Armstrong's luck running out?

[ulmont]

Heard a report last night saying he was gonna be on hook for close to $106million owed to various companies, the biggest amount was like $93 million to Floyd Landis?!?

IIRC Landis' suit is about defrauding money from the US public, as it was during the time the team was sponsored by the US postal service, not a direct settlement between both of them.

Yeah i heard it was amount he would receive under the federal Whistleblower laws or somesuch.

Landis - I think that's the right name - is in the name of the US.  The US recovers most of it, and Landis stands to get 10-30% of the ultimate recovery.

...that case is still under seal though.

[mongers]

Other organisations are now gathering to get some money back:

Lance Armstrong: US insurance firm ready to file $12m lawsuit

A Texan company plans to file a lawsuit next week to recoup $12m from disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong.

SCA Promotions insured bonuses paid to Armstrong when he claimed his fourth, fifth and sixth Tour de France wins.

The American has admitted using performance-enhancing drugs for all seven of his Tour de France wins.

"We will likely file that lawsuit as soon as next week unless we get a satisfactory response from Armstrong's camp," SCA lawyer Jeff Tillotson said.

The insurance policy was taken out by Tailwind Sports, owner of the US Postal team, to cover performance bonuses payable to Armstrong if he claimed his fourth, fifth and sixth Tour victories.

.....

Rest of item here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/21102475

[mongers]

His former masseuse, whom he can't remember if he sued or not, reacts to his doping admission, short video here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/video/2013/jan/18/lance-armstrong-masseuse-doping-video

Longer piece here, including this illuminating comment on the 'corrupting' influence on younger team riders:

'Lance is a little runt': Armstrong's bullied masseuse who was called 'alcoholic prostitute' rejects apology

By Sara Malm

Lance Armstrong's former masseuse and assistant has said his attempt at an apology is not enough.

Emma O'Reilly, who was sued by Armstrong after denouncing his use of performance enhancing drugs, added that he has not even started paying back for his wrongdoing.

She said a part of her wanted to 'drag him to Manchester' for an apology and called him a 'little runt'.

It was in last night's interview with Oprah Winfrey, where he finally came clean about his years of using performance enhancing drugs, that Lance Armstrong said he had bullied O'Reilly for telling the truth about his drug-taking.

Appearing on ITV Daybreak, Ms O'Reilly spoke of the abuse she suffered at the hands of Armstrong's team as they tried to discredit her.

'The polite version is that I was an alcoholic prostitute.'

Lance Armstrong said in the interview, broadcast on Thursday, that he had reached out to Ms O'Reilly and 'tried to make those amends on my own.'

Ms O'Reilly said she did have a missed a call from Armstrong on Sunday, and that he had sent a text saying: 'This is Lance, call me please, thanks.'

'I thought "This can't be Lance - please and thanks in one text",' adding that if Armstrong's apology is genuine, he will make another attempt to contact her.

She described being in two minds about Armstrong's attempt to make amends.

'One part of me thought "Oh, this is great" and the other part of me thought: "That little runt!" and I wanted clip him across the back of the head and drag him up to Manchester to apologise to the people close to me.'

She said sorry was 'not at all' enough after what he put her through, but that she would not be suing him back because she did not want to employ his tactics.

Ms O'Reilly was interviewed for a book, LA Confidential which was published in 2004, and explained that she was present when Armstrong and his team formulated a plan to excuse the cortizone in his system. In the end, they settled on having a doctor backdating a prescription that they said was to treat saddle sores.

Following the book's publication, and several articles referencing Ms O'Reilly's claims, Armstrong sued for libel.

When asked if he sued her, he glibly answered: 'To be honest Oprah, we sued so many people... I'm sure we did.'

When asked if she felt vindicated by Armstrong's fall from grace, Emma O'Reilly said: 'All of it has never felt like vindication - I can never think of another word to use, but I hate that word because it suggests almost that there was some vindictiveness.

'I had only ever spoken about it because I hated seeing what some of the riders were going through, because not all the riders were comfortable with cheating as Lance was.

'You could see when they went over to the dark side their personalities change, and I always felt it was an awful shame - these were young lads in the prime of their life having to make this awful decision, kind of living the dream, yet the dream is a nightmare.

'That was always why I had spoken out - it wasn't about Lance, it was about drugs and cycling.'

O'Reilly worked with Armstrong's US Postal Service team from 1996 to 2000 as he began to dominate the Tour de France.
......

Rest of article here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2264398/Lance-little-runt-Armstrongs-bullied-masseuse-called-alcoholic-prostitute-rejects-apology.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

For me the emboldened statement is why he shouldn't be allowed to compete again. Nor his carefully considered apologies be accepted.

[Berkut]

So I suppose the best thing to do is blind him with hot pokers.

More or less.

The USADA report suggests he was doped during his Tour comeback - which he denies (everything he's admitted so far falls lightly out of the statute of limitation). That should be investigated. If he's guilty of that he should be put in prison. Everyone he sued and destroyed should get a significant chunk of his money. And he shouldn't be allowed to participate in any sort of official sport, a game of tiddlywinks is too good for him.

He especially deserves it while he's refusing to name names.

I don't know jack about cycling, but it sounds to me like your argument here is that Armstrong is somehow worse than everyone else because he was better at it than they were.

I mean, if you are going to blatantly break the rules and cheat, it seems like it would be pretty stupid to cheat just enough to be as good at cheating as all the other cheaters, doesn't it?

If you are going to cheat, you might as well do it right and be best at that as well.

[Razgovory]

That's how we normally regard criminals.

[Sheilbh]

I don't know jack about cycling, but it sounds to me like your argument here is that Armstrong is somehow worse than everyone else because he was better at it than they were.

I mean, if you are going to blatantly break the rules and cheat, it seems like it would be pretty stupid to cheat just enough to be as good at cheating as all the other cheaters, doesn't it?

If you are going to cheat, you might as well do it right and be best at that as well.

Actually I think he's worse than everyone else because of how sanctimonious a cheat he was for those years and for the way he bullied and targeted people weaker than him.

But in response to 'everyone was at it', the answer is that Lance was significantly 'better' at cheating than anyone else.

[lustindarkness]

I really couldn't give two shits in Italian racing colors about the whole Armstrong thing;  it's an atrociously stupid and boring gay ass sport, and like Otto said, it's always been as doped up as any sport could possibly be for ages.

That being said:  they can take away all his titles, but they can't take away the sheer total enjoyment of watching Europeans ball up their little antisemitic fists in fury as an American totally smoked their own doped asses in their own little fag sport for so many years, over and over again.  That will always be priceless, and the delicious tears of faggy Europain can never be unshed.

Even our dopers are better than your dopers.  So all of you Euros can suck on Lance's single testicle, because it's better than any two of yours.

Worth quoting again.

[DGuller]

I wonder what it's like to be a lawyer on Armstrong's team.  You know your client is a cheat and a prick, and yet your job is to destroy people who try to say the same thing publicly by any technically legal means possible.  I could never manage that level of "professionalism".

[The Brain]

I wonder what it's like to be a lawyer on Armstrong's team.  You know your client is a cheat and a prick, and yet your job is to destroy people who try to say the same thing publicly by any technically legal means possible.  I could never manage that level of "professionalism".

That's why you're an accountant and not a lawyer.

[Berkut]

I don't know jack about cycling, but it sounds to me like your argument here is that Armstrong is somehow worse than everyone else because he was better at it than they were.

I mean, if you are going to blatantly break the rules and cheat, it seems like it would be pretty stupid to cheat just enough to be as good at cheating as all the other cheaters, doesn't it?

If you are going to cheat, you might as well do it right and be best at that as well.

Actually I think he's worse than everyone else because of how sanctimonious a cheat he was for those years and for the way he bullied and targeted people weaker than him.

But in response to 'everyone was at it', the answer is that Lance was significantly 'better' at cheating than anyone else.

Fair enough. He does come across as a rather giant douche.

[CountDeMoney]

An incredibly humungous douche.

He'd have made a fantastic venture capitalist.

[mongers]

An incredibly humungous douche.

He'd have made a fantastic venture capitalist.

Yeah, he could be the poster-child of that attitude taken into other realms.

[Maladict]

A Dutch cyclist confessed yesterday, another one today.
The media wil hunt down the rest until they've all gone down.

Another one today. 

[mongers]

A Dutch cyclist confessed yesterday, another one today.
The media wil hunt down the rest until they've all gone down.

Another one today. 

Former or current competitor ?

[DGuller]

I wonder what it's like to be a lawyer on Armstrong's team.  You know your client is a cheat and a prick, and yet your job is to destroy people who try to say the same thing publicly by any technically legal means possible.  I could never manage that level of "professionalism".

That's why you're an accountant and not a lawyer.