Lance set for last ride outside US
Source: Agencies |
January 23, 2011, Sunday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
LANCE Armstrong will hoist himself into the saddle today for the last stage of his last race outside the United States, with no hope of winning the Tour Down Under and with emotions as inscrutable as at any time in his career.
If Armstrong feels any pangs of nostalgia or regret that this portion of his career is ending, he is unlikely to reveal them.
His public persona as the final curtain prepares to fall is warmer than in the past but still controlled.
The seven-time Tour de France winner said before this farewell race began that he expected to feel no particular emotions when this substantial part of his career draws to a close.
He will climb off his bike at the end of the 90-kilometer street circuit in downtown Adelaide and, he says, he will walk away, perhaps a little more sore and weary at 39 than as a young man, but without remorse.
He enters an uncertain future. Exactly how his life and career will pan out from here is not yet decided: he has hinted at a return to triathlons and mountain biking events, which were his first love before he became the world's most celebrated road cycling. And the questions that have dogged his career remain as a vague shadow even over this farewell.
He has never tested positive to a banned substance, but even in the past week as he rode the undulating roads of South Australia state, a report in Sports Illustrated examined allegations new and old of his connection with doping.
He has refused to discuss those reports, though via his Twitter feed, on which he heavily relies to communicate with fans, he tweeted on Friday that he expected to be vindicated when the US anti-doping agency studied the substance of the Sports Illustrated report.
Spaniard Franisco Ventoso won the fifth of six stages at the Tour Down Under yesterday.
If Armstrong feels any pangs of nostalgia or regret that this portion of his career is ending, he is unlikely to reveal them.
His public persona as the final curtain prepares to fall is warmer than in the past but still controlled.
The seven-time Tour de France winner said before this farewell race began that he expected to feel no particular emotions when this substantial part of his career draws to a close.
He will climb off his bike at the end of the 90-kilometer street circuit in downtown Adelaide and, he says, he will walk away, perhaps a little more sore and weary at 39 than as a young man, but without remorse.
He enters an uncertain future. Exactly how his life and career will pan out from here is not yet decided: he has hinted at a return to triathlons and mountain biking events, which were his first love before he became the world's most celebrated road cycling. And the questions that have dogged his career remain as a vague shadow even over this farewell.
He has never tested positive to a banned substance, but even in the past week as he rode the undulating roads of South Australia state, a report in Sports Illustrated examined allegations new and old of his connection with doping.
He has refused to discuss those reports, though via his Twitter feed, on which he heavily relies to communicate with fans, he tweeted on Friday that he expected to be vindicated when the US anti-doping agency studied the substance of the Sports Illustrated report.
Spaniard Franisco Ventoso won the fifth of six stages at the Tour Down Under yesterday.
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