Different - but just the same

I still have the copy of L'Equipe from July 25th 2005, the day after Lance Armstrong had won his seventh Tour de France and gone into the record books as the most successful Tour winner in history. L'Equipe had maintained for several years a grudging respect for Lance's achievements whilst hinting darkly at the drug rumours that had accompanied his rise.

The headline was "Il restera a part" - "He will remain different". At the time I, like many other people, put L'Equipe's (and most of the French media's) obsession with sniping at Lance Armstrong as being due to:

1. Not being French
2. The collective angst at the state of French cycling and the lack for 20 years of a home winner of the Tour de France
3. Being American (a slightly worse sin than 1)

Now, of course, after the USADA report and the slightly strange note of LA's appearance on the Oprah Winfrey show the truth (at least the version of truth according to Lance) is out.

And L'Equipe was correct and I was wrong - he will always remain different; but really just the same as the hundreds of other cyclists who felt they had to cheat to win.