Mike Hanley from Team 7-Eleven to Now: The Official's View on Doping

Mike Holds up Scott McKinley in 1988 Tour of Texas Pit

Most of you know Mike Hanley as the chief referee at Ohio Valley cycling events.  In the 80's he worked with Andy Hampsten and the 7-Eleven Cycling team, the team that led the American charge on the then European dominated peloton.  Mike offers a professional, historic, and an official's perspective on doping that only a select few in the sport can deliver.  He answers the question of what it means to us, the amateur/local racers and riders, and what we can do to preserve and grow the sport.  I am both humbled and honored he gave his permission to share his opinion.  Thank you Mike. 

by Mike Hanley
Executive Director
Indiana-Kentucky Cycling Association

(Indianapolis, IN) After the first Oprah/Lance interview I sit here wondering what my friends in cycling think about the recent developments in the Lance Armstrong saga. 

Most of you know me as the chief referee that runs the majority of the races around these parts. And a few of you know that I work behind the scenes with race organizers to develop the annual schedule of events. After watching the first Lance/Oprah interview I feel the need to share my thoughts about Lance Armstrong and how recent revelations/admissions may impact what you and I do as amateur bike racers.

Professional cycling, like most endurance sports, has a long history of performance enhancing (PED) drug use. In the early days, there was a distinct advantage over the competition when athletes at the top of a sport were experimenting with PED's. Over the past 30 years, coaches, team doctors and sports scientists, have developed a sophisticated system of doping with the goal of circumventing current testing methods. That has been the game behind the scenes and that's why Lance has been able to claim he's never tested positive.

The one thing that Lance said during the Oprah interviews that I thought was truly relevant was that he didn't feel he was cheating, just ensuring a level playing field. I get that. During the 1980’s I worked for the 7-Eleven Cycling Team which was the first organized American foray into European cycling. I didn't know it at the time but we learned a lot about racing in Europe, and the most obvious lesson was that we needed to get on the program. A program that was firmly entrenched in a culture of doping that included all the champions in recent memory and a majority of the riders in the peloton during the most formative years of the sport. How can we expect Americans to be successful at a European game if we aren't entitled to a level playing field? What I'm saying here is not justification for Lance’s behavior or an endorsement of PED's, its a question of 'how is one to be competitive when facing a stacked deck?'

I'm proud to say that 7-Eleven, for the most part, and specifically Andy Hampsten, raced clean. There were times when we pushed the envelope (or, more accurately, certain riders took chances) but overall we were the new kids on the block and we brought a distinctly American (read, clean) approach to pro racing in Europe. It wasn’t easy. But with a tireless staff, great coaching and a brilliant team doctor we earned every win and the eventual respect of the European cycling community.

Lance Armstrong’s confession was watched by millions of people who, I’m afraid, now believe that all cyclists are dopers. I hear it every day. However, when applied to amateur racing, nothing could be further from the truth. Doping, on the local and regional level in the U.S., is virtually non-existent for two reasons. First, the cost of PED’s is prohibitively expensive for all but the wealthy. And second, U.S. rider demographics are predominately over 30, educated, professional and family oriented.

If those of us on the front lines of local/amateur racing hope to quiet the outrage associated with Lance and professional cycling, and preserve our heritage of club sport and athlete development, we must take every opportunity to inform our friends and families that Lance's world is about fame and fortune, not what we do as amateurs and weekend warriors. We are riders who simply love the sport for the lifestyle and health benefits it offers and who will never succumb to the pressures of competing in Europe.

Why My Daughter Cares About #doprah

Corey Green is part of the leadership team for the Lionhearts Junior Cycling Team and Program in Cincinnati and over the past few days, like Luke Armstrong-Lance's son, those juniors had to field questions about doping at school too.  It brings an interesting side to the conversation.

Days prior to Lance's #doprah special we got tidbits of "leaked" info, primarily that he "did it". You couldn't turn on a TV or even listen to the radio without hearing that Lance was going to admit Thursday night to Oprah.

As I thought about the proceedings and the forthcoming admission, I decided I didn't really care. I watched all his Tour de France's over and over on my basement trainer. I know every excruciating detail of those tours from Armstrong riding away from Zulle in 1999 to chasing down Fillipo Simeoni in 2004 to the famous "look" back to Ullrich on L'Alpe-d'Huez in 2001.  I have a barely worn t-shirt commemorating the look from Armstrong's Ride for the Roses ride in 2002.  Roughly 8000 others from that ride do too.  

I had watched this footage over and over, I knew there was no way Armstrong did it clean. When you watch him pull away from every previously confirmed doper, year after year, it doesn't take a genius to know it isn't a matter of "if" its confirmed, its "when". 

Still I needed to know more.  I needed to watch the Lance interview on Oprah, but not for me.  As you know from reading, I have been working with juniors for several years.  They would have questions and may even watch themselves. So I watched, curious what I would see and even more curious whether I would learn something.

The first night, I learned almost nothing, except for Lance Armstrong confirming his brash, unyielding and stubborn persona.  Night two I contemplated whether I should spend another hour watching.  The same conversation went through my head.  I was glad I watched.  Lance nearly broke down, but not for the reasons I had suspected. 

Lance nearly lost it when talking about Luke, his 13 year old son, defending his father at school. After the USADA report was delivered it had become increasingly difficult for a 13 year old to withstand the constant questions from other kids. The teen years are awkward enough without having to defend your dad's actions daily.

That's when it clicked with Lance.

As a dad I could see the anguish in Lance's eyes. It was easy for Lance to lie, control other people, inject EPO into his body, or meet in secret hotel locations to discuss strategy with doctors referred to as vampires. However, to uphold his secret, to maintain his control, it now meant his son, an impressionable teen, would have to lie too. He would have to continue to defend his dad no matter how complicated the situation, no matter when or where.

He told his son "don't defend me anymore." I can't imagine having that conversation.  I can't imagine what I would have do to put myself in the situation to have that conversation. It's quite a leap from the Easter Bunny.

Juniors on the Podium at Chicago Cup CX 2013

I hadn't expected the questions our juniors got at school. Other kids at school asked my juniors, my kids about drugs, why cyclists took drugs, and whether one of them did drugs themselves to improve their performance.

Until Lance on Oprah, I thought the situation only impacted current cyclists and riders from the previous generation, the guys who "did it." Tyler, Floyd, Ivan, Alex, Jan, etc, etc had taken the drugs and received their suspension.  Some disappeared.  Others returned to ride again. Without being known worldwide, their impact on the general public was minimal, and their issues came and went without my kids knowing.

Lance was different. Yellow LiveStrong bands graced the wrists of school kids of all ages. Certainly they didn't know the depth of LiveStrong and what it stood for, but they knew it was Lance and the bracelets were cool. He dated Sheryl Crow, hung with Robin Williams, was on Letterman and Leno every year, and even hosted Saturday Night Live.  The other kids at school knew who he was, what he did, and associated our kids with him because they were junior cyclists.

Pro CXer Kaitlin Antonneau Gives Tips To Junior Racers

Our quest is harder now. Lance didn't make adults 30 and over wonder about drugs and question whether all cyclists took drugs to go faster, he made anyone who could watch TV wonder.  Now, kids of all ages who love taking their bike out to the park to race and recently built a wealth of experience in Madison at Nationals were having to answer Oprah's questions. They didn't have to defend Lance - he excused himself - they had to defend their sport.

Lance wants a comeback.  Frankly I don't care if he rides or races or not, but his rehab program should include education to all of America that cycling isn't an evil sport. The world needs to know cycling is a community of good people, people who care not about themselves, but about a sport that provides lifetime fitness, a sport that Lance used and abused like a rental car to bring him fame and fortune. 

Funniest part of this whole story is how much Lance was just like the teens I spend my time working alongside. Teens are a combination of mature and immature at the same time. They understand complex emotional situations and teeter on the edge of making good and bad decisions. Their success rate is poor at times, but we all chalk it up to growing up and "those dang teen years." What do you do when a teenager needs an attitude adjustment or needs to see the fallacy in their decision making?

You take away something important to them.

Pushing The Lance Boulder Down The Hill

The elephant is in the room riding a tandem and twirling a soccer ball on his trunk, and only CNN last night got a glimpse of it.  It’s bigger than Oprah.  It’s bigger than Lance’s ego.  I watched Mike and Mike on ESPN this morning.  While they summarized the interview well, they quickly breezed through and went right on to the bigger, easier and tastier story of the day, the poor Notre Dame football player who got catfished.  I don’t blame ESPN.  It has to hurt when the self proclaimed world wide leader in sports gets scooped by Deadspin, the world wide leader in telling Donald Trump to go F himself.  Not to mention, catfishing a college football player is way more interesting to the majority of viewers than doping in a sport that only makes the news for three weeks in July.  But, what if there’s a bigger fish to fry?

My TOC Photos Take on New Meaning

What if there is systematic doping in Soccer, Football, Baseball, Basketball…sports where the money is bigger, the fame more intoxicating and the rules are way more lax?  What if your kid, your nephew, the high school phenom next door doesn’t have a shot at making the team unless Mom starts making room in the fridge pronto to store some blood?  On Oprah, you may see a mature man in his early 40’s, but think about how young he was when it started to get real.

Who’s asking these questions Sally Jenkins?  Isn’t it obvious that if Lance says he saw himself as being on a level playing field, that this is way bigger than we can imagine?  C’mon it’s cycling.  By salary comparison, most cyclists don’t make in a career what most football players make in a year.  Still, Lance alludes to a peloton 200 or so deep, all with their doctors and support staffs systematically doping, for at least 7 years.  Doping has to be engrained deeper in other sports.  Maybe that’ll come out on part two tonight with the 2^nd place world wide leader in sports, the Oprah Winfrey Network.

What's behind those drawn shades?

Let me help pull the wool jersey from over their eyes.  It couldn’t have stopped with Lance.  It couldn’t have stopped with baseball player hearings on Capitol Hill.  It must be still happening.  It can’t be one or two bad apples.  It’s has to be orchards upon orchards.  Sure cycling now has the biological passport and out of competition testing, but come on.  They don’t do a whole lot of that in football or baseball, where penalties are measured in days not years.  I’ve never seen a doping control tent at a ball game stadium.  History has shown us that doping has a way to stay a wheel length ahead of the knock on the door.  It can’t be only cycling.  Who’s shining the light on soccer, football, baseball, basketball?  Who’s nosing around those doctor’s offices?  Who’s swinging by the baseball team locker room for a look?  What’s going on in the college team hotel before the big game?  What are those kids really doing after school?

Damn I Loved George

Maybe it is up to Deadspin to dig it up and steal some more world wide thunder.  Last night we saw the fastest guy from the fastest team admit to years of systematic doping.  While Lance danced around giving “the look” to specific others, journalists could pull up any team roster from any sport and find some names, players, doctors, trainers to start with.  February sweeps are right around the corner.  If anything, Lance proved it’s not a witch hunt and more likely shooting fish in barrel. 

When you discover that doping likely didn’t come to a magical halt with cycling in 2005, and probably takes place in other sports, sports with crazy rock star money, sports with much more lax penalties for doping, then you’re getting at something.  Then take a look at how these athletes get to the pro level.  Who missed the cut?  Who’s next in line to make the pro jump?  Look at the feeder leagues.  Look at college sports.  Seriously, take a look at high school. 

Right now there are talented 14 year old kids out there who might have a chance to go pro, only they need to be much bigger, much faster and have much more endurance to compete with all the drug users and enablers that currently occupy the team rosters and staffs.  Put your arm around one of those kids, read the “side effects” of EPO, Testosterone, and Steroids and ask yourself, does it really matter if everyone is doing it?

Or, you could just run with this catfish thing.  

USADA Report: Now That You Know, Which Knee Warmers Will You Wear?

It was called “Clarity.”  As they adjusted the plastic mask over my face, I recall it having a hint of lemon lime.  It was what I ordered from the bar at the “O2 Lounge,” 9600 feet above sea level on Main Street in Breckenridge.  For lack of a better term, the barista at the oxygen bar turned on the flow and my wife and I sat back in hopes of relieving our pounding headaches on day two of our cycling vacation.  It worked.  If only for a few hours the headache subsided and my labored breathing eased climbing the trail.

While widely accepted, and being no hard and fast rules or sanctions against it, mountaineers are divided on the subject of using supplemental oxygen in their summit bids.  It’s also widely accepted that I’m no mountaineer.  Still I wonder, had I cheated in a way?  Absolutely not.  I was not trying to set a speed record on the local 14’er Quandary Peak, but simply trying to ease a day on the bike path to Frisco and a hike up to the Colorado Trail.  There are no rules in recreational cycling and hiking.  In more or less terms, nobody gives a hoot.  However in pro cycling we do, give hoots that is. 

Now with temps in the low 50’s and falling, I pulled on my knee warmers.  Blue, warm and sag-free, I love them.  Days earlier, I read Hincapie’s admission on his website, as well those of the others who cheated.  Like watching the slow helmet motion footage of a Red Bull Rampage rider casing an 80-footer, I followed the live blog of the USADA release at the WSJ website.  Even though we could all see this coming like semi-truck headlights in the fog, my stomach sank.  I began to feel played for a fool.  While there are a dozen companies that make blue, non-saggy, toasty knee warmers, I chose to buy Hincapie.  A few days ago, like many personal decisions we’ll make down the road based on our scruples, I chose to take them off.

Errmahgerd George!

The Hincapie I knew made those knee warmers as cool as the consummate right hand man I cheered for on TV and sought out for a photo when I vacationed at the Tour of California, the perfect teammate, always up there toughing it out in mud, in rain, and on the steeps.  I identified with that.  While I can count my personal solo wins of my 14 years of amateur racing on the fingers of one hand, I’ve always tried to encourage my teammates, give them the perfect lead-out, help with a draft, and lend equipment or advice.  I’m not going to say Hincapie knee warmers were like putting on Superman’s cape, but they did make me feel more like the bike racer I wanted to be.  Now instead of being a symbol of cycling’s team and hard-men nature, the knee warmers are a reminder to keep role models at a distance while trying my hardest to hold the sport dear. 

“Don’t be naïve Joe,” I can hear you say.  Everyone was doping.  Get over it.  “People suck and they cheat,” a reader posted on our Facebook page.  I know.  I know.  I know.  With taxes, the stock market and their spouses it happens everyday.  We all get screwed sometime or another.  However, I do feel cheated and I’m entitled to feel that way.  For (insert name of hero you can believe in here)’s sake, the accomplishments of the greatest American cycling team, the results of every race I saw them compete, the fame gained by the coaches and management, every dollar earned directly or indirectly because of that success is all ill-gotten. 

Adam Myerson ‏@AdamMyerson

You motherfuckers have a LOT of work to do to pay your debt back to all of us.

The root of my feeling lies in the fact that doping is not a one race thing.  To me, it’s preposterous to think, and as far as I can tell, physically impossible for a rider to stop doping and continue to masquerade as a clean athlete.  Doping is a tattoo, permanent.  Even if for a short period of time, the muscles built, the cardiovascular system developed, the knowledge gained at the top of the sport will always be with these riders till the day they die.  The phrase “former doper” is a joke.  Once a doper, always a doper. 

Nooo!  Him too?

By using EPO they were able to train harder and recover faster, win, get their name in the headlines, generate fans, and be in touch with industry people.  Now, years later these riders, team managers, coaches and doctors are going to ask me to participate in their Grand Fondo, read their book, go see their new team race, watch the movie, believe in the new crop of athletes under their wing, sign up for that triathlon, purchase their training program, to toe the line with me at a non-sanctioned mountain bike race, buy their brand of bikes or feel comfortable in their knee warmers.  I’m sorry.  They may be able to race a UCI event in 6 months, but I think I’m done with them and their knee warmers.    

However, I do somewhat sympathize with the riders…somewhat.  I’m sure you noticed a hint of victimization in the USADA report.  Many riders allege management more or less said it was dope or go home.  It reeks of coercion.  Yet a Barry, Hincapie and the others made the decision.  They were 10-12 years younger than now, hungry to go big time, pressured and perhaps a bit narrow minded to realize that there were more options than doping or going home. 

In mountaineering you’re judged by your peers, be it bottled oxygen or team support, on what type of assistance you used to get to the top and back down.  Maybe that’s what divides us from the those that doped.  From the USADA document, most riders seem to hint that they felt there was no other way to the top of the mountain.  We the fans feel otherwise, until now having to assume we were witnessing a monumental accomplishment.

I Booked a Plane Ticket and Got Up Early for This?

The real victims in all of this are the people that didn’t make the cut, the riders who lost to the dopers, talented prospective staff members that didn’t buy into the program and ended up trying to make the most of other avenues and/or cycling’s minor leagues.  I also feel sorry for the fans that booked a plane ticket, drove up the mountain in a rent a car at 5am to be a tiny part of something they thought was great.  It turns my stomach to think of all the people in the last decade that bought into the Trek marketing machine.  I feel bad that I once poked fun of Floyd Landis showing up for the Mohican 100 NUE Mountain Bike Race and thought LeMond was a loud mouth buffoon.  Looking back, at least they had the courage to speak out against a momentous opponent. 

Doping is against the rules in cycling.  Cycling is not anything goes like fighting cancer.  It’s not kill or be killed.  You practice, you eat right, you persevere, you find a mentor, you play by the rules, you lose, until one day…you win, and it’s glorious.  As a fan, I cheer for the guy dangling off the back in danger of getting dropped as much as the one goosing the pace at the front.

Floyd Landis and I (I'm the Fat One)

People jump up and down.  They scream.  Some have followed you since you were an amateur.  Some heard about you and came out to see if you could pull it off.  Now, they surround you cheering.  You get a trophy, sponsorships, book deals, and cameo roles in movies.  They want the same brand bike you have.  They want the same clothes, now with your name on them.  They want to get the advice of your coach.  They want to ride alongside you on a Grand Fondo.  Your success creates a worldwide movement.

However, doping makes all of that lying, stealing and cheating.  So don’t tell me that it’s okay for any of these cyclists, managers, coaches, doctors to continue in the sport, to continue their endorsements, to put on rides, to start or consult other teams, to show up at local mountain bike races and triathlons, endorse products, and create foundations based on the very color of the ill gotten glory.  It’s not.  All their perceived success in cycling is tainted by doping.  They gave up that chance the moment they went down the wrong path.

I’m not a strong enough voice to sway cycling one way or the other.  I’m not qualified to come up with a fool proof way to insure pro cycling is clean nor have the authority to change its direction.  I am however qualified to not attend events tainted by the presence of a doper.  I can impress on our local racers about what it really means to cheat and that there are other options.  Like Adam Myerson, I am qualified to question those at the highest level of the sport, raise an eyebrow when things don’t look right and be vocal about it.  For now, I can choose to remain a fan of the sport, but not the individual.  I can choose which bike to buy and which knee warmers I wear.

Goodbye Town Line Sprint, Hello #Strava

I taste what you call “Strava Glory.”  It’s sort of a sweet & salty mix of GU Energy gels and sweat combined with the odor of burning 350 dollar bills.  The Best Bike Blog EVER is now on Strava, sits on top of a Leaderboard and has a crown to prove it.  Better check your segments to see if you got knocked down a rung.  Ba bam!  Judo chop!

The problem is, I’m sort of having trouble squeezing my big head into my tiny .jpeg crown.  Still, I make no apologies for spending the equivalent of a week’s worth of family groceries on a GPS enabled cycling computer.  My Polar passed away and I enjoy a team discount.  So while you were out racing for real on Sunday, we went segment hunting in Northern Kentucky with my new Garmin Edge 500.

After the ride, unlike most people I know on Strava.com, I was able to toss my kit in the wash, take a shower, make a recovery shake and eat lunch before downloading my first ride file.  I know better.  While standing naked with their I-phone between their legs, sadly those who are addicted will find out there is not an App to cure jock itch and saddle sores.

Prior to our Sunday morning adventure, I virtually scouted segments of our planned ride.  In a way Strava turns the sport of cycling into a video game.  That sort of bothers me.  It brings cycling one step closer to Farmville.  You scoff at the ridiculousness of people paying real money for virtual world real estate, but yesterday I wondered what it would’ve taken for my teammate to sit up 10 meters from the top and let me have the segment?  Damn.  I drilled it with all I had.

There are no rules on Strava.  Segments aren’t asterisked with “drafted behind bus” or motor-paced by Vespa.  Sunday we returned favors, a lead-out for a lead-out.  That’s fair game I think.  Lead-outs are part of cycling.  But the next time we crest Amsterdam Road, I wonder how I’ll play it.  And it irks me that I’m even thinking of this.  Will I defend it?  Or, will I offer up some Strava currency to save my crown, an inner tube or air cartridge, a Coca-Cola or Snickers at the convenience store, a buck slid in the right hand jersey pocket.

The great thing about winning good ol' wooden town line sprints is enjoying the moment of glory among your peers.  As I log in and check the leaderboard on this 80 degree March day, I’m worried Strava is stretching the moment too far.