VOLTE-FACE

I have to confess to feeling sympathy for Lance Armstrong.
I've had a go at him in the past (I hear he's really upset about that), and I've jeered at his insistence that he was drug-free during his racing career.
Well, without taking anything back, I think he's getting a rough deal. Why now? Why not when he was at it? Of course he was reported as clear of anything illegal in his testing, but the circumstantial evidence, the accusations by people in the know, were there. Has the US Anti-Doping Agency got any more on Armstrong than they had when he was racing? What we are told is that people who were also at it have done a deal and turned him in. Is that the only advance in the case against him? if so, it's not much of an advance.
To repeat myself, why now? The Tour de France is in full swing, and some of the USADA's collaborators are actually taking part; Leipheimer, Zabriskie, et al. Of course they aren't guilty of any wrongdoing as far as the Tour organisers are concerned, but this casts a shadow on the great event. It also ensures maximum publicity for the Yankee drug snoops.
Seven Tour wins; what, should he be found guilty, happens then? Will the Tour organisers feel bound by the findings? Presumably they'll have to hold an enquiry of their own, but, Jesus! If they have to strip Armstrong of all those prizes, and reallocate them. What a mess. We've just seen Alberto Contador stripped of the 2010 win, which was then awarded to Andy Schleck. Justice done, maybe, but does Andy S. feel like a real winner?
I have to wonder, what proportion of these achievements can be ascribed to performance enhancing substances, and how much to the rider's effort? I don't suppose anyone can answer that. I also wonder, when the riders drink their specially concocted energy drinks, submit to pain-killing injections, swallow their vitamins, do they know what they are ingesting? How guilty are they if they obey doctor's orders.
I think we are now at the stage where any Tour de France that wasn't overshadowed by a drug scandal would elicit cries of "cover up!".
In spite of which I say, hand on heart, this is the greatest event in the sporting calendar, and those athletes, with or without the dodgy boosters, are heroes every one.