The Science of Lance Armstrong

Should be interesting, but a lot of what I've seen in the promos are things he probably shares with all professional cycle racers - "a heart 1/3 larger than the normal man's" as an example. There are probably a few very suble quantifiable advantages Lance has over his peers, along with a concentration on winning the Tour, and some intangible characteristics that have lead to his success.

On the fact of his heart being 1/3 larger than a normal person...
I wonder how is it compare to other top of the line racer...because being up there as a world class athlete, you've got to have something special...not like me whose heart is probably 1/3 smaller than ordinary persons 😄

Rudy said:

The Discovery Channel has a program that will air later on tonight about Lance's physical ability? called the "science of lance armstrong".

I wonder if this program will fend off the doubters or make it worse.. of course he's also sponsored bu the Discovery Channel 🙂

It should be interesting to watch...I can't wait to see all the scientific facts on his physical abilities.. 🙂

I watched it last night. I thought it was pretty crappy and I would have been better off going to bed early. It was (reasonably enough) aimed at non-cyclists, but was disjointed and selective.
There was stuff about wind tunnels, how an eschelon works, how this helmet saves XX seconds over that helmet, a bit about cancer and just a general mish-mash of nothing in particular.
Plenty of shots of Trek and Discovery logo's. A documentary? - No. A sponsor's time-filler? - Yes.
Lots of facts and figures with no context to relate them to - "This saving of 100 grams is equivalent to 100 paperclips, but that works out to 10% in climbing a mountain..." [Not a direct quote, but it was something like that]. It's actually something that I find common in Discovery "doco's" - If the subject is something that I know little about, it all seems amazing - If it is a subject that I do know about, they seldom seem to present a broad picture.
If you are a great LA fan, should you watch it? - Yes, because you're going to want to see absolutely anything that has LA in it. Would I spend another hour of my life watching it again? - No.

If you know anything about cycling or race on any level, don't waste your time. It's an hour long commercial on Mr. Wonderful and the channel who sponsors him. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan, but this fawning has got to stop. No pre-tour wins all year and they've got him winning number 7. Puhlease. Talk is cheap until Paris.

I just started racing this year and I was really hoping to get SOMETHING out of the show. All I got was Lance, Nike, Trek, Discover, more Lance, blah blah blah. Boring!

Chris

Well, as a cycling fan ...I was just glad to see something about cycling on TV
😉

I liked it. You guys are too hard to please

I think they did a good job, you guys would like them to cram all of cycling in an hour show and we all know thats impossible...the show after all was called "the science" ... and they did show some intersting stuff and how far advanced teh technology really is...

I found the (genetic?) advantages interesting (like how he produces less lactic acid, etc) and found myself wondering, how many other people have advantages like this but never find out because they never get into sports, or are couch potatoes, etc?

For all we know, there are thounsands of "Lances" wandering around who just never got into sports.

On the FitTV channel they also had "chasing Lance" a 5 parts series...that showed footages of the Discovery Team, as well as Lance, going through the cycling season in Europe... I thought this was really good too.

Cycling on TV is scarce, let alone a program about the US Postal err Discovery Team... so this week and the next 3 weeks following TDF is a real treat!!! :p

Rudy said:

On the FitTV channel they also had "chasing Lance" a 5 parts series...that showed footages of the Discovery Team, as well as Lance, going through the cycling season in Europe... I thought this was really good too.

Cycling on TV is scarce, let alone a program about the US Postal err Discovery Team... so this week and the next week following TDF is a real treat!!! :p

I found it a little cheesy that they even portrayed the logos on the computer generated demonstrations but there were some highlights and this is only the first in the series of shows that I hope will get more in depth.

I thought the show was pretty excellent. It shows how besides their "engines" it is actually "about the bike". For all you Armstrong haters...........try to do 1/10th of what Lance can do before you throw stones at the guy. I saw a show about Lemond and then Armstrong afterwards on Sunday and I thought both shows were inspirational to show how BOTH of these guys came back to win and shine after such adversity.

I liked it.

lumpy said:

I liked it.

I watched the show as well and thought it was awesome...The show was geared towards the general public and yes you can say there was a lot of promo in it...I think this was designed to give a lot of exposure to the team and companies that support LA to the general public to rally support for the sport...I have been riding for 2 years now and anytime I can watch a show and learn something new it was worth my hour...As for LA, he is a magnificent specimen of human power and efficiency. There is now doubt that the way his body works is something of a freak of nature but NO athlete gets to his level without and unbeliveable amount of determination, self-sacrifice and just a genuine desire to accept nothing less than to be #1...

I watched my mother die of cancer and I understand how deep you have to dig (emotionally and spritually) to accept, fight and overcome the disease/cancer, especially when it is all over your body (Testees, Lungs and brain)...Tear it up Lance!!! 😄

There is just no pleasing some people.

I am extremely happy that cycling, no matter how 'bland' or 'aimed towards the general public' it is. As long as it involves cycling and helps gain awareness, I'm fine. I still learned some stuff about Lance.

TrekDedicated said:

There is just no pleasing some people.

I am extremely happy that cycling, no matter how 'bland' or 'aimed towards the general public' it is. As long as it involves cycling and helps gain awareness, I'm fine. I still learned some stuff about Lance.

HHRUMPHH! HHRUMPHH! Let's take what we can for now, because there is no telling what coverage there will be after LA retires. And like TrekDedicated said, let's hope it makes the public more aware and more cycling friendly.

It was on the Discovery Channel. Why wouldn't you expect it to be aimed towards the general public and glorifying Lance?

I would have liked to see it just because it has something to do with cycling, but I don't have cable. Too bad, since most of the already small amount of coverage is on cable/satellite.

keydates said:

It was on the Discovery Channel. Why wouldn't you expect it to be aimed towards the general public and glorifying Lance?

I would have liked to see it just because it has something to do with cycling, but I don't have cable. Too bad, since most of the already small amount of coverage is on cable/satellite.

I watched it, I did expect it to glorify Lance (I don't have a problem with that), I did expect it to be aimed at the general public (I don't have a problem with that). I did find it to be very disjointed (I do have a problem with that) and selective rather than informative. I think that, viewed from the perspective of the non-cycling general public, it would have given a very strange view of what the "science" of Lance Armstrong is about. An hour is a short time to try and pack a synopsis into - true, but what there was jumped from one piece of trivia to another (in my opinion). If I weren't a cyclist, I may have come away thinking that racing is all about paperclips and fast helmets.
You are all welcome to your own opinions - for me, it was an hour that I would have been better off doing other things, even given the dearth of cycling broadcast over here in Malaysia.

Here's another point. It was on Discovery HD tonight and the high definition image was simply awesome.

I mean how often can you see cycling in HD? TDF will not be in HD...correct me if I'm wrong. It should!!! but it won't 😠

Also...where else would you learn that they aged the tire tubes in a basement like fine wine? they had a stack of tubes aged for LA and his teammates...that was news to me 🙄

I have to agree that I was disappointed. As mentioned the show was disjointed and was limited to minimal 'science' I would have enjoyed more physiology.