Silence, wrote George Bernard Shaw, is the most perfect expression of scorn.
Lance Armstrong, however, as we all know, just can’t resist a comeback. But when a previously unknown tweeter with (at the time) just two followers and a dozen or so tweets to his name linked to our item about Lance’s Twitter Ride with the pithy observation “i see this asshole was in scotland” Lance just might conceivably have let it slide.
But no. The Texan, presumably killing time at Inverness airport, tweeted back: "@Bike_Terrorist don't worry, he's flying out in a minute.”
This was the cue for the newbie tweeter, (who, before his sig. became slightly more warm and fuzzy in the last couple of hours, appeared to be intent on exposing “knobhead cyclists” and “benders” or threatening to “fuck you up” if you jump a red light in Hammersmith), to attempt to do what much of the world’s cycling media not to mention the forces of the US federal government and its ace investigator Jeff Novitzky have sought for some time.
“just come clean mate. We will all respect you so much more for it,” was the Bike_Terrorist’s chummy, yet heartfelt plea to the seven-time Tour winner.
This came after he, or possibly she, had vented their spleen about what they apparently perceive to be a terrible betrayal by their former hero: “i got into cycling because of YOU, i believed in you. You cheated. Unacceptable” they had tweeted.
Lance might be in the air at this time so we wait with bated breath for his tweeted reaction when he touches down. Stand by Mr Novitzky.
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37 comments
You have to love comments like this tho
How did fixed wheel start? Weren't the first kind of bikes steel frame fixie?
Also, i'm sure i have seen Bike_Terrorist on here? is it the same person?
Paraphrasing A.Warhol, Mr B_Terrorist has achieved his 15 minutes of fame.
Im no Lance fanboy - but I think his twitter rides are a good thing. On a sport level they give the rest of us a chance to say we've ridden with a rider like Lance, but more importantly it makes the national news and shows cycling is not a just minority sport
Its certainly more positive than sitting at your PC fighting a holy war against fixed wheel conversions
lance armstrong was a terrorist biker ... funny to see this mix of little words as a good sum-up
it's a pretty big load of fuss over one little internet enemy. footballers must get loads of hate mail
just looked on his twitter page. I wonder if he wants me to send him a soapbox or a couple of sandwich boards
Totally unnecessary article. Why give this sad lout the publicity?
I'm no fan of fixies off the track myself. But this guy sounds like an utter twerp. His name does sound familiar. How Lance Armstrong keeps his cool when people like this guy make comments along these lines beats me. I don't do Twitter and can't be bothered to.
some of his tweets are actually quite funny. I think people are taking him too seriously, and possibly some of you haven't even read them? Lets face it, everyone is getting their pants in a twist because he's had a pop at Lance, who may or may not have been a very naughty boy in the past like so many of our other cycling heroes.
I'm with matt637 on this – I'd say the bike_terrorist is more an agent provacteur than terrorist and he's only saying what a lot of people think and don't dare say even using the anonymity that the internet confers.
We ran this story because the bike terrorist used the link to our story of the twiter ride in his pop at Lance, I'm sure Mr Armstrong has to deal with stuff like this on a daily basis - I also quite admire him for responding cos he knew that by doing so was giving the_bike_ terrorist a massive amount of publicity, but he did it anyway. @Bike_terrorist now has 218 followers pretty good going considering he started the day with 2.
naughty boy!!!!!!!! are you for real, chasing other riders down in a race out of pure spite, telling clean riders to leave the sport, cheating to 7 TdF wins, using cancer to enrich himself, ensuring the sport remained a tainted PED ridden sport after it had a chance to take a clean road after the Festina affair in 98. Ruining the careers of the Andreus, ruining Greg Lemond's bike business through his % in Trek, lying in court about his doping to defraud SCA for $5Million. Insinuating former masseuse Emma O'Reilly did more(wink nudge) for the riders than massages. this list goes on........
The guy is scum.
Not only are his rides good for the above things, i also think that it brings local cyclist in contact with other locals who cycle therefore giving them the chance to maybe get out on rides together in the future.
I myself would love him to come here, because i dont know ANY local road cyclists so have always been a solo rider, but would like that to change
I particularly like how he says he hates bike snobs but half his tweets are like some incoherent velominati rip-off
Ok, so I've read the Twitter posts. I now know what I thought I knew to be the case. Twitter isn't for me. As I suspected, the bike terrorist seems a little grumpy and may have personal issues that need to be addressed. That said I don't appreciate cyclists who jump red lights myself, they get us all a bad name.
I'm not a particular fan of Lance Armstrong, nor do I dislike the guy. He certainly has done a lot to raise the profile of cycling as a sport internationally, which is no bad thing and he came back from serious health issues, which shows real determination though.
I'm shock, shock I tell you, to learn that there are jackasses on the Internet!
Wow Old Ridgeback does NOT like me. Gutted.
If you joined a club you would find lots of people in your area to ride with. I don't think we all need Lance to bring us together, we can do that just fine by ourselves.
The unfortunate thing is that the man himself has of course done alot to promote cycling but with his actions he has also damaged the sport. If cycling is to be taken seriously characters like him have to be purged. He is a virus. Also my tweets are about stuff i like and dislike there is no 'holy war'.
Yeh what a lout.
I've always admired Lance for being big enough to rise above this sort of criticism.
Well done, you have shown your ignorance again, not everywhere has a club and not everyone likes clubs
For me, there is no club and i dislike them because you always get idiots like yourself who seem to think cycling should be done their way or not at all
Arthur Dent?
Arthur Philip Dent?
"he's flying out in a minute" - sounds more like the PR person managing the account (probably in the USA) for Lance answered, rather than Lance himself, to me.
But Lance getting everyone together-thats different to a club? Not everywhere has a club? Take a look at the BCF and all the clubs that are affiliated with them there are hundreds, wherever you live in the UK there is one within a few miles. http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/clubfinder
However if you don't like them thats fine. Enjoy riding by yourself, or you can wait for Lance to come back.
it's embarrasing that you have to go shouting about your opinion 'cos when a non cycling twitter user sees your comments they think were all a load of opinion shouters which is gonna totally put off new people.
Bike_Terrorist,you're a bit of a patronising knob mate.
Apologies
define a 'few' miles? for some it can be 20/30 miles depending omn where they live. others are fortunate to have a number of clubs to choose from, and as gkam wrote many are so stuck in their ways that if you don't wear the right kit or can't keep their pace tough!
Now what do you class as a few miles? there are NO road clubs within 20 miles of me and any that are within 50 are not even possible for me to get to
Everyone getting together and going for a ride with Lance is totally different to a "club" because there would have also been solo riders like myself whom maybe never even knew about other riders in their area that might like to go for a ride out with someone else, without being part of a club
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