As of 7:05 this morning, Lance Armstrong is officially done with cycling.
According to Pat McQuaid: “We will not appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and will recognise the sanction that USADA gave. The UCI will ban Lance Armstrong from cycling and strip him of his 7 Tour de France titles. Lance Armstrong has no place in cycling.”
[Updated 1t 7:05 a.m. ET] The International Cycling Union has stripped Lance Armstrong of his seven Tour de France titles. “This is not the first time cycling has reached a crossroads and has had to begin anew. … It will do so again with vigor,” International Cycling Union President Pat McQuaid says.
His reputation already in tatters after a lifetime ban by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, Lance Armstrong finds out Monday whether he will be scrubbed from the record books for the seven feats that made him a cycling legend.
So an era of cycling has been wiped clean from the stain that has persisted upon it for so long.
While I’d like to write a book on this today, I just can’t. I need to digest everything and I’ll return with my opinion on the whole charade in the coming week (since quite a few of you have been asking my opinion on the matter.)
