Lance Armstrong confession… Wiggins and Cav have their say (or don't)

I can't blame Cav, Wiggo etc for snapping at reporters who keep asking questions about a washed-up never-was, they've been getting it for months now.

No doubt some sections of the media with an agenda on this will accuse these riders of maintaining the omerta because they refuse to give the same answers to the same questions over and over again.

Wiggins has every right to criticise Kimmage, he has made a veiled comment that Sky must have cheated as the team did the same for Bradley as the teams did for Armstrong.

The man has gone way way down in my estimation. How can someone who was to be sued for defamation come out with "Interesting that Bradley Wiggins is still following the Lance Armstrong blueprint for success"

The TdF and other top races will need to be transparently clean for five to ten years before reporters are likely to stop asking these questions. The appalling legacy of the sport is such that it's hard to 100 per cent believe anyone - even Sir Brad - when they say they don't dope. Cav and Brad will spend the rest of their sporting lives answering these questions and - unfortunately for them - they'll have to get used to it. Sounds like the Pharma Quickstep PR's need to get their backsides in gear too.

I can understand why the guys may get cheesed off, but like it or not, Brad and Cav are the two highest profile riders in the world now. That fame and cash brings a degree of responsbility and status that means they absolutely would and should, in my opinion, be asked about the highest profile ex-rider in the world.
Cav has a point though, what the fcuk are press officers doing sitting on their asres? They should be pro-actively working with their riders and team management to scotch the rumours and nip the whispers in the bud. Sky and Brailsford in particular must accept that PR works both ways, you can't now just bask in the glory without accepting the scrutiny. Sure, be as pssied off as you like that Lance still casts his ugly shadow over your achievements, but hey, deal with it.
As much as what Wiggo says (or ghost wrote) rings true and strong, we've kind of heard similar before and look where that's ended up. All us fans want is to believe in the guys we invest so much time, emotion - and money - on.
Getting the Kimmage seal of approval would, if I were doing the PR, be a priority. Paul is beyond reproach and a GC-standard pain in the arse, but convincing him, through total transparency, pretty much gives a team (and its star turns) a "kite mark" for probity - surely worth the hassle of having him around for a while, as Garmin did.

Not impressed with these guys today.

Kimmage is right that the style of Wiggo's win was very much like US Postal. We all said it at the time.

But the substance is completely different. Simple power output analysis of la Planche des Belles Filles earlier this year showed that a rider giving the output that Lance, Pantani, Riis etc used to would have been minutes ahead of this year's riders.

Cav's reaction is daft though. I know he's always like that, but he has to realise it loses him fans?

I find all of this really frustrating to read and digest, Team Sky and in particular Wiggo had a very good year last year culminating in a TDF victory and yet they are now having to justify winning!! from what I remember from watching last years (not just the ITV highlights) they played it right tactically they didn't win every stage or build an unassailable time margin, it was close right up to the last TT stage. I don't read of criticism of Peter Sagan for example a relative newcomer yet took a number of stage victories. Yes their is bad history in the sport yet it comes under such intense scrutiny while other sports get none at all. You never hear of anyone questioning how a football team can win x amount of trophies in a season which is played over 9 months and then they do it again the following year and so on yet 1 Team win a TDF and it's automatically assumed by a certain element that they must have cheated. I can understand Cav and Wiggos frustrations they are now assumed Guilty until proved innocent by some.

Kimmage is like a witch hunter, if you drown you are innocent, if you float then burn the f****r. It reeks of bitterness. Why doesnt wiggins want to talk about it, coz hes sick of the subject thats why, he's pissed that his season was blighted by armstrong and the epo fall put. Anyway, how can you talk about it when the interview has not been aired. Time to let loose kimmage on another sport, I'm sure there is some drug use in football, send him on to sniff it out, he's going to feel empty now armstrong has fessed up.

Telling a reporter to f off loses Cavendish fans? I doubt it somehow. And Kimmage's innuendo deserves all the scorn it gets.

I'll believe Wiggins is clean until he starts making donations to the UCI.

Kimmage needs to get a grip before cycling fans like us decide that he's just bitter.
For goodness sake has he not seen the data comparison between Lance Tours and 2012's Tour where Brad won?
Totally out of order in my opinion.

Have to say Sky/Brailsford more or less dug this hole.

You can't go around pronouncing you're team is squeaky from top to bottom, win the Tour and then hold a Show Trial where it transpires that most of your key back room staff, responsible for the win were dopers/facilitators.

Sky said they were 100% transparent. They clearly weren't and their reputation has been badly dented. It was their own doing. Can't blame Kimmage for simply pointing this out.

Kimmage is scratching around for something to do, his career is already on the slide and now that LA is old news he's got nothing to say worth listening to. Screaming unfounded allegations at Wiggins and then kindly offering to let him address them in an exclusive interview is sad and desperate. Seems like the only person in the sport who doesn't want to move on is kimmage.

Also, the point someone made earlier about him addressing doping in other sports is something I put to him on email. He's interviewed dozens of sportsmen but had never ever mentioned drugs in any interview other than with a cyclist

I think Kimmage should pull his copy of Moby Dick off the shelf and give it a read.

Unfortunately Sky as a team have shot themselves in the foot on a couple of occasions regarding transparency.
In 2010 they invited Kimmage to embed with the team during the Tour but Wiggins blocked it. Why? If you want to to prove your squeaky clean let the journalist in to see the setup. (www.bit.ly/Miakt6)
The hiring of various Directors Sportifs and doctors who where upto their neck's in doping. Leinders, Yates and Julich. Dave Brailsford knew their respective background's before hiring them, bad choice.
What about Michael Barry's signing, Landis linked him to doping previously.
Brailsford should not have set out his stall from the start as so high and mighty against doping and then hire these people. He basically played lip service to one of the main principles of the team's foundation

IMO Wiggins won the Tour clean with the aid of team orders (Froome was a lot stronger in the Mtns and could have lit the race up had he been free to do so). The bigger issue is that the team seemed to be utterly faultless everyday? I think that in a situation where a team is utterly dominant the whole team needs to be heavily scrutinised. At the end of the day a single rider doesn't win the tour without an extremely good team controlling it for him.

How come journalists aren't camping out outside the training camps and hijacking the team launches of other leading lights of the peloton, ones who had far greater connections with Lance, and doping convictions of their own? People like Olympic road champion, and eyebrowless wonder of the Kazakhstan steppes, Alexandre Vinokourov? Or former Lance team mate, and fellow Johan Bruyneel disciple, Alberto Contador? Or the human slug, Alejandro Valverde? Or Ivan "I only intended to dope" Basso, alleged friend and nearest challenger to Lance (i.e. the person with the second best doping programme in the mid-2000s.) The reason, I suspect, is that the journalists are hoping for the kind of reactions they got: peevish, annoyed, and after a decade of being in fear of Lance's wrath, over-cautious. Which makes good copy, especially for sports editors whose only interest in cycling is doping insinuations. Those other riders, on the other hand, will blow off the question, as they do questions regarding their own cases. A pity, as it would be interesting if they could get someone who was probably inspired to dope by Armstrong to talk openly about it (Ricco, maybe, after all he has nothing to lose.)

Simon, you can only beat whats in front of you and the Sky riders destroyed themselves to get rid of any challenge from other riders.

Contador at the top of his game ? rightly or wrongly there will always be doubts now about his ability after the steak incident.

Just looked at 2012 TdF results.

After Wiggins and Froome the next set of riders for Sky were:

Michael Rogers at 54:52
Richie Porte at 1:20:49
Edvald Boasson Hagen at 1:52:34.

They were all pushing hard throughout the mountain stages until they could push no more and dropped away as their overall times show. If they were all on drugs as insinuated by kimmage than their times should and would have been better.

This is Kimmage from 1999.
The man is consistent in the face of popular consensus.
I don't think he's pointing the finger at wiggins - more Brailsfords lack of transparency and double standards.
I don't see bitter - surely the mans doing his job.
Phil Ligget calls himself a journalist as well - I know who's opinion I trust more.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/reserving-the-right-to-applaud-403806.html

@Colinth
Sky should never have said yes to Kimmage's request to embed with the team and then said no. It just gives Paul Kimmage ammunition and an angle to start a discussion.

Regarding 2012 TDF results none of the team barring Froome where ever going to get too high on the GC. Its the fact that during the mountains it tended to be the same guys everyday, day after day being able to ride hard tempo for longer than any of the other teams and indeed alot of the GC contenders. I don't think that Sky's technical and performance staff can have that much more knowledge or a silver bullet which gives them such an edge over the other teams which is giving domestique's the ability to match and exceed performance of GC riders in the mtns.

Unfortunately having Gert Leinders as a doctor within the team and then terminating his employment within months of winning the tour is not the best PR. Never mind the other team members who have admitted to doping and as a result of admission have be proven liers. Can these people be trusted!

Wiggo seems pretty relaxed about the whole thing and keeping calm, I dont tink he's going to take the bait from this Kimmage muppett, and dont believe he has to.
Cav is just a legend, what a great quote "**** off, seriously **** off if you're asking about this," he is reported to have said, before asking one of the team’s staff, “Can you get him away please. Please get this guy away. He just wants to talk about Lance, **** off.”