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Leave it to Livingstone
After all the words that have been written and conjecture and perspective that has been thrown around related to this year’s Tour, leave it to the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, to sum it all up perfectly. Here’s what the Mayor said in a story about his efforts to get the Tour back in London again soon. “It is a unique event, and I do not think a handful of riders breaking the rules diminishes the achievements of those who do not.”
That’s it. It really IS a totally unique event with its own lore and unwritten rules. Each day pits rider against rider at the limits of their endurance (drug-enhanced or not!) and their will to push on through the pain. It’s compelling TV and it’s a drag when the actors change, but the next episode is always worth watching. I can’t wait for le Tour 2008.
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August 23rd, 2007 at 2:44 pm
I agree. This years race surely had less fanfare but the racing was as good as usual. The issues with doping do detract from the entertainment value. I hope that the integrity of the race can rebound in the years to come.
October 10th, 2007 at 5:35 pm
When my cable TV started covering the TDF back when Lance was the big name, I would tape every stage and hurry home after work to watch the race. Last year I didn’t even bother taping the coverage because of my disappointment with the whole Floyd thing. After this year, 2007, I throw my hands in the air not as a champion finishing a stage, but in complete disappointment of the cheating getting more coverage than the actual race. I think the cheating has become as much a part of the race as the Yellow Jersey.
October 24th, 2007 at 1:15 pm
(Originally part of an email I’d sent to VeloNews, in response to an editorial whose tone mirrored Mr. Ventimiglia’s response to Andy’s piece)
Sports is entertainment, and the Tour de France remains an enormously entertaining spectacle, in spite of, or perhaps enhanced by, whatever scandal might come its way.
I’ve been to the last eight Tours, and found neither this nor last year’s event anything less than captivating, amazing and memorable in the best possible way. You can’t take away the memory of watching Floyd Landis pass by on the Columbiere, way ahead of his chasers … and then after the last rider passed by, racing back down to a bar to watch him ride into history as the greatest comeback ever. And sneaking through the barriers on the Champs-Elysees at the conclusion of the race, getting the shot of Floyd as he headed off the course towards the team bus. To hear days later that he was suspected of doping was shocking, but I still felt like I’d lived part of a dream for those 10 days in France.
And this year? I brought along my 14-year-old son and rode with him up the Port de Bales and Aubisque climbs, got into the Village at Pau where he got Virenque’s autograph on a KOM jersey, and cheered Contador, Boonen and Evans (and many others) from a spot very close to the finish line we’d sneaked into after the race. Drama had played out all around us; Rasmussen being pulled from the ‘Tour, and Astana’s incredible debacle, which unfolded no more than half an hour after my son and I visited their encampment in Pau.
We were entertained by the spectacle, amazed at the courage of the riders, and always, everywhere, felt like we were part of something grand and special.
So what’s my point? Simple. All the excessive, introspective whining penned by columnists and newscasters throughout the world will not kill off the Tour, not as long as there are people like myself and hundreds of thousands of others who read the stories and op-ed pieces and yet still find we can’t take leave of it. It’s addictive beyond all reason. And a great number of us refuse to feel guilty about that, no matter how many “sky is falling” pieces are written.
August 30th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
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