2009 Tour De France

[Hoosier Red]

Originally Posted by SunDeck

I guess there's another side to Lance?

I stand by what I wrote, I think this enhances his legacy to actually be a good teammate, it's not like anyone's going to break 7 tours any time soon anyway.

Color me surprised.

[Nugget]

Originally Posted by M2

Great Phil Liggett line (in reference to some spectators in superhero tunics running alongside the bikers) "They look like ... well, they must be Australians I'm sure."

[Nugget]

Originally Posted by Hoosier Red

I stand by what I wrote, I think this enhances his legacy to actually be a good teammate, it's not like anyone's going to break 7 tours any time soon anyway.

Color me surprised.

I think Lance has always ridden as a great team mate. Even when he was the leader of the team he made sure the other guys around him got their glory too. Look at how George and Paolo got to perform in the record seventh. If anything Alberto has shown that he is less of the "team guy" with what he did to Kloden.

[Hoosier Red]

Originally Posted by Nugget

I think Lance has always ridden as a great team mate. Even when he was the leader of the team he made sure the other guys around him got their glory too. Look at how George and Paolo got to perform in the record seventh. If anything Alberto has shown that he is less of the "team guy" with what he did to Kloden.

I agree that Alberto has pretty much painted himself as a selfish punk is indisputable. Good point about Lance as a teammate, I suppose its hard to judge because Lance was such a jerk in so many ways before he had cancer, but that's the poor teammate I was speaking of.

[Nugget]

I don't know in the Motorola days he was always a great team guy - think of the reaction to the Casartelli tragedy. But that said I think he was a lot younger then, a guy with real promise and one of the youngest world champions and I think you will see that most of the elite riders have a bit of an attitude.

[BuckeyeRed27]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SPORT/07/27/...ong/index.html

What a punk. Really hope Lance (or somebody) can take him down next year.

[improbus]

I like Lance the bike rider, cancer survivor, and spokesman, but that is all. He is a real piece of work as a person. Contador may not have handled the situation well, but look at it from his perspective. You are the guy on your team. You are the world's best mountain climber and are the favorite to win the tour. Suddenly, your team brings in the divisive, strong willed, selfish old champ who immediately starts to divide the team. You KNOW that you are a better rider than Lance, so how are you going to act?

Here is a link from Truehoop that I remembered that covered Lance:

http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/...h-the-NBA.html

[M2]

The problem for Contador is apparently his entire team wants to chuck him under a bus. As far as I gather, the team was pretty much unified in its dislike of Contador. I remember reading that Leipheimer, who did a massive amount of work for Contador in the 2007 TDF, wasn't too fond of the kid either. Putting Kloden to the sword seemed to be the final straw.

It will be interesting to see where Contador lands. The new team being formed by F1 driver Fernando Alonso wasn't supposed to be ready until 2011, but they may push it up a year to lock in Contador. Who gets involved beyond him and who wants to work for him remain open questions.

[Nugget]

It will be interesting to see who goes to Team RadioShack. No tampering before 01/09. I think Armstrong is a driven person but he has never belittled or put down his team mates. Even in the dominant years you hear what both his team mates and more importantly what his competitors say about him - that's important. His going to have real problems if he stays at Astana because there is no doubt Vinokourov is going to want to be the leader no matter what. Lance just said that they have a number of guys who can win the tour and they didn't have a declared leader. Contador could not take that - I mean in the first week of the tour Astana had four of the first five spots and even after Pyrenees they occupied four of the top ten.