LeMond for Pres - Or Not?

So the sinking Armstrong ship has gone down and now it’s the turn of the ship’s pilot to come under scrutiny. Suffice to say, it’s not going well. Pat McQuaid, Captain UCI himself, is now having his ability to run the sport questioned. In fact, public opinion has already written his resignation letter and started looking for his replacement.

And it seems the world has found it in Greg LeMond, anti-doping poster child, ex-rider and general all-around good guy. LeMond has three Tour de France titles to his name along with years of experience in the cycling industry, and earlier this month the 51-year-old put his hand up to be the ‘interim’ president of the UCI until a long-term replacement can be elected. Fans love the idea. He’s a perfect, noble choice. It’s a great ending and we’ll all live happily ever after like Cinderella. Right. For me, the problem is that LeMond has never been caught doping.

Yes, I said ‘has never been caught’.

LeMond rode during a time when – as we now know – there was a serious doping subculture and more than one of LeMond’s contemporaries tested positive. The Armstrong affair has shown us pretty clearly that the only way to beat doping is with more doping. The astute fan will acknowledge that there’s a possibility that LeMond was doping. There’s never been a positive test or an admission of doping – but again, Lance Armstrong proved that you can be the most successful doper in the history of cycling without a single admission or ‘official’ positive test.

Yes, there’s an equal chance that LeMond might be innocent, that his absence of confession and staunch anti-doping stance are because he’s never used performance-enhancing drugs. But if we’re honest with ourselves, how many of us believed Armstrong, and got burnt? Imagine this – Greg LeMond is made president of the UCI. The post-Armstrong anti-doping arrangements are well underway, everything’s going fine, and then suddenly LeMond is busted for doping as a rider. It could be a retested sample, the testimony of a teammate or even a confession from LeMond himself, but either way the results are the same. We get burnt again. The fallout would be huge. Do we really want to risk that possibility; take that chance? Do we really want a UCI president who will always leave us wondering if he’s telling the truth; always leave us in fear of the announcement that he’s not?

But more than that, the UCI presidency for the next 10 years will be about doping. It’s inevitable – how it started, how to stop it, what measures will be effective. If, as in the hypothetical above, LeMond has doped and lied about it, then we have another lying, cheating rider. We’re getting used to having our hearts broken by these guys. After we get past the denial stage, we kick him out of the house/UCI and never want to hear from him again. And then, of course, we’re back to square one – being alone/needing a new UCI president.

But if, on the other hand, Greg LeMond is one of the seemingly rare ‘clean’ riders who has never doped, how will he be effective as the ‘doping-era president’? If LeMond never engaged in a team doping system, how will he know how riders become a part of a team system, what would discourage them, how a team doping system works and how to take it down? Where is the virtue in promoting a clean rider to the top of the sport when his entire job description for his entire term will be the one thing in which he has no expert knowledge, no experience? Aren’t we just setting ourselves up to fail yet again?

There is, of course, an easy answer to these problems. Instead of choosing LeMond, why not bring in a confessed ex-doper? It sounds crazy and completely counter-intuitive, sure, but think about it. You never need to worry about Jorg Jaksche’s reputation being ruined on the job, and you can guarantee that Tyler Hamilton knows what he’s talking about when it comes to how to dismantle organised doping systems. Counter-intuitive perhaps, but the intuitive measures have been working just great so far, haven’t they? These guys have done their crime, they’ve done their time, and now they could be the key to healing a diseased system that was led astray by the purportedly ‘anti-doping’ guys.

So why not run in the complete opposite direction to the Verbruggen/McQuaid presidencies? Instead of picking another clean, eligible willing candidate, why not choose a reluctant, gritty former doper who has a genuine vested interest in eradicating the doping culture? After all, it was a wise man in Albus Dumbledore who said, “Perhaps those who are best suited to power are those who have never sought it. Those who, like you, have leadership thrust upon them, and take up the mantle because they must, and find to their own surprise that they wear it well.”

Is anyone else beginning to wonder why LeMond wants the job at all?

Cleaning House

My mum always loved old musical films. So I guess it was no surprise that I immediately thought of the house-cleaning duet from Calamity Jane when I heard that the UCI was establishing an external commission to investigate the UCI in the wake of the Armstrong affair. They’re actually finally doing it. The UCI is cleaning house.

It’s been bruited around for a while, though never more so than now, that the UCI were in Armstrong’s pocket when it came to his literally unbelievable career, and more than one ex-rider has pointed the finger at the UCI when it came to laying blame for cycling’s doping culture. With USADA shining the world’s biggest spotlight into every corner of Lance Armstrong and US Postal, the pressure has been growing for a while now for the UCI to take the same steps and sweep out their own dusty corners too. Unfortunately, with the UCI the highest body in cycling, there was no-one to ensure that they actually would, but it seems they’ve been listening to the voices on the street at last.

It’s a gesture of good faith, certainly, but let’s hope it becomes more than just a gesture. As part of the investigation the UCI has also halted the controversial lawsuit against Irish journalist and ex-rider Paul Kimmage. This gives no guarantee that they won’t relaunch it again either after the conclusion of the commission’s investigation or even before then, but it’s a start, and a much-needed one. Even with all the whisking and mopping that USADA have been doing over in the US, cycling could never start over and be ‘clean’ with such a dark cloud hanging over the sport’s governing body. Scrubbing all the cyclists’ pasts raw would make little difference if the administration wasn’t equally squeaky.

Thankfully, despite all the denials and professions of non-culpability over recent months, the UCI seems to have recognised this fact as well, and they’re taking steps. What we have to wait and see now is whether they’re serious about those steps. Will the UCI give the external commission carte blanche to dig as deep as they need for as long as they need to in order to polish up every single dirty ‘winder’? Will the ‘appropriate terms of reference’ to be negotiated with the committee omit all the key concerns such as alleged cover-ups in the Armstrong era and the culpability of ex-UCI president Hein Verbrugghe and his successor, Pat McQuaid? And will the UCI give due credit to and implement any or all of the recommendations made by the committee at the end of their investigation?

Let us hope that the instigation of the investigation means they will. Maybe, with a completely exposed and absolved past and a clear vision for a clean future, we will finally get to see cycling as the ‘shiny castle’ of which Doris Day and Allyn McLerie sang all those years ago.