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Lance Armstrong Livestrong speech You Tube stillLance Armstrong confirmed to cycle two stages of this year’s Tour de France route
Ex-footballer, Geoff Thomas, has announced the two stages that Lance Armstrong will be riding during Thomas’s charity ride, 'Le Tour – One Day Ahead'. The American will join Thomas for the 198.5km 13th stage between Muret and Rodez on July 16 and the 178.5km 14th stage from Rodez to Mende the following day, reports the BBC.
Thomas credits Armstrong’s book, It’s Not About The Bike, with giving him the inspiration to fight cancer after being given three months to live in 2003. After Thomas went into remission a decade ago, he rode the entire route of the 2005 Tour one day before the race tackled it. This summer, the 50-year-old will lead 20 cyclists – including Armstrong – in the equivalent endeavour, raising funds for Cure Leukaemia in the process.
Thomas has said he had "no regrets" about inviting the disgraced Texan to take part in the fund-raising event. Nor does he see his presence as being disrespectful of the Tour, an accusation which has been made by UCI president, Brian Cookson.
"We know Lance's involvement has split opinion, so we've tried to be as respectful as possible. The stages Lance will be riding come towards the end of week two, when I know all the riders will need some support. I know his arrival will give them the encouragement they will need to carry on with this gruelling challenge and in turn raise as much money as possible for blood cancer patients."
While Armstrong has sidestepped the mountains, he will still have to tackle some tough terrain with multiple categorised climbs and plenty of uncategorised ones. Most strikingly, the second of the two stages finishes with the Col de la Croix Neuve (also known as the Montée Laurent Jalabert following the French rider’s victory there on stage 12 of the 1995 Tour) which is around 3km long at an average gradient of 10 per cent.
"This is a charity bike ride,” said Thomas. “The Tour turns up on the day, but the day before or the day after it's just a highway, everything's gone. And that's what the Tour is about."
He clearly feels that the positives of Armstrong’s presence outweigh the negatives.
"He's paid for his past and he's going to pay more. It's for the governing bodies to sort that out. I just want to give him the opportunity of helping others. If his two days of involvement help get more revenue in for a good cause then that's great.”
Armstrong himself believes he will get a better reception than many are predicting. “I could be wrong but I’ve been to France since all this happened and that’s not the reaction I get.”
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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33 comments
Yawn. The best cheat out of a huge bunch of cheats comes back to help out for a charitable cause.
Anyway have we had a yes/no helmet debate this week?
let him do whatever he wants to do. Just STOP telling the world, he's old news & if the media stopped reporting his activities he'd soon give up trying to get attention. Trouble is, the media think we care so they keep feeding us; oh, and his ego...
I'd be willing to bet that Lance Armstrong's twitter following would be more than every rider on the 2015 TDF starting line combined.
The point being that there are a hell of a lot of people interested in him and what he has to say. Hence why the media report it. If you don't care that's your prerogative, but don't assume everyone feels the same.
Let us hope that the fans just turn their backs on him as he goes past. no jeering no shouting just nothing.
The devil incarnate. The only rider who ever doped. The only rider who ever bullied. How can we stand for this in the new clean era of cycling?
Oh dear, just as the conversation was getting civil....
Leaving all the furure aside, I for one will be interested to see what kind of a performance he can put in.
Depends on what he's taken I would've thought
He is great for any event to make money. Perfect for charities.
He was a bully, probably still is, and ruined peoples lives...that's his biggest failure - he cheated, so did everyone else, there are dopers in near enough every sport- he also should have died and didn't and should be allowed to raise money for a given cause.
Live and let live. Let Lance get on with it.
Presumably he *enjoys* cycling? And he (as I understand it) did survive cancer and did raise money to help with cancer charities? So let him do it, for a good cause and all that. I'm sure he knows he's not going to be rehabilitated so let him get on with it.
Big deal! Alberto Contador is going to ride the whole route and will probably win the thing!
Well maybe not, but if someone else does that it would be an IMpossible feat, im-possible!
That performance was IMPOSSIBLE, QUACK QUACK QUACK...
There's a big difference between Contador and this Armstrong bloke.
Contador took drugs and is still competing.
Lance took drugs and has a life ban.
??
You do understand why the two situations, and the reasons for the length of ban, are different don't you ? If you do, stop trolling - if not, go and do some reading.. fairly binary I think.
So if Lance has been treated equitably, that means that in light of the Dane's doping investigation and his admission of forcing riders to dope, we should see Bjarne Riis banned from all involvement with the sport and stripped of his TDF title...I think not somehow.
Although still very different from the situation with Armstrong, don't you think, I would personally like to see more and stronger sanctions - there are worst places to start than a ban for Riis I reckon.
Lance who?
I would have been calling for his head on this one, but after talking with someone who is doing the full ride. I can see that it is only going to help raise money. Leave him to it and stop focussing on him.
Support and write about the ride and the charity, just leave Lance out of it.
No, boycott Cure Leukemia and donate to another charity in that field instead. Pinfish the dopers but not the ill.
Please just go away.
I live in France, and I think he will be as welcome here as a fart in a spacesuit.
Or a rattlesnake in a lucky dip, as Paul Hogan once said
Who fancies heading over and accidentally crashing into Lance?
In the grand scheme of things, he didn't kill anyone right? There are people walking around that are responsible for thousands of deaths that don't get such a negative reaction by some.
If the media weren't telling me I probably wouldn't know.
Well, not directly. And no, he wasn't alone. However, during that period there were a number of younger, less famous riders who did die because, although they had access to EPO, they didn't have access to the same medical help that the big names did.
To say that "they were all doping" makes it OK is not true. There is a reason that these substances are banned in sport and it's because they endanger the health of the athletes. http://www.sportsonearth.com/article/39997062/
Bugger. Was so looking forward to seeing what reception he'd get at Dutch Corner
Like a dog returning to lick it's own vomit.
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