In Vino veritas?
By Ian Landau
Vinokourov wins the 2010 Liege-Bastogne-Liege. Photo: Roberto Bettini via Cyclingnews.com
Throughout the world of cycling fandom, there seemed to be a collective groan yesterday as Alexandre Vinokourov crossed the line to win Liege-Bastogne-Liege. Somehow, despite so many idols having fallen—or nearly fallen—from grace these past few years, Vino seems to draw the ire of fans on a level unmatched by that of Millar, Basso, DiLuca, Valverde, Contador, or the Boss himself, Lance Armstrong.
What is it about Vino that makes his L-B-L win so unpalatable? Is it that he’s unrepentant? If David Millar had triumphed we can be sure that he wouldn’t have been booed, as Vino was by the partisan Belgian fans (who, it’s true, so hoped their homeboy Philippe Gilbert would take the day).
Somehow Vino’s win seemed to call into question whether all the anti-doping palaver since Operacion Puerto broke was just that—idle talk.
I found myself wishing as the closing k’s ticked down “Goddamit! Anybody but Vino.” This was a guy who was supposed to walk away and never be heard from again, right? He was a pariah, a cheat, a disgrace. But here he was winning the oldest of the Classics. It seemed like a giant Kazakh kick in the gut.
Needless to say, Vino’s win has sparked much chatter in the cycling media. VeloNews’s John Wilcockson has a thought or two on what’s behind Vino’s current form:
And apparently during the Versus coverage of L-B-L, Phil Liggett surprised Jonathan Vaughters with this question: “So, Jonathan, how is it these guys can come back from suspension and still ride so well?” To which Vaughters had no reply. JV tweeted about it:
http://twitter.com/Vaughters/status/12826086916
Meanwhile, Whit Yost over at Pave neatly sums up what might best be called the pragmatic attitude toward Vino’s win: “Just because he wins doesn’t mean we have to like him.”
http://pavepavepave.blogspot.com/2010/04/monday-musette-liege-bastogne-liege.html
What’s your take on this year’s L-B-L?
[...] Vino’s hard to swallow win at LBL, I needed to disconnect from cycling for awhile. I know he says he is clean, but something [...]
I’m okay with Vino’s win. It was a cool win and a hard race. He got caught, served his suspension, and wants to move on. We can move on, too. If cycling fans want to gripe about dopers coming back then they should gripe about the anti-doping rules, not the racers who take their suspensions and come back.