Just as I’d never heard of propofol before it killed Michael Jackson, I’d never heard of EPO before Oprah asked Lance Armstrong if he had used it to win the Tour de France seven times. Being a vitamin and supplement junkie, and having waded through Life Extension many years ago, EPO sounds like the kind of thing everyone should be using.
Jon Stewart of the Daily Show ran a clip of an interview he did with Lance Armstrong-one of countless interviews where Lance lied about cheating-and Jon looked a good deal young than he does now. Lance looked pretty much the way he does today. Jon joked that maybe he should start taking steroids.
I’ve never hated Lance Armstrong and I still don’t hate Lance Armstrong. Yeah, he cheated and it was wrong. And no, it doesn’t matter that everyone else who has ever thrown a leg over a top bar seems to have cheated as well, it was still wrong. BUT…
When I’m tired I stop and buy a Red Bull. I take DHEA, Ginkgo Biloba, Phosphatidylserine, and a lot of other stuff that makes me feel ‘normal.’ I use protein drinks, amino acids, and creatine when I’m training. In the 4 Hour Body Tim Ferris talks about different stacks of over the counter supplements he used to loose weight, gain muscle, and win sporting completions of one sort or another. Tim Ferris cheated and he’s make his fortune from doing it; he’s turned cheating into his personal mantra. If we all had access to the Lance Armstrong Cocktail, would we be better off or worse off if we took it? If we weren’t interested in trivial nonsense like the Tour de France but wanted to live twenty years longer, would anyone care?
Would they yank away the birthday cake on your 120th birthday and say-Hey, You Cheated!
Cycling is a lot every other sport, it’s changed a lot over the years. The bikes are made of new and better materials, the gearing is smoother and easier to use, the clothes are made of miracle fabrics, and the way cyclists train has changed drastically. Is it cheating if one team rides carbon fiber bikes while another rides chromoly steel? No, because the Rules don’t say it’s cheating. You can only break the law when there’s a law to break.
So why is it so wrong to improve the rider?
The Rules say it’s wrong.
Terrel Owens used to sleep in a Hyperbaric Oxygen Chamber to help raise his VO2 Max, would that have gotten him kicked off a cycling team?
There was a short lived sci-fi show a few years back that had a group of more evolved humans plotting to take over the world. Once in a while they would give someone a gene treatment that would evolve them as well. All they would have had to do was put the gene drug in a health food store and the conquest would have been complete in a couple of months.
So yeah, pretty much the only thing I’m taking from the Oprah/Armstrong interview is that I could really take hills if I could get my hands on some EPO. All Lance Armstrong needs to do is put out his own line of Sports Supplements and he won’t have to worry about paying back all those millions, it’ll be nothing more than pocket change.
