Let’s clear the decks first. I for one, along with countless millions, was largely seduced by the Lance Armstrong global propaganda machine, a machine it seems that incorporated some extremely powerful people, up to and including people near the Obama White House. Not necessarily Obama himself, but those charged with protecting his image and getting him re-elected. More of that presently. When I first blogged on Armstrong a few years back I was moved, naively it turns out, by his, ‘It’s Not About the Bike’ story, a story of human endurance against all the odds. I was wise enough to avoid coming out directly in Lance Armstrong’s corner, but deep down I believed no one could tell such a moving story while at the very same time being up to their neck in doping and lying.

I was wrong, and hopelessly and pathetically naive with it. I keep telling myself that I should have known better, after all, I repeatedly claim to be able to see through any number of corporate and government scams. Not on this occasion. I was suckered well and truly and boy does it hurt much like all those millions of loyal Jimmy Saville supporters who much now come to terms with that ugly sordid truth.

Tyler Hamilton and his co-writer, Daniel Coyle do a thoroughly competent job at exposing the true nature of professional road racing. Nothing is spared including Hamilton’s own complicity in the world of doping. Not only is it an eye-opening account of that murky, drug ridden world, it is also a pretty good read; a story of great early promise, of seduction by the darker forces, and of eventual redemption and personal reconciliation. Quite Shakespearean in its own way. I’ll pick out some key quotes in a moment, but first I need to summarise it all in my own mind.
Lance Armstrong was and is, it seems, a true champion; champion of the cycling dopers, champion of the bullies and manipulators, and above all, champion of the liars and cheaters. Virtually everyone who was successful in the sport was up to their necks in it, but he simply did it better than everyone else. In that sense there was a level playing field and Lance was the champion. He was more determined, more cunning, more ruthless and just more driven. And in his defence, doping was the world that he, probably unknowingly, entered. He simply adapted to that world better than anyone else. In that sense, and in that sense only, he was and is a true champion. Had the sport been clean and had Armstrong been allowed to ride clean, he may also have turned out to be a champion. He and we, now, will never know.

Before starting on this blog I went back to re-read Matthew Syed’s chapter in ‘Bounce’ which dealt with drugs in sport to see if I could conjure up any real justification for Armstrong’s behaviour other than the plain fact that everybody else was at it. Syed flirts dangerously with the notion that some legalisation of doping might usefully be permitted as long as the legalised levels were not dangerous to the health of the athlete. (Bounce P226) It’s a similar argument used by those wishing to legalise recreational drugs, an argument incidentally, I support. Whilst I admire Syed’s willingness to be open minded and experimental on this issue there is a real danger that the authorities would simply see it as an excuse to turn a blind eye to excessive doping. And anyway it would be a slippery slope for all concerned. Either sport is clean and drug free or it is not. No amount of clever Oxbridge argumentation can obscure that basic fact.

So now it is the turn of Hamilton and Coyal to have their say. The corrupt world of pro cycling is finally laid bare. Hamilton does not mince his words.

The tests are easy to beat. We’re way ahead of the tests. They’ve got their doctors, and we’ve got ours, and ours are better. Better paid for sure. Besides, the UCI, the sport’s governing body doesn’t want to catch certain guys anyway. Why would they? It’d cost them money.’ P10 

With reference to Armstrong, to whom Hamilton has a somewhat ambivalent attitude towards; part admiration, part pity, part loathing, we get this explanation:

I can feel for Lance. I understand who he is, and where he is. He made the same choice we all made, to become a player. Then he started winning the Tour and it got out of control, and the lies got bigger and bigger. Now he has no choice. He has to keep lying, to keep trying to convince people to move on. He can’t go back. He can’t tell the truth. He’s trapped.’ P12

Hamilton is highly perceptive in his understanding of how the rooky cyclist gets drawn in. I suppose you could say he is seeking to excuse his own weakness and subsequent actions but his words do have a ring of veracity about them. Hamilton continues:

Nobody sets out wanting to dope. We love our sport because of its purity; it’s just you, your bike, the road, the race. And when you enter a world and you begin to sense that doping is going on, your instinctive reaction is to close your eyes, clap your hands over your ears, and work even harder. To rely on the old mystery of bike racing push to the limit, then push harder, because who knows, today might be better.’ P34

That sounds convincing and heart felt, though I remember feeling exactly the same when reading Armstrong’s account. Am I being conned again? I don’t think so. The next few lines are very revealing. No attempt is made to soften the blow. Hamilton explains:

Here’s an interesting number: one thousand days. It’s roughly the number of days between the day I became professional and the day I doped for the first time. Talking to other riders of this era and reading their stories, it seems to be a pattern: those of us who doped mostly started during our third year. First year, a neo pro, excited to be there, young pup, hopeful. Second year, realisation. Third year, clarity the fork in the road. Yes or no. In or out. Everybody has their thousand days; everybody has their choice.’ P46

That’s good writing. That’s good story telling. And above all, it has the crystal clear ring of truth. If it turns out that Hamilton is conning me, I’m going to resign from the blogosphere! But I don’t think he is. Just listen to the power of the next few lines. Very convincing. Very compelling.

In some ways it’s depressing. But in other ways it’s human. One thousand mornings of waking up with hope; a thousand afternoons of being crushed. A thousand days of paniagua (bread and water) bumping painfully against the wall at the edge of your limits, trying to find a way past. A thousand days of getting signals that doping is ok, signals from powerful people you trust and admire, signals that say, ‘I’ll be fine, everybody’s doing it’. And beneath all that, the fear that if you don’t find some way to ride faster, then your career is over. Willpower might be strong, but it’s not infinite. And once you cross the line, there’s no going back.’ P46

You can begin to see what I mean when I say this is a cracking good story. This is the classic story of good people, with the very best of intentions, eventually succumbing to the dark side. This is not a story primarily about cycling, this is a microcosm of the universal human story. I love it. Hamilton is not finished yet. He’s pouring out his innermost thoughts in an attempt to cleanse away the crime and the guilt. He’s confessing but also rationalising. How Lance must be ruing the day that he allowed Hamilton to win the ultimate race the race to be honest and clean. Just savour these last few lines:

At this point I could tell you all about what an honest person I am. But that wouldn’t be honest, because in my opinion this decision isn’t really about honour or character. I know wonderful people who doped; I know questionable people who decided not to. For me, the only fact that mattered was that for a thousand days I had been cheated out of my livelihood, and there was no sign that things were going to get better. So I did what many others had done before me. I joined the brotherhood.’ P47

You might say it sounds a tad melodramatic and an overblown excuse for outright cheating, but having lived in my own micro world of sport for too many years, I can relate to the strange and distorted logic of a closed and incestuous world.

If you want the detailed mechanics of just how the doping was carried out this is definitely the book for you. Of equal interest is the deteriorating relationship between Hamilton and Armstrong. Of course we are only presented with Hamilton’s take on their downward journey, but it does make for interesting reading. It’s the blend of science and human psychology that makes this a compelling read. Cycles don’t dope and lie and cheat. Humans do that, and for all sorts of motives and twisted logic. Hamilton and Coyal are very adept at teasing the human dimension out. That’s where having an experienced journalist on board becomes so invaluable.

I don’t want to give too much away but I must comment on the US Federal Government’s decision to drop the legal proceedings against Armstrong after years of accumulating decisive and watertight evidence. Hamilton and Coyal hypothesise as to the exact motives for this inexplicable decision, the most shocking being a political manoeuvre. Under a long note on p269 the authors write:

Birotte, who’d been appointed just 11 months before, wanted to protect President Obama from the potentially ugly spectacle of indicting an American hero during an election year.. While some are inclined towards conspiracy theories, it makes more sense that Birotte made a political judgement that the risks of the criminal prosecution outweighed the rewards.

Either way, that sounds like a political conspiracy to me. Now that the election has been and gone it will be interesting to see if the legal case is magically resurrected, especially in light of the USADA pronouncing definitively against Armstrong. I can’t help feeling this story is going to run and run for a good many miles yet. It could, when all is done and dusted, make the Tour de France look like a Sunday cycle in the park.