If you’re a fan of professional cycling, I cannot understand why you don’t understand a) that people dope and b) WHY they dope. I also don’t understand people who actually believe the whole peloton is clean, but that’s a completely different issue (one that’s already been proven wrong). Anyway, the point is that if you’re a fan of sports, any sport (it doesn’t matter which one), you should not EVER be surprised when a an athlete (from any sport) tests positive.
Maybe it’s something about the type of fans Armstrong brings into the sport, but there is so much naivete out there that it just blows my mind. Of course cyclists are going to dope. Of course they are going to get caught. Until the punishment sufficiently scares athletes, there will always be doping. As for why people dope? There are a million reasons. There’s pressure to win, pressure to keep up, pressure because everyone else (so to speak) is doing it. And yet all people seem to come up with is a feeling of betrayal and shock. I mean, COME ON.
I don’t know how people can continue to be fans of cycling if they cannot accept that perhaps, one day, their favorite cyclist will test positive. I’m lucky, in a way, because looking back, my former favorite cyclist was almost certainly doping. He rode for T-Mobile back with Jan Ulrich and Erik Zabel. Of course he was doping. But I never had to suffer through positives because he quit before he had a chance. It’s a risk we take. I like to think that Sylvain and Heinrich aren’t doping, but do I know for sure they’re not? No. Do I know for sure that Garmin and Columbia aren’t doping? No, but I have more faith in the fact that they probably aren’t. Would I be heartbroken if [insert name of cyclist I adore] tested positive? You bet your ass I would be.
But that’s the risk. You have to understand that cyclists, even your favorites (whoever they are) might test positive. You cannot go through life as a fan of cycling without accepting that just because you want the sport to be free of dopers it’s going to be free. Because it’s not, at least not until something major happens and WADA/UCI/etc get their acts together, which we all know will definitely happen. Oh yes. WAIT NO. It won’t. Which, whatever. Out of our control as fans. Therefore we must accept that positives happen. We need to stop being so fucking shocked about it. Come on, seriously.
I get that people don’t understand cycling, but this is just common sense. Cyclists dope. They could be your favorites. Things might change, they might not. In order to be a fan, you have to accept the risk that someone you adore is or might test positive. That doesn’t mean they will, but it definitely doesn’t mean they won. It’s just a fact of being a sports fan. I accept this risk because I wouldn’t want to stop being a cycling fan. It means too much to me.
Maybe that’s not how it works for the rest of you, but that’s fine. Just stop being so damn surprised all the time.
