he saw those articles just prior to the start of the Tour, he would have known he was a lame duck, yet at the same time had unchallenged power to play favorites with Lance and try to win Lance the race, gaining more acclaim for themselves and an even brighter future.

Alberto Contador knew all of this, and lived with the build-up for ten months. He knew he could win the Tour again. His only true ally was his brother, who the earlier article suggests was often unable to stay in the same Tour hotel because Armstrong had people in available rooms. I'm willing to believe that bit after reading about the rest day transfer flight on a plane supplied by the Tour. Armstrong had the front row of the plane reserved for himself, and he sat there with Bruyneel. Contador sat with Kloden in row eighteen. Alberto won the spot as team leader in the opening day in Monaco. Lance was looked upon as a veteran genius when he went with Team Columbia in a crosswind, waving Zubeldia and Popovich to help set pace at the font of the group, with Armstrong gaining 41 seconds on Alberto and leapfrogging him in the standings. That was a pretty clear act of war, unless you listened to Versus announcers.

Alberto attacked in the mountains to reclaim his position, but instead of being called a hero, Bruyneel, Armstrong and others tried to make him sound like a loose cannon who wouldn't follow orders. Later in the race, Armstrong told the world that he couldn't beat Alberto and would devote himself to working for him. The fans gave him credit fir that, but a bit later he changed his mind when talking to his home town press, saying that a lot of things would have to go his way to win. That's when Alberto had to start looking for rides, and I honestly feared that someone would put Castor oil in his oatmeal to take him out of the race.

In my opinion, it was cool when the Discovery Channel decided to quit sponsoring cycling, and Johan took the staff along to Team Astana to keep them working and together. I think it's awful that Armstrong, and apparently Bruyneel, are about to raid those same people en masse from an ongoing team. The hostile takeover didn't work, so let the raiding and plundering begin. If Team Astana folds, let there be no doubt: it was the management of Johan Bruyneel and his welcome of Lance Armstrong to the team that brought about the demise. And God help me, I supported the first first five months of the comeback. Mea culpa. I was wrong.

Let's finish this off with an exchange of tweets:
This from terrywawest to johan bruyneel"

This ones for Alberto, it is better to be silent and thought a fool, than to speak up and remove all doubt!

the response from johanbruyneel to terrywawest:

I will borrow this one from you if you don't mind

and johanbruyneel to the world:

Sometimes it is better to be silent and thought a fool, than to speak up and remove all doubt!

For the record, it's an Abraham Lincoln quote. Yes, the President who saw a nation divided, with brother fighting brother, and brought them together again. Someone should probably have mentioned that instead of seemingly taking credit for it. And it's really ironic coming from Bruyneel right now.

“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.”

The truth is slowly starting to be translated into English, and will hopefully hit the fan soon. I've been leaving comments everywhere and e-mailing and tweeting journalists and cycling publications as well. I'm going to add news to the bottom rather than rewrite every time.

This is from a Nate Peterson article in the New York Times:

After Contador revealed his dislike and lack of admiration for Armstrong in a news conference Monday and Armstrong fired back on Twitter, more reports detailing a testy relationship between them have emerged.

El País, a Spanish newspaper, reported that on the Mont Ventoux stage of the Tour, Ivan Gutierrez, another Spanish rider, said that he offered Contador his water bottle but that Armstrong picked it off and drank it himself, then turned back to say something to Contador. El País also reported that Armstrong took the last Astana team car after one Tour stage and left Contador stranded, forcing him to get a ride with his brother.

I tracked down the original El Pais article by C. Arribas / E. Up / E. Rodrigalvarez here. There's also a bit in there about Johan Bruyneel steering Alberto to the smaller contingent of Spanish press for interviews, even though he apparently speaks decent English (Lance said recently that he didn't communicate with Contador because he (Armstrong) doesn't speak Spanish). It allowed Lance to say whatever he wanted in the press with no chance for rebuttal from Alberto. It also kept Alberto from telling the English-speaking fans what was happening to him. I watched on Versus, and they always showed Contador speaking Spanish, without translating, which made sense if he was only given to the Spanish-speaking press.

If you'd like to imagine what it might have been like at the team meals, you can watch this video from Trek.



7/31 Road Bike Action has stepped up to the plate with a partial translation of the El Pais story here.

Contador said psychologically, the worst day of the Tour for him was the day after Arcalis. Bruyneel and Armstrong criticized him for his move. Armstrong said, ‘I have always obeyed the instructions of the team and I have won seven Tours.’ From that point on Contador said he acted as if Bruyneel and Armstrong simply didn’t exist.

Apparentely, other riders loyal to Armstrong also spoke up, but he said he turned to his small cadre of supporters: Paulinho, his mechanic, his soigneur and his brother who serves as his manager. Team staff remained neutral throughout the race.

Contador said that the fact that he gave his press conferences in Spanish was for two reasons. First, Bruyneel believes it is best to speak your native language. Second, it was a line in the sand between Contador and Armstrong, with Armstrong only speaking in English. The Spanish paper accused Bruyneel of deliberately isolating Contador even further by attending only the first press conference with him in Monaco. Bruyneel spun if differently, saying “If the questions don’t all come to me than I can’t diminish the role of anyone.”

Contador said when it was time for him to go to the time trial in Annecy that all the Astana support vehicles were being used to ferry Radio Schack VIPs and Armstrong entourage members; he took a hotel car to the start. That was the height of the psychological warfare, from his point of view.

8/1 Time for more propoganda without actual substance. Diane Pucin of the Los Angeles Times wrote this puff peace trashing Contador, and praising Lance. The words can be found here. I doubt she'll approve and post my comment. Here's the gist of her logic:

Honestly, it makes Contador seem like a sore winner and something of a whiner. After all, Contador has forever the yellow jersey from 2009. Armstrong and Astana couldn't have treated him that badly then. You don't win the Tour without assistance from a team.

Lance Armstrong & Media Drama

I thought that this week might be a good time to remind you what Lance said about the press when he announced his comeback. If you haven't kept up with recent news, Cycling Weekly will catch you up here.


The two paragraphs below are from the Vanity Fair article by Douglas Brinkley that was meant to break the comeback story on September 9, 2008. I'm not going to give my own opinion on the matter, but after seeing twitter this morning, I thought I'd put the info out there. Cheers.

In addition, he promised, “We’re going to be completely transparent and open with the press. This is for the world to see.… And everybody was supportive. Bart—because he’s my best friend—looked at me like, Do you really want to do this? That was the extent of his skepticism. But everybody else was like, Let’s go!

Armstrong recognizes that the European press may very well be laying in wait for him, hoping he’ll fail. “I didn’t go out of my way to make friends with the French media,” he says. “In fact, I was combative. I was unavailable, arrogant, and I was that way to a lot of them. Anybody who wrote a negative article: Done. Never speak to them again. I won’t do that this time. I mean, these daily or weekly [phone conferences]? Everyone’s invited. From the bitterest of rivals I’ve ever had in the pressroom: Get on call. If you’ve got a question, ask it.… They’ll realize that I’m not messing around.” The difference this time, he says, is that he won’t be flaunting his Americanism in their faces. “The constituency that I represent,” he says, “is now cancer survivors.

Why I STOPPED Blogging About Lance Armstrong

I’m actually writing this entry for myself. If you’re a Lance Armstrong disciple/zealot, you’re better off looking at any other entry in the blog and avoiding this one. Seriously.

Recently I considered bringing the blog out of retirement. I added a stats counter to the one at Blogspot, and was less than delighted to see that someone had apparently linked to my extremely cryptic farewell blog post from some site with “psychotic men” in the title. Nice. I deleted the post, cleared the counter, and went on my merry way. But friends and strangers told me on twitter that they were confused by things I wrote and was intentionally vague about at the time.

My reason for being vague was that when I started the first version of this blog last Fall, I’d been going through every news item on Google that mentioned Lance to gather info about training, racing, and preparation. I had to wade through a lot of negative stories. There was the whole Greg LeMond debacle in Las Vegas. Bordry of the French doping agency put pressure on Lance to have old samples tested. German TV said they wouldn’t show the Tour of France if Lance participated. The haters came out in force. A writer for ESPN demanded explanations for various parts of the comeback as if she possessed veto power and could make him go away. Alberto Contador went to the Spanish press and demanded that he be named the leader for the Tour de France team, and threatened to switch teams even though in real life he’d signed a multi-year contract that he had requested, and there was no way out.

Since I’d pull up the last hour of news item, and just refresh, I was usually the first one to comment on those stories. When Australian news sites said Lance would ride in the Tour Down Under, I left comments for two weeks saying he couldn’t race until February 1, but good luck. I defended Lance at a number of sites against the negative stories. I questioned LeMond’s motivation, and when he said that having Lance or Astana pay Don Catlin to do yet another tier of drug testing created a conflict of interest, I explained that scientists don’t travel the globe doing free drug testing, so who did he think SHOULD pay for them. I addressed a lot of things the woman at ESPN said in a comment that I’m still proud of, and it was strong enough for someone at a cycling forum to link to and try to flame me for suggesting that maybe Lance wanted to come back “for love of the game”, etc.

Of course, Lance later did the long interview with Guardian UK saying that if you read the comments to articles closely, you’ll notice a lot of them are from the same people, so they have no value. My bad for trying to defend you, dude. I’d started following him the first day he was on twitter – I’d seen on the Livestrong page that Doug had talked him into signing up. I’d sent a few people, including Lance, a heads up about the blog at the time, and I believe he clicked on the link, and know for a fact that some people from LS at least peaked at it. In that same Guardian article, he said that the opinion of bloggers doesn’t matter, and he actually mentioned the name John as part of his example. It could have been coincidence, but the timing was close, and as a loyal fan who stuck up for and supported him, I felt slighted. But I wasn’t blogging for him, I was doing it for other fans, and so that I could look back and find articles and videos myself, so I regrouped and came back with gusto.

I decided that since I was doing all the research anyway, enjoy writing, and needed a project to occupy my time, I would gather the best of the articles, videos, etc. available and put them in one place. The idea was to help other loyal Armstrong fans save time, and avoid wading through negative, and political and celebrity stories and find quick links to the good stuff. This was a kind of sanctuary, or safe haven.

When I wrote the farewell entry, I’d become disillusioned by some things. But I respected my own rules about this blog, and that’s why I didn’t spell them out. It would be like inviting people into a church and then cursing at them, or making them watch South Park or something.

Those of you who have read the Lance books, and watch Road to Paris, The Lance Chronicles, etc. will remember how Lance used to go to Europe months before the Tour, live alone, train long and hard, especially on the climbs of the Tour, brave all kinds of weather, test out equipment, and so on. I expected him to do it that way again, and looked to that work ethic, attention to detail, and willingness to sacrifice for inspiration.

Sometimes you can look at someone too closely, though. I was blogging my little heart out about his personal training camp in Hawaii. I’d seen the article by Chris Carmichael giving Lance’s schedule as three-day training blocks. I realized that he’d done four hard days in a row, and he said he was going to take it easy in Hawaii for a while. I figured that if a guy had an easy day coming, and a hellaciously long flight, it would make sense to fly on the rest day. He and his personal photographer had gone hours without tweeting, and after tweeting back and forth with some new Aussie friends, we decided that he was on his way. I even checked flight times and things and pegged it within an hour. I tweeted Lance about it. When they landed, he said that they didn’t think that people would notice anything and figure out what he was up to. Then he gave credit to Rupert Guinness for figuring it out. Later he changed the story to say that he knew in advance that people would notice the absence of tweets, but there was nothing they could have done about it. Why change the story? If they’d really thought of it, and had Phillip Maertens lying to the press about travel plans, he could have told his manager what time he’d eat supper, given him his password, and let him tweet for him that he was eating supper.

Yes that’s small, but I have a thing for honesty. Anyway, I was still blogging and really excited about the Astana camp in Santa Rosa prior to the Tour of California. I expected more training with the team, including Alberto Contador, bonding and team-building, etc. But they had scheduled the Trek-Livestrong U23 team to be there at the same time, and Lance rode with them instead of Astana. Then he left halfway through to go alone to the wind tunnel in San Diego. Johan Bruyneel flew over from Spain, and instead of spending time with the other 27 riders, and the whole staff, at training camp, he was in San Diego with Lance. From there Lance went to Los Angeles to the velodrome, and flew home. I wrote the One Hour Record entry at the time, but there wasn’t much to say about the camp that went on without him.

The Tour of California finished me off. There was the famous robbery. There were what, three bikes stolen and Jani’s was misplaced? So the twitter army went mobile, and all the news stories were about a vanity painted bike that he wasn’t to ride for a couple of days. Meanwhile, he and everyone else ignored the fact that a couple of his teammates didn’t have anything to race on that day or the next. They ended up borrowing some Madones from Trek Travel. Trek had plenty of time to paint Lance a new TT bike and get it there. But for someone who wrote a book called It’s not About the Bike, it sure was about the bike for a couple of days.

Then there was the stage two crash into a moto carrying a photographer. It turns out it was his personal photographer. In his interview, he described it as “a photographer from the race,” but she admitted on her twitter that it had been her, turned around taking a picture of him while he talked to Johan in the car. This is a woman he’d known for years, took pics of him in his hotel room, went with him to Hawaii, Australia and everywhere else, and even cut his hair. Why not just be honest and say it was her? And I had no problem when she was riding in a team car that was already part of a race, but who in the history of cycling has needed their own personal photographer on an extra moto in a race causing crashes? They later, I believe at another race, identified her as an Astana team photographer, but for that race they paid to have photos by the legendary Graham Watson on their website, and they didn’t use hers anywhere. If Astana had cash flow problems, why have a photographer whose pictures they didn’t even use? And why did she go home with Lance when he hurt his collarbone instead of staying and taking pics of Alberto and the others? I imagined what it would be like if Alberto brought his own moto photog, or Cavendish, or Sastre, or Cadel, or one for each team competing for time on the narrow roads or climbs of the Giro or the Tour. I had expected Lance to have the same treatment as everyone else while actually in the peloton.

I think that Livestrong does great work, and I’m glad they exist for people with cancer, and their families and friends, and researchers. But I saw a YouTube video from the ATOC that really bothered me. It’s a tradition that dedicated fans at races like the Tour get to the big climbs days in advance, party and write on the road in front of where they’ll sand for their favorite players or teams. Some of the corners at L’Alpe d’Huez have fans from certain nationalities marking up the roads and cheering on their nationals. In the ATOC video, there were members of the “Livestrong Army” driving out in front of the riders. They pulled up to the intersection, piled out of the van, and some handed out yellow chalk while others started writing things like “Go Lance” on the road. One leader told the fans in the area to take the chalk and write Go Lance, and one of the fans could be heard asking, “what about the other riders?” Then the van pulled off, making it look like the fans there had done the work and were all supporting Lance, and I’m sure repeated that along the course. Did Lance really not have enough supporters that they needed to use resources to go out and write his name all along the route? I read afterwards that some people near the finish line had been given yellow chalk and had written names of loved ones on the road in front of them while they waited for the end of the race. It sounded really touching, and apparently meant a lot to people. But can you imagine people from say the Basque Country staking out spots with their campers on some climb for four days, and having strangers pull up just before the race and write some non-Basque riders name on the road, then leave and make it look like those folks had done it?

The one thing I knew for sure since last September was that Lance would train old-school, do recon on the Giro course, and win the thing. I didn’t look past that to the Tour. Then he wasn’t going to do recon in Italy at all. He wasn’t going to do recon on the Tour stages in June, but stay in the States. Before the race where he got hurt, he said in an article that he might not even finish the Giro – if the baby came early, he was flying home.

At the same time, I was following Ivan Basso on twitter, and reading his Cycling News diary, and going through his SRM workouts, and realized that he was preparing for the Giro with the same attributes I’d looked for in Lance. He’d get up, train, preferably with teammates, do so much course recon that the Gazzetta accused him of obsession, get the massage, eat and sleep. He’d spend time with his family when he could, but he was willing to go to Tenerife and live and eat and train with his Liquigas teammates even though they’d already had two training camps together. I followed other riders on twitter, and read articles, and saw how hard they were working, and sacrificing.

There are a lot of fans out there who worship Lance. He can post a picture of a pair of ugly orthopedic shoes to his twitter as a joke, and people will tell him how great they are, and ask where they can buy a pair. I’m not one of those guys. And it would be hypocritical of me to try to get attention to new blog posts to satisfy my vanity as a fledgling writer. I reactivated my BloggingLance account at twitter for a bit (I’d deleted it when old friends wouldn’t let me change the name to something not involving Lance), and then posted the entry about Ivan Basso’s training, because people, especially cyclists, are always asking riders how far they went and things, and the info is all out there. Some new readers questioned my loyalty. Which is fine.

I’m not anti-Lance. I’m not impressed with the new bikes for every race. But I wish him well. His coach (in name anyway) tweeted recently that “from his training data..i think lance with surprise some people on how he rides in the giro”. I thought that was a bit ironic, since the coach takes money from Bicycling magazine to give exclusive training updates about Lance, so if people who read his articles faithfully are surprised, then he’s not doing his job as a writer. His last article mentioned that Lance had been on a Time Trial bike for half an hour and it wasn’t too bad. There was a video that didn’t include the coach, and that was pretty much it. I had tried to put together an entry of Lance’s training since the end of the Tour of California, but it would have consisted of info from tweets that had already been seen by hundreds of thousands of people. There’d been weeks lately where I followed all the news again, and I told myself I was lucky to not be blogging about him any more because there was no meaningful information out there.

Every time they tested Lance, they said he was ahead of schedule, all the way back to mid-December. He was still ahead of schedule at the race where he got hurt (a race he’d changed his schedule to enter because Alberto Contador had called him out, by the way). He missed a bit of time with the travel and surgery, but it seemed his interest in hard training was renewed by the challenge of the injury. He did better than he expected when he tested with Kevin Livingston in Colorado before the last-minute entry into the Tour of the Gila. Take all that, and add in the tweet about his condition from Carmichael. I’m not going to look up the quote, but I saw one line from Lance somewhere after the Team Time Trial that led me to believe he’s planning a lot more than his mantra of being there solely to help Levi and will try to win one stage himself. When I saw him being led out by Popovych late in today’s stage, on a day that Levi was having flat tires and getting caught behind crashes, I started thinking that Lance might have been bluffing to the press to make him seem like an underdog with no chance, and then he’ll go out and try to do something special. The bettors and oddsmakers will hate him for it. At least half of them will.

And why once again be so vague when questioned about receiving appearance money? It was a political issue in Australia. If he’s getting a pile of money for showing up, and there’s nothing wrong with it, why make it appear otherwise? And if he’s not getting a pile, why not say so, instead of alluding to $500 from the Tour of the Gila?

When Lance first started posting twitpics last November, there was one of him and his soigneur Richard on a snowy col in France. Richard is in charge of giving Lance his daily massage, driving the follow vehicle behind the bike in places like France, help with the bikes, etc. It seemed like he was a full-time employee traveling around the world with Lance. When Astana’s financial problems hit the news big this week, Lance talked about Richard, and his wife and two kids, and how Richard was with Lance every day of the year, and that he had to have a paycheck, so if Astana sponsors don’t come through, Lance might end up paying him himself. Say what now? Let’s say you’re a professional cycling soigneur with years of experience, and you have to be away from your family for weeks at a time, and act like a personal assistant. How much would you charge? And Astana has apparently been paying for him all along even though he’s only with Lance?

I wish Armstrong well. I also wish Leipheimer well, and Jani Brajkovic, and teams Columbia and Garmin, and anyone who goes on a long breakaway, and people who attack bravely and win. I plan to enjoy this years Giro exactly the way I did last year, by sitting here each day, enjoying the scenery and the culture, and applauding human effort. Like the rider today who went off by himself nine kilometers in, led for hours as advertising for his team and sponsors, then was swallowed up, dropped off the back, and finished alone in dead last eleven minutes behind the winner. I’ll respect the tifosi for making the effort to ride their own bikes up the tough climbs to watch the race. I’ll probably cheer for Lance if he attacks and does something. But I’m not sure how he can ride completely for Levi and still win a stage. No one is going to let him go on a long breakaway that might not come back. Levi lost time to him today. He would have to finish ahead of Levi, but by a small enough margin not to move ahead of him in the general classification. If Lance plans to be a super domestique and just use the race for training, and Levi is in the maglia rosa before the Stage 12 long Time Trial, would Lance act like a domestique and rest up so he can do more work for Levi team in the mountains?

So many top riders have said honestly that they're trying to win the Giro, or a stage, or multiple stages, or use it for training for the tour, etc. I believed all of them. So I guess I need to watch Lance ride for Levi to win, and to see him try for exactly one stage win himself without sacrificing Leipheimer.

I think it will be a beautiful race. I know that given the chance to watch, I’ll totally enjoy it. But my focus will be on whatever riders happen to put in an effort on any given stage. And I’ll spend time listening to the Eurosport UK announcers that served me so well for three grand tours last year, and who announced earlier that Lance is just one rider in the race and they won’t get swept up in all the hype. Godspeed.