Another Opportunity To Hate The French

I hate to state the obvious about these people, but they make it so easy.

The French still can't, and won't, swallow the fact that an American came to their country and schooled them at their own game.

The French paper L'Equipe is saying that they have proof that Lance Armstrong cheated.

They have analyzed a frozen urine sample from 1999, the first year Armstrong won the Tour de France.

They claim they found EPO, a drug that stimulates red blood cells to allow them to release more oxygen.

There are a couple issues here.

First, they didn't test for this enhancer in 1999. That doesn't make it right, if, and I say if, Armstrong used it.

But second, since they weren't testing for it, they better retest everybody.

If one person knew it wasn't being tested and tried to get away with it, so did a whole lot of others.

Are the Tour officials going to test everybody's frozen pee?

I doubt it.

While we're at it, they better test the '98 winners urine, and '97, and so on.

But they won't.

It was won in '98 by an Italian, and in '97 by a German. I bet the French are OK with that.

The French should be a little embarrassed, having not won The Tour since 1985.

Maybe that's why they are so bitter.

Let me give you an example in reverse and show how an American handles it.

1988-89

A young French Motorcross rider named Jean-Michel Bayle, not only won the 125cc and 250cc motorcross World Championship, but also won the French Supercross series, while adding a couple US event wins to his resume.

1990

One year later he entered the far more competitive US Supercross series and took second overall.

1991

The following year he not only took first overall in the US Supercross series, becoming the first European rider to ever win an American Supercross series, but also picked up the overall win in the 500cc outdoor series.

That alone would make for an impressive career, but he didn't stop there.

At the height of his motocross career, he quit the off-road sports to begin a new career on the road.

1993

Bayle entered the 250cc World Championship, a road racing series.











If you know anything about motorcycle sports, you know that the only thing that off-road and on-road have in common is the fact that they are both done on two wheels, beyond that, they are two different worlds.

It took Bayle a few years to fully make the transition, but....

1997-98-99

Bayle won three 500cc World Championships in a row.

Even today, American journalist, and Americans that follow motorsports will tell you, Jean-Michel Bayle is bar none, the most versatile and talented rider the sport, as a whole, has ever seen.

A far cry from those bitter French.