Armstrong’s Return? It’s All About The Bike (Ottawa Citizen)

Since Lance Armstrong’s recent announcement that he plans to return to the professional peloton in 2009, lots of journalists have attempted to decipher why the seven-time Tour de France champion will make a comeback.

The best article I’ve read on the topic comes from Mark Sutcliffe of The Ottawa Citizen.

In the newspaper’s Sunday, Sept. 21 edition, Sutcliffe, in part, writes:

“There’s only one thing that could bring Armstrong back to the exhausting, punishing life of a professional cyclist – measuring every ounce of food intake, taking the elevator to go up or down one floor and training to within an inch of your limit. He’s hooked on the sport, just like ordinary mortals are hooked on cycling, running or triathlons . .

“There is one major difference, of course. Lance, unlike you or I, knows what it’s like to be the best in the world. That’s a buzz that can’t possibly be replicated in private life . . .

“In his book, It’s Not About the Bike, Armstrong wrote: ‘I want to die at a hundred years old with an American flag on my back and the star of Texas on my helmet, after screaming down an Alpine descent on a bicycle at 75 miles per hour. I want to cross one last finish line as my stud wife and my ten children applaud, and then I want to lie down in a field of those famous French sunflowers and gracefully expire, the perfect contradiction to my once anticipated poignant early demise.’ “

Sutcliffe concludes: “He wants to ride 75 miles per hour at age 100. Does that sound like a guy who would be permanently retired at 33?”

Yup, that’s sums it up, perfectly.