That’s Enough Inspiration for Me, Thanks Very Much Lance
Lance Armstrong is at it again. He’s near the lead at the Tour de France, despite being nearly 40, and despite not having participated in the race since 2005.
It has been, as always with Lance, an inspiring, Profiles in Courage sort of performance. You can’t watch Lance pedaling his bike up one of those hills without hearing Chris Connelly’s voice in the background earnestly informing us that what we’re seeing is extraordinary and unbelievable and greater than anything that has ever been seen anywhere in the history of the world, except for that one time the football player let the 10-year-old lupus patient ride on his shoulders.
Lance is truly an example to us all – an example of what a man can do if he puts his mind to it. He’s proof that cancer doesn’t have to be a death sentence. He is a living, breathing testament to the fact that a dude can still be hot with one testicle.
I don’t know about you, but I’m fricking tired of it.
Yeah, I said it – I’m sick of Lance Armstrong. I’ve had it up to here with his whole determined cancer survivor bit. Yes, I know – you beat the deadly scourge. You suffered through all the horrible treatments and you lived and not only that, you excelled. You won a bicycle race through mountains 7 years in a row, in a country that isn’t even America. You had sex with Kate Hudson. You stood up to the doping allegations and didn’t blink, and now you’re having the last laugh. Again.
Honestly though, how many last laughs can one guy have? At some point, doesn’t the last laugh have to be just that? A final, ultimate expression of amused triumph?
It almost seems greedy, the way Lance refuses to leave the stage, despite having proven everything there is to prove.
It probably seems more than greedy to the other guys on Lance’s team who would like a shot at winning the race themselves. All week we’ve heard about the unpleasantness between Armstrong and teammate Alberto Contador, the 2007 winner, who was going to be the man for Team Astana until Lance decided 7 wasn’t enough.
Imagine if you were, say, working at an office, and there was some guy with a great position who retired, and you were promoted into his spot, and then a couple years later he came back and said he wanted his old job, and the company let him return but made the two of you share an office, and compete with each other head-to-head until one of you knocked the other off. You probably wouldn’t be very happy about that. You probably wouldn’t have that other guy on your Christmas card list. You would probably want to bash him in the skull with a paperweight until he went down like Michael Jackson after his 35th Xanax.
Now you know how Alberto Contador feels. More or less.
I think we should all side with Contador against Lance Armstrong. I think we should hit the gong and get Armstrong the hell out of there. I’ve had all the inspiration I can take for one life, thanks very much.
Fortunately, there’s always a chance Armstrong will lose, at which point I imagine he would decide at last to bow out gracefully, and find something else to do with his time. Let him start some more foundations, write some more books, nail some more starlets. At least then I won’t have to hear about him on SportsCenter every night.
Maybe then I will finally be able to get Chris Connelly’s voice out of my head. Seriously, if it doesn’t stop soon, I am going to have to shoot myself. Or Chris Connelly.
You are one bitter, bitter man.
July 10th, 2009 at 1:29 pm