Lance Armstrong: Unforgivable

Tomorrow night, at 2am UK time, Lance Armstrong will launch a heavily-funded PR campaign to repair his sporting reputation and (more importantly) commercial stock by shedding a wallet-felt tear or two in response to some very gentle questions from an interviewer with no specialist knowledge or expertise.

Exclusive: Lance Armstrong's rider for that Oprah interview

We don't know precisely what he's going to say, but it's not hard to guess.  He'll admit to having used one or more performance-enhancing substances (probably EPO), but might stop short of disclosing the full collection of skeletons in his pharmacy-sized medicine cabinet.  He'll say that he started doping because that was the only way he could possibly compete at the top level of international cycling, as most other big names were doping too.  He might say that he felt he had to continue doping because his charity Livestrong proved so successful in raising funds for cancer research and support, and the only way to maintain its public profile was to keep winning at all costs.  He might say that he couldn't admit his actions sooner because that would have destroyed Livestrong's work.  Finally, he might even say that the UCI (cycling's governing body) was complicit in the ubiquity of doping in professional cycling because it knew what was happening and actively took steps to conceal his involvement to take advantage of the sport's increased popularity.

There are certainly a few carefully concealed kernels of truth lurking in those points.  Most of Armstrong's main rivals - Jan Ullrich, Joseba Beloki, Alex Zülle, Marco Pantani, Alexandre Vinokourov, Ivan Basso and others - have since tested positive or admitted doping.  And some of the witnesses who testified in the US Anti Doping Agency (USADA)'s inquiry provided evidence which implicates the UCI in helping Armstrong to cover his tracks.

Assuming that Armstrong takes this approach, then, should we forgive his actions and move on without any further recriminations?  No.  Here's why.

1.  He probably still won't admit the full extent of his cheating.  Even if he admits taking EPO, that still leaves cortisone, human growth hormone and testosterone.  According to testimony provided to USADA by former teammate Frankie Andreu and his wife Betsy, they both heard Armstrong tell doctors treating him for cancer in Indianapolis in 1996 that he'd already taken all those substances.  There's also credible evidence from several sources that he engaged in systematic blood doping.   Armstrong's lawyers have repeatedly claimed that he underwent 500-600 tests during his career without returning a positive test, but this is nonsense.  First, UCI and USADA figures show that he was only subjected to 275 tests.  Second, evidence presented to USADA appears to show that he tested positive several times - for corticosteroids at the 1999 Tour, for EPO at the Tour of Switzerland in 2001 (according to former teammates Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton), for EPO when six urine tests provided in 1999 were reexamined using new tests in 2005, and for blood doping when 38 samples provided between 2009 and 2011 were reexamined by USADA.

2.  He probably still won't name names - or, at least, not all the names.  Armstrong's friend Dr Michele Ferrari has still not admitted any involvement, despite strong evidence presented to USADA that he ran the doping program at Armstrong's team (US Postal).  According to USADA, examples of his methods include administering saline injections to fool blood tests for EPO and blood doping, and using hypoxic chambers and other measures to boost natural production of EPO and thereby throw off the ratios by which synthetic injections of EPO can be identified through testing.  USADA charged him in July 2012 with administration and trafficking of prohibited substances and issued a lifetime ban from professional sport, though the effectiveness of this ban outside their jurisdiction remains to be seen.  If Armstrong claims to be trying to clean up the sport, he needs to start being less selective in identifying the culprits - regardless of their staunch support for his lies.

3.  Not being the only cheat doesn't excuse cheating.  There were some clean riders on the professional circuit while Armstrong was winning the Tour.  Perhaps they would have achieved better results had Armstrong (and others) not chosen to cheat.  Perhaps riders arriving later on the circuit would have been better placed to resist peer pressure and ride clean had Armstrong not dominated the sport with tainted performances - it's been reported by at least one rider that this pressure came from Armstrong himself.  The fact that his rivals were also cheating does not mean Armstrong beat them on a level playing field - it just means he was able to deploy greater financial resources to gain an additional advantage from "better" doping.

4.  He's accrued substantial personal gains from cheating.  Armstrong built a false reputation as the greatest road cyclist of all time, and milked it for every cent he could get.  He's estimated to have a personal fortune in excess of $100m.  This was partly gained and ruthlessly protected by Armstrong's army of lawyers and commercial backers.  He'd previously declared an intention to leverage his do-gooding and seek election to public office.  He wasn't cheating to help fellow cancer patients - he was cheating to help Lance Armstrong.  Hiding behind Livestrong just won't cut it.

5.  He tried to destroy three-time Tour de France champion Greg LeMond.  In 2001, LeMond was quoted in a Sunday Times article as saying he was "disappointed" by Armstrong's association with Dr Ferrari.  Frankie Andreu testified to having heard Armstrong threaten to ruin LeMond once he became aware of the article.  LeMond says Armstrong called him and threatened to find ten of LeMond's former teammates who'd testify that LeMond used EPO.  LeMond's wife Kathy has said that one teammate was offered $300,000 to do this, but refused the offer.  A month after that article, a retraction from LeMond was published - Kathy has said this was issued by bike manufacturer Trek, who at that time produced a range of bikes branded with LeMond's name as well as supplying Armstrong's team.  Armstrong owes LeMond an apology, which he probably won't give.

"Let me do drugs or you will get cancer!"

6.  He tried to destroy US Postal team masseuse Emma O'Reilly.  O'Reilly came forward in 2004 as part of a book about Armstrong and US Postal called LA Confidential, and has since told her full story in an affidavit submitted to USADA.  At the 1999 Tour de France (Armstrong's first victory), it's now accepted that Armstrong tested positive for corticosteroids and was excused by the UCI and the organisers on the basis of prescription use for treating saddle sores.  O'Reilly's evidence states that she was present in the room with US Postal's team doctors and Armstrong when they decided to concoct this flimsy defence by fabricating a backdated prescription.  She has also said that she was routinely asked to collect and deliver performance-enhancing drugs as part of her job.   Armstrong's response was to publicly refer to O'Reilly as "a prostitute with a drinking problem".  He sued O'Reilly, the authors of LA Confidential, its publishers and the Sunday Times (who'd printed extracts from the book).  The Sunday Times paid $1.5m in damages to Armstrong, which they are now considering trying to recover.  It's been reported that the other claims were mostly withdrawn or settled by Armstrong's lawyers at the last possible moment, with the presumed intent of causing the maximum possible damage to the reputations of his accusers without having to prove anything and serving as a deterrent for other witnesses.  Armstrong owes O'Reilly an apology and compensation, which he probably won't give.

7.  He tried to destroy Frankie and Betsy Andreu.  We've already mentioned the Andreus' evidence regarding Armstrong's hospital confession.  This was only made public in 2006, when they were called upon to give evidence in a contract dispute between Armstrong and a sponsor who'd withheld a bonus payment. Armstrong's response was to throw the Andreus under the US Postal team bus.  A recent Telegraph article quoted an email dated 15 December 2003 and submitted to USADA in which Armstrong had told Frankie that "By helping to bring me down is not going to help y’alls situation at all.  There is a direct link to all of our success here.  I suggest you remind her of that [sic]".  Armstrong's evidence in the 2006 dispute stated (as the New York Times noted in 2006) that Betsy had given this evidence because "she hates me", and Frankie had confirmed her account "to back up his old lady".  He's reported to have publicly denounced Betsy as "fat and ugly".  He told Sports Illustrated in 2007 that Betsy's evidence was "motivated by bitterness, jealousy and hatred".  In a Guardian interview in 2007, he said: "Betsy blogs 24 hours a day about me. If that ain't sick, what is?"  According to the New York Daily News, Armstrong's key contact at Oakley left 27 threatening voicemails for the Andreus in a single evening, featuring tactfully-crafted gems such as “I hope somebody breaks a baseball bat over your head”, and “I also hope that one day you have adversity in your life and you have some type of tragedy that will definitely make an impact on you".  Armstrong's line has always been that the Andreus' evidence was motivated by US Postal not renewing his contract in 2000 - but (a) Andreu's departure was triggered by his refusal to keep using EPO, (b) an email submitted to USADA shows Armstrong asking Andreu to consider coming back to the team in 2001, and (c) the Andreus and Armstrongs continued to travel around Europe together in 2002.  It's nigh-on impossible to disagree with USADA's verdict that "[t]his evidence provides a strong indication that Armstrong intentionally vilified a longtime friend and his friend’s wife merely to protect himself".  Armstrong owes the Andreus an apology and compensation, which he probably won't give.

8.  He tried to destroy other former teammates.  After agreeing to testify and admitting his own drug use, Tyler Hamilton published a book about doping in cycling in 2011 - according to Hamilton, Armstrong responded by accosting him at a restaurant and saying "When you’re on the witness stand, we are going to fucking tear you apart.  You are going to look like a fucking idiot.  I’m going to make your life a living fucking hell".  Floyd Landis has confessed to using EPO, assisted the authorities and initiated a civil claim against Armstrong for defrauding the US Postal Service - Armstrong is fighting the claim and has referred to Landis as "desperate for attention and money".  When Levi Leipheimer confessed to using EPO and agreed to testify, Armstrong texted his wife Odessa for the first time in several years with the three words "run don't walk", which the Leipheimers understandably interpreted as a veiled threat designed to procure their silence.  Other former teammates such as George Hincapie, Jonathan Vaughters and Filippo Simeoni received similar treatment according to USADA.  Several riders have speculated that they were turned down for better jobs due to Armstrong's pervasive influence.  Armstrong owes apologies to all these riders and several more besides, but he probably won't give any.

9.  He tried to make six-figure payments to the governing bodies which were responsible for drug testing.  In 2002, Armstrong is reported to have made a payment of at least $100,000 to the UCI - purportedly to pay for their purchase of a piece of anti-doping equipment called a Sysmex machine, though the UCI has not been able to clarify where all the money went.  It's worth noting - also in 2002 - that the UCI arranged for Armstrong and US Postal team boss Johan Bruyneel to meet Martial Saugy, the director of laboratory in Lausanne which carried out the UCI's doping tests. USADA head honcho Travis Tygart says Saugy told him that he gave Bruyneel and Armstrong a thorough explanation of the testing methods for tracing synthetic EPO at that meeting, having been instructed to do so by the UCI - though Saugy now disputes this.  According to the evidence presented to USADA by Landis and Hamilton, the meeting happened shortly after Armstrong told them he had returned a positive test for EPO at the Tour of Switzerland and reassured them that this wouldn't matter because the UCI would take care of it - the implication of the evidence reported by USADA being that the UCI not only covered up the positive test result, but tried to make sure that US Postal would be better placed to avoid positive tests in future.  In 2004, Tygart says USADA quickly refused to accept a similar offer of $250,000 from Armstrong on the basis that they recognised a clear conflict of interest.  It's rumoured that Armstrong is considering agreeing to testify against the UCI - if Armstrong decides to take the UCI down with him (which would create a serious threat to cycling's inclusion in the Olympics), he at least needs to admit that he offered these payments and explain his reasons for doing so.

10.  He's chosen to be interviewed by Oprah rather than finally giving honest evidence under oath.  If Armstrong has suddenly experienced an epiphany and is now desperately seeking to clean up his act and the sport he claims to love, why did he choose Oprah to conduct the first "honest" interview of his career?  It's the equivalent of Tony Blair appearing on Richard & Judy.  When you've got plenty more to hide, choose a mainstream interviewer with no specialist knowledge and admit just enough to fool them into sympathising - it's probably worth a whole chapter in Crisis Management For Dummies (which really should exist).

So don't be fooled into thinking that Lance Armstrong is a crusading knight in shining armour riding to cycling's rescue.  He has cynically and remorselessly tried to destroy the lives and reputations of those who were brave enough to tell the truth about him before the tide turned.  He has not chosen to come clean of his own volition; rather, he has been backed into a corner by the overwhelming weight of publicly available evidence that he is a cheat and a liar.  Even at this stage, he will choose to admit only the bare minimum that his advisers believe is necessary to protect his commercial interests.  He hasn't earned your compassion or forgiveness and nothing he'll say on this campaign broadcast will change that, so join us in treating him and his crocodile tears with the contempt they so richly deserve.

The Sporting Owl #7

The seventh podcast from The Sporting Owl is packed with a preponderance of Paralympics ponderings. After bidding a fond farewell to Andrew Strauss, Tom and Ria guide you through some of the exciting events and superstar athletes to watch out for at the BIGGEST PARALYMPICS EVER!

The Sporting Owl #6

Episode 6 of the Sporting Owl takes place in the abyss between Olympics and Paralympics and features a searing riposte on Lance 'drugface' Armstrong, a review of the cake-based crazy golf extravaganza currently occupying the roof of Selfridges, and Ria's debut in the men's 110m hurdles. As you do, if you're a terribly unfit woman.

How I Accidentally Fell In Love With Road Cycling: a personal memoir by Kenny the Nuthatch

As a regular reader I’ve noticed the real dedication to cycling that the leaders at Owl Towers demonstrate, both in terms of track work and the longer road races. Until this summer I was a total sceptic when it came to road cycling, but having previously gone hopelessly crazy for velodrome experiences I knew I wasn’t immune to the appeal of wheels. The ongoing exploits of Victoria Pendleton (and now a large roster of pretty ladycyclists) can’t have undermined the popular appeal of the keirin and the omnium, either, to some parts of the crowd.

However, things like the Tour de France didn’t do much for me. It all just seemed like a lot of skinny men in coloured clothes riding a breathtakingly long way on a bike. But that was before I became trapped in the theatre, tactics and teamwork that characterises this kind of racing. Who were the domestiques? Why did the person who won the most stages not necessarily win the race? Why are there donkeys wearing polka dot jerseys in that field in Provence?

This year, by dint of nothing else being on television one Sunday when it was raining, I tuned into the Tour. I knew vaguely that some British cyclists were doing quite well, but given it was Stage 5 or something I assumed there would be time for someone Belgian to sneak up on the inside and nick it from our boys long before the end. Well, from that point on it was constantly on my mind. I learned that friends are everything in a cycle race, because they’re prepared to completely sacrifice their own races for your sake (voici les domestiques). I learned that looking like you’re winning doesn’t mean that you’re actually winning (tête de la course; poursuivants; groupe maillot jaune). I learned that tactics can change in the blink of an eye. And I learned that good conduct is generally rewarded, and that cheats rarely prosper. This was like test match cricket, Formula One and chess all moulded into one.

As the weeks of the Tour ticked by, my wife and I would genuinely rush home from work to watch the stage highlights. If we’d got wind of something, via Twitter or the BBC, that Vincenzo Nibali or Cadel Evans had experienced some sort of a problem, we rushed home even quicker to see how this affected the overall standings. We were wowed by Peter Sagan’s unlikely skills on the hills (sprint points and King of the Mountains points) and yelled for the Slovenian if it became clear that Mark Cavendish was too far back on a stage. I learned all about the personal history of American-but-Dutch-sounding Tejay van Garderen and was genuinely amazed by the emotion of Pierre Rolland and his team when Rolland won for France on Bastille Day. Suddenly, yet progressively, I finally understood why this daft spectacle was so brilliant. The colours, the cars, the fans, the enthusiasm, the speed, and all the time these scrawny chaps, legs pumping, eating energy gel and drinking isotonic pineapple juice, forcing themselves up yet another mountain, through yet another town. It was fantastic.

And then Bradley Wiggins won, drew the raffle numbers on the Champs-Elysées and it was all over. Until the Olympics, when I watched the men’s road race on someone else’s jerky iPhone footage inside the City of Coventry stadium and screamed Lizzie Armitstead home in the rain sat in my in-laws front room, all of us gathered to watch these incredible athletes. Surely this was it, until the Tour came round again next year?

No – another Sunday, and another poor TV night settles us in front of the team time trial at the Vuelta a Espana. A race I’d never heard of. And here we are once more, thrilling to some of the same chaps all over again and finding new pantomime villains to boo (I’m looking at you, Alberto Contador, and your ludicrously named Saxobank-Tinkoff Bank team). It gets under your skin, road racing, and even though there is no way on Earth I’m getting on a bicycle to follow in their tracks, I will fight to watch Froome, Roche, even Contador as they thrash their way through Spain. See you in the Pyrenees – I’m the one in the Lotto-Belisol shirt next to the small woman cheering Omega-Pharma-Quickstep for no clear reason.

The Sporting Owl #4

After taking a long weekend, the Owl is back with musings on the British gold rush, and Tom provides an eyewitness report on the Greco-Roman wrestling.  Ria takes her first turn as question master in another exciting game of 'Olympic True or False' before butchering Grenada's national anthem (sorry, Kirani James).

A quick guide to keirin racing

We've reached the final day of competition at the velodrome, and there are still medals up for grabs in the men's keirin, women's sprint and women's omnium events.  Victoria Pendleton is chasing her second gold medal of these Games and has reached the semi-final stage of her quest to retain her Olympic sprint title - you can still find our handy guide to the sprint here.  Meanwhile, world and Olympic champion Sir Chris Hoy is the favourite for the keirin and has safely qualified for the second round.  We've dug up and dusted off our hypothetical moron to help explain the finer points of the keirin for you.

Hello again!  I've really enjoyed watching all these British stars at the velodrome, and I saw Victoria Pendleton win the women's keirin a few days ago.  Not for the first time, I didn't have a clue what was happening.  Help!

OK, calm down!  What do you want to know?

Well, what does keirin mean, for starters?  I think I drank a beer called keirin once.  Is it named after that?  Do they all get drunk first?

Keirin just means "racing wheels" in Japanese.  The beer is called Kirin, and it's named after some kind of mythical deer-dragon-unicorn chimaera.  Racing wheels.   Mythical deer-dragon-unicorn chimaera.  Racing wheels.  Mythical deer-dragon-unicorn chimaera.  Two different things.  Got it?

I think so.  But if it's a Japanese pastime, where are the teenage girls and the octopus?

Er.  Yes.  I'm not sure.  If it helps, you can imagine them watching excitedly from the stands.

Oh, it does help, trust me.  *awkward pause*  So... what's the basic set-up in a keirin race?

The race lasts eight laps or 2,000 metres, and the winner is the rider who crosses the finish line first.  On the start line, six riders line up across the track in positions determined by drawing lots.  As the starting gun fires a motorized pacing bike called a Derny rides past the start line at a speed of 30km/h, and the riders set off and form a straight line behind it.  The Derny gradually increases the pace until it reaches its top speed of 50km/h, and pulls off the track with about 600 metres to go.

It might help to think of a keirin race as being divided into two separate phases.  In the first phase, the riders line up behind the Derny and try to secure the best position to apply their chosen tactics for the final sprint.  In the second phase, the Derny pulls off and the riders start to sprint for the finish line.

How does the first phase of the race work then?  Can the riders overtake the Derny?

The riders can't overtake the Derny, but they can overtake each other.  The positions of the riders in the line behind the Derny will primarily be determined by any extra acceleration that they decide to apply in riding away from the start line.  Once the riders have lined up behind the Derny, it's quite difficult (but by no means impossible) to overtake another rider without doing so dangerously and breaking the rules.  Trying and failing to overtake could also mean that the rider ends up further back down the line than they started as gaps are quickly closed by the other riders.  Riders will often leave little gaps in the line to give themselves more room for manoeuvre (so they can respond to attacks from behind or put more effort into their own attacks later in the race), but any such gap cannot exceed 10 metres.  Most riders prefer to ride in the first few places behind the Derny, but Chris Hoy for one has consistently shown that keirin races can be won from anywhere.  The tension slowly builds as the pace of the Derny increases, and reaches a crescendo as it pulls off the track.

How does the race change when the Derny pulls off?

Once the Derny pulls off, the proper racing begins and the riders sprint for the finish line.  There are two main dangers that the riders will be keen to avoid.  The first is getting stuck on the inside of the track surrounded by other riders and not being able to start their final sprint at the crucial moment.  The second is getting stuck at the back of the pack and being forced to take a longer route around the other riders.  At these speeds, either problem could cost a rider any chance of winning a medal, so careful positioning is vital.

Does that mean that the best strategy is to ride immediately behind the Derny and start sprinting flat out as soon as the Derny leaves?

Not necessarily, no.  Some riders with better sprint endurance than their rivals might try this - Chris Hoy might well do so tonight.  However, as we explained for the sprint event (and as Anna Meares showed in the women's keirin final), this is a high-risk approach as the rider creates a slipstream which their rivals could use to launch an attack if they can catch up.   Just like the sprint, there's no one-size-fits-all strategy that will always work best.  No rider would use the same strategy for every race, not least because their rivals would know exactly what to expect.

Could we see thrills and spills?  I like thrills and spills!

In a word, YES.  With six sprinters jockeying for position at up to 75km/h on a sloped track, it's not surprising that crashes, relegations and disqualifications are very common in keirin racing.  The riders will often be forced to use their shoulders and elbows to defend their position, and the slightest touch of wheels could unceremoniously scatter the whole field across the track.  It's a much more physical event than you might expect, and anything can happen.

Chris Hoy is by no means guaranteed to stay upright, let alone to win his record-breaking sixth Olympic gold.  If we had fingers, we'd be crossing them hard.  But if all goes to plan, Britain might well end the day with a staggering total of eight golds from ten track cycling events.

A quick guide to the track cycling sprint

The track cycling is well underway at the Olympic velodrome, and, judging by all the questions we've received, it's got you all thoroughly baffled.  We've probably left it too late to fully explain the omnium, as we'd have needed to start several weeks before the Olympics.  But the sprint competitions and men's keirin are still going on.  Taking the sprint event first, this is what you need to know.

Jason Kenny rides for Great Britain against multiple world champion Gregory Baugé in the gold medal race of the sprint competition in the next few minutes - so you'll want to pay attention to see whether Kenny can win Britain's 18th gold of these games!  Meanwhile, Victoria Pendleton is progressing smoothly through the women's draw and should be battling for gold tomorrow.

Let's start at the beginning.  In the sprint, the two riders are drawn in lanes - one in the sprinter's lane near the inside of the track, and the other higher up.  For simplicity's sake, we'll call them the top and bottom riders.  The starting position for the bottom rider is slightly further forward than that of the top rider, so they will be expected to lead out the race.  Simply put, the first rider to cross the line at the end of three laps wins the sprint.  It's a "best of three" format at this late stage of the competition, so the first rider to win two sprints will take gold.  Both Kenny and Baugé won their semi-final rounds 2-0.

While the format of the event is very straightforward, the tactics are a little more complicated.  There are no restrictions as to when a rider can start to ride at full speed, so you might expect that either or both riders would choose to ride the full three laps flat out, challenging the other to respond.  However, just like athletics, sprinters are not usually built to maintain speed over long distances, and this would be a very risky strategy because the responding rider could use the other's slipstream to catch up and eventually overtake.  Bear in mind that riding in the slipstream of another rider can reduce the effort required by up to 50%.

Instead, you're much more likely to see the riders play a drawn-out game of cat and mouse.  Apart from the effect of slipstreaming, the two crucial points to keep in mind are that riding around the centre of the track means covering a shorter distance, and that using the shape of the velodrome by swinging down from the top of the track will increase a rider's speed.

Let's look at tactics in a little more detail.   It's impossible to say what the "best" tactic would be for any given race, so we can only try to explain how a typical race might shape up.  The bottom rider will usually ride most of the first two laps looking over their shoulder to keep an eye on their opponent.   The top rider will try to sneakily gain as much height as they can compared to their opponent, in order to increase the burst of acceleration they can produce when they eventually decide to start their sprint by swooping down.  The bottom rider will try to mark the top rider's moves by staying close to them.  The bottom rider can try to force the top rider's hand by steering them up to the top of the track as slowly as possible, removing any possibility that the top rider could swoop down and capture the initiative by overtaking.  Equally, if they see that the top rider is hanging back to give themselves more room to work with, the bottom rider could put in an early burst of speed to try to gain an advantage over the top rider.  In an ideal world, the top rider would manage to start their sprint while the bottom rider's back is turned, giving them a slight advantage and propelling them to take the shortest and quickest route around the track.

Without going into technical detail, it's worth remembering that riders can be disqualified for bumping and barging each other to try to secure a better position on the track.  However, you might still see the bottom rider sticking their elbows out to make themselves a slightly bigger obstacle, as the margins in this event are so small that this can decisively increase the distance that the top rider would need to cover to overtake.  Crashes do happen, and when they happen at this speed, they happen hard.

The sprint will usually start with a little over a lap to go.  As soon as either rider puts in a decisive acceleration, the other must respond as quickly as they can.  At that point, it's a straight race to glory at the finish line.  With races frequently decided by photo finishes and thousandths of a second, this is definitely the most exciting event to watch at the velodrome.  So tune in, don't blink, and enjoy it while it lasts!

Welcome to the velodrome: how track cycling has changed since Beijing

I wrote a little piece on my blog a couple of days ago to try to answer a few questions about the differences between track cycling at Beijing 2008 and track cycling at London 2012.

Why can't Chris Hoy ride in the individual sprint?

Where have the individual pursuit and madison events gone?

And why won't Great Britain be able to emulate their success from Beijing, no matter how many world records they break?

All the answers are here.

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The Olympic track cycling has just started at the velodrome. It's a beautifully designed building and a fitting tribute to all the success that our cyclists have achieved since the state-of-the-art Manchester velodrome was built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games.

Great Britain won seven gold medals, three silvers and two bronzes on the track in Beijing, including three golds for Chris Hoy and two for Bradley Wiggins. To put that into perspective, we won seven of 10 events and 12 of 30 medals available. Of our entire track cycling team, only Mark Cavendish failed to win a medal, and (as most of you know) he's since become the most successful road cyclist in the world. That's an astonishingly dominant performance by any measure. Even more so when you consider that the prestigious men's 1000m race - at which Britain's Jason Queally and Chris Hoy had won the previous two Olympic golds - was surprisingly cut from the Olympic programme prior to Beijing.

Repeating that performance was always going to be a difficult task, especially with several other countries increasing investment in the sport to try to catch up. But changes introduced by the UCI (the sport's governing body) at the behest of the IOC have made it an impossible one.

Firstly, each country can now only enter one rider or team for each event. This immediately means that no country will ever emulate our Beijing feat of winning more medals than there were events. The main headache this created for the GB selectors was who to pick for the men's sprint, since Jason Kenny and Chris Hoy would both be favourites to win medals. The selectors have picked Kenny on the basis of his better recent form, so Chris Hoy cannot now defend one of his three Olympic titles. As mentioned above, this is now the second time that Hoy has been prevented from defending an Olympic title.

Secondly, several events have been cut from the Olympic programme. This is an unfortunate consequence of the admirable objective of enabling women to compete in just as many track cycling events as men. Rather than adding women's equivalents of the existing men's events, the UCI have been forced to remove some events to avoid increasing the total number and thereby diluting the value of a gold medal (as the IOC would see it). The men's madison has been cut, along with the men's and women's individual pursuit events (previously won for Britain by Chris Boardman, Bradley Wiggins and Rebecca Romero) and the men's and women's points races. These events have been replaced with the women's team sprint, the women's team pursuit, the women's keirin and the men's and women's omnium races. For those of you new to track cycling, the omnium is a hexathlon of disciplines aimed at rewarding all-round cycling skill where competitors tackle a short time trial, a flying lap race, a points race, elimination race, pursuit race and scratch race.

It's worth remembering that these changes are great news for some riders - Victoria Pendleton now has the chance to ride for three gold medals rather than one, and to translate the staggering dominance she's exhibited at recent World Championships into the Olympic arena in front of an adoring home crowd. But it's a real shame that administrators couldn't have found a way to retain traditional events such as the individual 1,000m and 4,000m races while also introducing long overdue equality. Even taking into account that there are also a few mountain bike, BMX and road cycling events at London 2012, it must be pretty devastating for track cyclists to see swimmers and track and field athletes competing in 34 and 48 events respectively. I'm certainly not arguing that any sport should be structured to ensure that Great Britain wins as many medals as possible. I'm arguing that the sport should be properly represented at the Olympic Games, and that we should be able to see athletes competing to become Olympic champions in the most prestigious track cycling races.

In short, don't blame Team GB's track cyclists when we fall short of our Beijing medal tally. Blame murky manoeuvrings behind the curtain of sporting politics.

Track cycling day one: a tale of two rules

Two gold medals were on offer on day one of competition at the velodrome in the men's and women's team sprint races.  Both British teams set world record times that would have advanced them to the gold medal race and guaranteed at least a silver medal under normal circumstances.  Despite a controversial incident in their first round, the British men produced a brilliant display in the final to thrash world champions France and snatch gold.  But the British women were relegated to last place in their second round and missed out on the medals.

Let's take the British women's team of Jess Varnish and Victoria Pendleton first.  Why were they relegated?  In the women's team sprint, the two riders on the team start at the same time and complete two laps, with the first rider (who sets the pace on the first lap) peeling off as that lap ends.  At the end of the first lap, the first rider must still be ahead of the second rider when they both cross the line.  If the second rider has already overtaken the first rider, that constitutes an illegal change and the team is relegated to last place in that round of the competition.   The equivalent situation in athletics would see a relay team disqualified for completing a baton change after the end of the change box.  In this case, Pendleton had already overtaken Varnish by the end of the first lap.  The margin was extremely small and the commissaires officiating the race do have some discretion in applying the rule, but replays confirmed that their decision was correct.  In the gold medal race, China also performed an illegal change and were therefore relegated to last place in that round, taking silver instead of gold as a consequence.  While we naturally feel extremely sorry for Varnish and Pendleton - Varnish because that was her only event, and Pendleton because this is probably her last competition - they accidentally broke a rule and should be treated the same way as any other team.

Turning to the British men's team of Philip Hindes, Jason Kenny and Chris Hoy, we need to start by describing what happened in their first round.  Hindes' bike seemed to come out of the start gate at a strange angle and he wobbled about for a few metres before falling to the track.  The commissaires decided that this was a mechanical failure and ordered a restart.  The team (and particularly Hindes) rode superbly three times after that and won gold.

So far, so good.  Nothing controversial about that, you might think.  If anything, performing so well after the shock of an unfortunate mechanical failure makes their achievement all the more impressive, doesn't it?  Well, perhaps not.

When asked about the incident by the BBC's Jill Douglas straight after the final, 19-year-old Hindes answered that he had crashed deliberately.  He explained that the team had planned for a poor start and decided that he would crash to make sure that a restart was awarded.  Or, in his words: "I crashed, I did it on purpose just to get the restart, just to get the fastest ride.  It was all planned really."  So let's be quite clear about this.  There was nothing wrong with his bike and he decided to try to void their first attempt to give the team another chance to record a better time.  This wasn't simply a case of exaggerating a mechanical problem to attract the attention of the commissaires: there was no such problem.  Hindes dived.

At the team's press conference after collecting their medals, Hindes told a very different story after what we can only assume was a crash course in media training.  He denied that he had deliberately fallen and claimed that he had simply lost control.  Hindes was born in Germany and only moved to England to join the British Cycling academy in October 2010.  Perhaps inevitably, the official line distributed by British Cycling was that Hindes' post-race comments were somehow lost in translation.

Based on Hindes' initial response and reported comments from other teams, we'll proceed on their assumption that he crashed on purpose.  By the letter of the rules of track cycling, no rule was broken and the commissaires acted correctly.  So while we might feel that Hindes' actions (which appear to have been dictated by the team) were morally wrong because they were designed to gain an unfair advantage, sanctions could not have been imposed.  The other teams have all accepted the result of the event (though the French team has called for the rules to be changed in future) and the governing body has confirmed that the result cannot be reexamined.

Now, we don't believe that the crash necessarily affected the overall result.  It happened in the first qualification round, where the best eight times advance to the second round.  Based on the expected performances of the other teams, we think Team GB would probably still have qualified comfortably even if Hindes had followed through with his bad start and completed the ride.  But what if Hindes had felt the need to crash in the second round, or even in the final?  In any case, we just wish Hindes hadn't been asked to crash so we could focus on celebrating the team's stellar record-breaking performances in later rounds.

Two races.  Two actions which resulted in an unfair advantage for British teams - one accidental, one deliberate.  The former was punished, the latter was not.  In our view, the strategy which seems to have been employed by the British team would not be accepted in any other sport.  Imagine the farcical scenes if every other team also decided to crash if they thought there was any chance of producing a better start second time around.  Track cycling rules must be changed to ensure that the sport does not descend to the level of public contempt and irrelevance that Olympic badminton has recently achieved.

A beginner's guide to the Olympic time trials

The women's Olympic time trial has already started, with the men's to follow later.  Funny helmets!  Weird wheels!  Chances for three British medals!

Read our full guide to both races below (reprinted in full from its first appearance here), and stay tuned for the results on the next instalment of The Sporting Owl...


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After your kind comments on my guide to the weekend's Olympic road races, I've been persuaded that something similar might help you all through the road time trials on Wednesday. You'll be very relieved to hear that there aren't any complicated tactics to grapple with, so this post will focus on the competing riders and assess the prospects for British success.

Hello!  Hypothetical moron reporting for duty again.  Did you miss me?

Not so much.

So I really enjoyed the road races, despite the TV coverage.  I'm ready for more cycling, and I've heard the time trials are next.  How do they work?

This time, the riders will set off one by one separated by intervals of 90 seconds. The winner is the rider who completes the course in the shortest time. It's really that simple! Is that all you wanted to know? Can I get back to watching the archery now?

Not so fast!  I have LOTS more questions for you to pretend that I'm asking.  When and where will these races happen?  Can I go and watch?

Both races take place on Wednesday - the women's race begins at 12:30 and should finish at about 13:45, and the men's race begins at 14:15 and should finish shortly after 16:00. The course winds its way from Hampton Court around south-west London and back to the palace again over a distance of 44km (with a reduced course of 29km for the women). I think Hampton Court is the only ticketed part of the course, so you can rock up anywhere else on the day and see the best riders in the world for free. Take a look at the course maps and get there early for the best views.

So it's all about times, is it?  What happens if the organisers screw up again and fail to provide proper time checks to broadcasters?  If I can't make it to the course, should I even bother tuning in?

You're right in the sense that watching a time trial without being able to see intermediate checks would be horribly masochistic. But I think the Olympic broadcasters have got the message now - even though the IOC is publicly claiming that their road race failures were caused by overexcited spectators tweeting too much! The women's road race benefited from far more accurate time checks and rider identification the following day. In any case, the time checks during a time trial are provided by computers positioned at two or three fixed checkpoints around the course, so (even if you rather generously choose to believe the IOC's explanation) interference shouldn't cause a problem here.

What happens if one rider catches another who started earlier?

Catching the rider ahead of you has no impact on the final result, though it's an encouraging sign as it obviously means that you're 90 seconds ahead of their time to that point. The starting gaps at the Tour de France time trials are usually two or three minutes, so we could see more catches in this Olympic format. When a rider gets caught, they'll be watched very closely by the race officials to make sure that they don't try to gain an advantage by staying in the slipstream of the faster rider. Doing this could result in a time penalty or perhaps even disqualification.

Do the riders use different equipment for time trial races?

Yes. Every aspect of the rider's kit and bike is fine-tuned to reduce weight and make them more aerodynamic. Even the rider's position on the bike will be different, as they keep their heads low over the handlebars to cut through the air with as little resistance as possible. Without getting too technical, look out for extremely tight lycra skinsuits, a carbon disc wheel rather than the usual spokes at the back of the bike, ovoid chain rings to help riders conserve every last drop of momentum out of a consistent pedalling rhythm and even tiny packets of gel taped to bikes to replace more cumbersome drink bottles.

I'm still a patriotic Brit because you're being consistent.  Which British riders are competing?  Could we win a medal?

Bradley Wiggins is the favourite for gold in the men's race. He comfortably won time trial stages of 41.5km and 53.5km at the Tour de France over similar terrain this month, and his background in pursuit events on the track makes him ideally suited to this event. The only cause for concern (apart from his sideburns) is that he might not have fully recovered from his exertions in trying desperately to pace Mark Cavendish back to the leaders in Saturday's road race.

Chris Froome is the only other Brit riding the time trial. Primarily a climber, he's made massive improvements in time trialling since joining Team Sky a couple of years ago. In those Tour de France time trials I mentioned, Froome finished second to Wiggins both times. He'd have an excellent chance to give Wiggins a run for his money on a more hilly course. Nonetheless, he'll still be expecting to finish in the top five and possibly to claim a well-deserved medal.

Emma Pooley and Lizzie Armitstead are riding for Britain in the women's time trial. A Cambridge engineering graduate currently studying for a PhD, Pooley won a silver medal in the same event at Beijing and has since taken gold and silver at the last two World Championships. However, all three of those courses were much better suited to her climbing prowess and efficient technical style than the flatter London course, which will probably favour stronger, heavier riders. On paper Armitstead is far less likely to win a medal, but perhaps Sunday's brilliant road race might propel her to another special performance - especially if she's been reunited with her lucky sunglasses…

Sounds very promising!  Who are the other favourites?

Switzerland's Fabian Cancellara (known as 'Spartacus') is the Olympic champion and a prolific time trial specialist. You might remember that he crashed towards the end of the road race and burst into tears after finishing last, fearing that he'd broken his collarbone for the second time in three months and would miss the chance to defend this title. But the collarbone was only bruised, and his reputation for resilience was earned the hard way. Cancellara beat Wiggins in the prologue at the Tour de France over a much shorter distance, but performed poorly in one of the other time trials and pulled out of the race to concentrate on the Olympics.

Why is his nickname 'Spartacus'?  He doesn't look much like Kirk Douglas.  Does he pay a few other decoy riders to use the same nickname, just to confuse the Romans?

I don't know. It doesn't make much sense. At one point he was using "Tony Montana" as a back-up nickname, so perhaps the Swiss only allow partially-sighted people to go to the cinema? Anyway, shush, we've got more riders to talk about. Tony Martin won the time trial at September's World Championships for Germany, beating Wiggins into second place. It's difficult to assess his form as he broke his wrist at the Tour de France and missed both time trial stages. He started Saturday's road race but stopped very early to conserve energy for the time trial. If he's fully recovered from his injury, he should win a medal and could certainly take gold. As for any other contenders in the men's race, it's a very small field and that was reduced further when Australian star Cadel Evans was forced to pull out citing fatigue. Among the other 33 riders, only Luis Leon Sanchez (who finished third in one of the Tour de France time trials) and Sylvain Chavanel have a realistic shot at a medal.

Turning to the women's race, Olympic champion Kristin Armstrong (no relation to disgraced wristband magnate Lance, thank goodness) is the favourite to defend her title among a tiny field of 23 riders, though Germany's Judith Arndt should be hot on her heels.

My prediction? If you don't want to miss two British medals, you'd better stay tuned to the cycling on Wednesday. It should be well worth getting sacked for!

UPDATE

Since writing this post, the start times and race numbers for all the riders have been published. As expected, the favourites for gold are starting towards the end to ratchet up the tension. Here are the key times and numbers to look out for.

Women's race

Emma Pooley, GBR (number 6) - scheduled to set off at 12:57

Judith Arndt, GER (2) - 13:03

Kristin Armstrong, USA (1) - 13:04:30

Men's race

Sylvain Chavanel, FRA (8) - 14:58:30

Chris Froome, GBR (7) - 15:00

Luis Leon Sanchez, ESP (5) - 15:03

Tony Martin, GER (3) - 15:06

Bradley Wiggins, GBR (2) - 15:07:30

Fabian Cancellara, SUI (1) - 15:09

The Sporting Owl #2

They said it couldn't be done.  They said no-one particularly wanted it to be done.  But we've done it anyway - a second Olympic edition of The Sporting Owl!  Featuring an exclusive-ish report on (our visit to) the badminton at Wembley Arena, and Ria singing the national anthem of Suriname.  And a disturbing premonition of Beth Tweddle's untimely demise...

A beginner's guide to the Olympic road race

If you're having trouble getting to grips with road cycling, our handy guide (which first appeared here on my blog yesterday morning) should help.  We've reprinted it in full below.

The women's road race is happening RIGHT NOW.  Most of the points in my guide apply equally to the women's race.  And that statement will seem EVEN MORE accurate if you ignore all the names of male cyclists I originally included...

We'll report the results of both races in our next podcast, which (technology permitting) should appear late tonight or tomorrow morning.

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I'm sure we're all still coming down after yesterday's incredible Olympic opening ceremony, but THE SPORT STARTS NOW people. Don't forget about the sport!

Britain's best chance of a medal today comes at the men's cycling road race. As a public service, I've allowed myself to be interviewed about it by a hypothetical moron. If you're suddenly intrigued by road cycling because we're amazing at it, or have recently suffered a life-threatening head injury, this might get you through the day.

So, road cycling. Why do I care? 

Because it's a fast-paced tactical sport that produces intense moments of unforgettable drama. I can't remember whether I was going to make you a hypothetical patriotic British person, but if you are - we have a very good chance of winning a gold medal, and we've just dominated the shit out of the Tour de France. 

I can ride a bike. Why should I be impressed? 

They're riding 250km in less than six hours. Can you do that? No, I thought not. How about doing that almost every day for three weeks, as they do at the Tour de France? How about riding that distance at an average speed of more than 40km/h, including nine trips up a tricky little climb? Starting to sound almost impossible? It is. That's why they all deserve our attention and adulation. 

Where is it? Can I go and watch?

Yes, you can still go. There are two ticketed areas on the course - the start/finish at The Mall, and part of Box Hill, the only climb on the route which the riders will tackle nine times. The rest of the 250km route isn't ticketed, so you can pop along and cheer on the riders for free. If you can find a slight incline, that might help as the riders will come past you more slowly. These projected timings should give you a good idea of when to expect the riders to pass. If you're going to sit at home, the start time is 10:00 and the estimated finish time is 15:38.

Who's riding in the race then?

There are 144 riders - you can see the full list here. Broadly speaking, they're grouped into national teams of a maximum of 5 riders, though only Spain, Italy, GB, Belgium, Australia, the US, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany have qualified to bring a full team. If you're completely neutral and desperate for someone to cheer on, scroll down to rider number 82 - yes, that's right, JACK BAUER is competing for New Zealand. Is there anything that man can't do? A couple of big names missing from the start list due to injury and illness are Sammy Sanchez, who took gold for Spain at the Great Wall course in Beijing four years ago, and Thor Hushovd, who's won the green jersey for best sprinter at the Tour de France several times and would be a major medal contender for Norway.

Let's assume I'm a patriotic Brit. I mean, you can do that, right? Since you're making me up? Who's riding for us?

There are five British riders in the race. They won't have to achieve much to beat our results in Beijing - we entered four riders there (none of whom are returning) and none of them finished due to the extreme heat - but they're aiming a little higher this time around. Taking them one by one, Bradley Wiggins has just won this year's Tour de France, the most prestigious bike race in the world. Chris Froome (who competed for Kenya until a few years ago) came second in the same race and could probably have won it if he hadn't been riding under team orders to help Wiggins. "Manx missile" Mark Cavendish has been the best sprinter in the world for at least four years, and won the road race World Championship title last year. David Millar is a veteran rider who reads the race well and will be the team captain on the road. Between those four, they won an unprecedented seven of the 21 stages at this year's Tour de France. Finally, Ian Stannard is a hard worker who will help the team to chase down any attacks that look likely to jeopardise their plan for gold.

So what are Team GB going to do? What's their plan for the race?

Their plan will be to make sure that Mark Cavendish wins a big sprint finish on the Mall - the other four riders have no medal ambitions of their own (unless something happens to Cavendish) and are primarily there to give him the best possible chance of winning gold. If they can get him to the final kilometre in the leading group, there's a very good chance he'll win. But that's going to be very difficult to achieve. Everyone else in the race knows that Cavendish has the best sprint finish of all the riders, so the other teams will be trying to launch attacks throughout the race to gain a lead over the main field (or 'peloton'). For the same reason, the onus will be on Team GB to take the leading role (and therefore expend the most effort) in chasing down any such breakaways. Box Hill will present another challenge, as Cavendish is less suited to hauling himself over climbs than some of his other sprinting rivals - however, he's lost a bit of weight this year to try to beat Box Hill, and that didn't seem to have affected his finishing power at the Tour. Even if it does come down to a big sprint finish, there are several other riders who can beat Cavendish on their day.

How will they manage to apply those tactics out on the course?

It's going to be a bit more difficult than usual as the riders can't carry team radios in this race, so they can't get any information from their team managers. That's why a veteran rider like David Millar will be so important - he can use his expertise to read the race, determine whether a particular attack is likely to succeed and whether it contains any dangerous riders, and decide whether or not the team needs to chase it down.

You've mentioned David Millar a couple of times. I thought he was a drugs cheat? Isn't that a major problem for this sport? 

Well, you're partly right. He was banned for a year in 2004 for taking EPO, a drug which increases the oxygen-carrying capacity of blood and therefore improves endurance by boosting production of red blood cells. Unlike many other riders in the same position, Millar confessed straight away and has since established a role as perhaps the leading anti-doping advocate in the sport. He has been accepted back into the peloton and is widely respected among his peers. Despite all that, he would still have been unable to compete in the Olympics under the BOA's policy of Olympic bans for anyone convicted of a doping offence. However, that policy was struck out as unfair by the Court of Arbitration for Sport this year after a challenge by an American runner. David Millar is perhaps the best available example of a reformed drugs cheat who deserves a second chance. and Team GB will benefit hugely from his experience and decision-making in this race. Overall, cycling has become a lot cleaner over the past decade, and cyclists are subjected to more advanced testing throughout the year than any other sportsmen. Basically, don't let Lance Armstrong put you off. As far as it's possible to tell, Bradley Wiggins and Mark Cavendish have proved to everyone that you can still win clean.

OK, you've convinced me, I'm going to watch. Let's say it comes down to a big sprint finish. Who are Cavendish's main rivals?

After the Tour, I'd say his main rival is Peter Sagan from Slovakia (wearing number 36 in this race). Sagan is only 21 but managed to win three tough stages and take this year's green jersey at the Tour at his first attempt. He doesn't have any teammates in this race as Slovakia haven't qualified any other riders, so the lack of a team leadout for a traditional sprint is a slight handicap, but he's good enough to win alone. Box Hill gives him a slight advantage as he's also a competent climber - he even managed to attack on a couple of gruelling mountain stages at the Tour, so he's perfectly capable of winning from a breakaway group too. In a sprint, the other contenders are probably Andre Greipel (number 47), who won three Tour stages and has the support of a very strong German team, and Matt Goss (number 23), who was well placed in most of the big Tour sprints but comes out of that race with quite a lot to prove.  Belgium's Tom Boonen and Philippe Gilbert (numbers 16 and 17) could also play a part, but neither has particularly good form this year. Anyone could win if a breakaway manages to beat the main field to the line, but France's panache-dripping Sylvain Chavanel (number 54) is definitely worth keeping an eye on.

This is going to be one of the most exciting events at the Olympics, so do watch if you can. If you enjoy today's race, the women's road race (featuring Beijing's British Olympic champion Nicole Cooke) follows tomorrow, and the men's time trial follows on Wednesday, with Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome both back and battling to beat time trial specialists Fabian Cancellara of Switzerland and Tony Martin of Germany. Track cycling follows towards the end of next week.

So stay tuned throughout the day, support Team GB and let's all cross our fingers that Mark Cavendish can win our first gold of the Games!