(The interview in its entirety can be read on the free iPad magazine app 2r. To learn more about the project, visit the website: http://2rmag.com/)

A Gitane advertisement featuring the newly-crowned World Champ

 

The first time I ever saw Greg LeMond was on September 4, 1983. I am precise about the date, because he had just won his first World Road Race title championships in Altenrhein, Switzerland, and I was watching from the pit-lane. The day before, I had finished a distant seventy-something in the amateur race – a sobering experience – but the silver lining was a chance to watch the pros. That we (the Ireland amateur team) had spent most of the week in the same hotel as Sean Kelly was another bonus. We all hoped one day to be Kelly, and all hoped one day to be Stephen Roche – they were real, touchable – but we, or at least I, never aspired to be LeMond. His talent was simply off the scales. He was barely one year older than me but had already secured a ‘palmarès’ to dream of: World Junior Road Race Champion 1979, Tour de l’Avenir Winner 1982 (he had beaten Robert Millar by a staggering ten minutes), Critérium du Dauphiné Winner 1983, and now, stupendously, the World Professional Road Race Champion. If someone had told me that afternoon, that three years later we would race the Tour de France together, I’d have been the happiest man in the world. But if I had known about him then, what I know about him now, I might have put away my bike and never raced again…

Paul: There’s a passage in a book (The Incredible Comeback) Sam Abt once wrote about you, where you are railing against the European traditions of diet and training. Sean Kelly was the classic disciple of that tradition and you are quoted as saying that Kelly wouldn’t make love for six weeks before a race. You also say that you had once made love the night before…

Greg: The World Championships.

Kathy: Yeah.

Greg: And the Tour de France

Kathy: Oh, yeah.

Greg: Every time we saw each other we’d have sex.

Kathy: Guimard used to follow us back down to Greg’s room. One time he refused to leave us alone.

Greg: I could never figure that out: ‘How could that be bad? Is there a scientific basis for not having sex?’ And there was nothing. It was a cycling myth.

Kathy: Actually, I think it’s good mentally. The night before you won the Worlds, you got up so early to eat your meal three hours before, and you were so nervous, so of course we had sex that morning actually. Then he goes over there and…

Before Altenrhein?

Kathy: Yes.

You had sex before the World Championships in Altenrhein?

Kathy (laughs): Yes.

Christ! That’s unbelievable!

Greg (erupts): You were the one that reckoned Kelly’s wife was a virgin!

No, that was my brother, actually.

Greg: We always laughed when we invited Sean Kelly to dinner.

Kathy: He never came.

Greg: We’d invite him to dinner at seven-thirty or eight and he’d say okay. He didn’t know how to say no, so his wife would call-up later and say ‘No, we can’t make it. Sean will be in bed by eight.’ But I kind of admired Sean in that…he just did his job. I admired his quiet (demeanour): ‘Don’t talk, just do.’ I would watch Hinault and Fignon shouting about attacking and dropping everybody but that means you don’t really respect your competitors. I mean, how do you know? I would never do that.

Fignon had a lot of respect for Kelly, too.

Yeah, because Kelly was…he was another guy I felt bad about for winning the Worlds. I said ‘I’ll trade you a Paris-Roubaix for that.’

You said that to him?

Yeah.

And he would definitely have traded – Worlds was the race he most wanted to win. The only time I ever saw him crying was after you beat him in Chambery (where the 1989 World Championships were held).

Greg: Ohhhhh

Kathy: We knew it meant a lot to him. We actually did feel bad.

Greg: I’ll tell you one story though…I had Moreno Argentin (ask me) for 10,000 dollars (in 1984 at the World Road Race in Barcelona) and I was like ‘Fuck! I would never, ever pay for a victory, ever. I would not accept money from somebody…I had to learn that there was a culture in cycling where arrangements were made. In ’86, I attacked on the Poggio in Milan-San Remo. (Mario) Beccia is just in front but I attack from the group and Kelly just bridges over the top. I go down the descent (makes a rocket noise) and I’m going good. And I know Kelly had beaten me in the Tour of Lombardy (in ’83) but it was only by a little…

Yeah, I remember, he beat you by a whisker.

We go down and come out and there is 1 k to go and I hear (adopts high pitched squeak) “Fifteen thousand…Eighteen thousand…Twenty thousand.” He’s offering me twenty thousand dollars if I don’t sprint! And I’m like ‘What! Fuck you!’ I think I said ‘Fuck you.’ And I don’t know if I led it (the sprint) out…I think I led it out and he got a jump and I was second. But that was the first time I had ever been offered money except for the kermesses.

It’s probably the only time in his entire career that he ever offered anyone money.

(He laughs)

I’m serious! It’s probably the best compliment you’ve ever been paid.

I never thought of it like that. Do you know what my team-mate said when I got back? He said ‘What the fuck! Are you an idiot? You knew you weren’t going to beat him in the sprint – take the money. And in the next race, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, you have some money to buy somebody else off!’ Isn’t that crazy?

(Note: After the interview with LeMond, I had the following conversation with Kelly about the race.)

“Greg LeMond has said that you tried to buy Milan-San Remo from him in 1986?”

“I tried to buy it from him?”

“Well, you made him an offer?”

“Don’t remember.”

“You don’t remember?”

“No, I don’t remember making him an offer but he said to me ‘I’d like to win,’ or ‘I want to win,’ something like that. And then it went on from there. I think that was getting…I’m not sure if that was before the descent or after the descent.”

“So was he making you an offer?”

“Well, he was the one that said to me ‘I’d like to win’ or ‘I want to win’ something like that.”

“But you definitely didn’t say it to him?”

“Well, I said ‘I also want to win,’ I think was my answer.”

“Did that go on a lot?”

“Did it go on a lot?”

“Yeah, these discussions.”

“On that race?”

“No, generally.”

“Well, yeah.”

“They did?”

“Yeah…in my time, there were discussions and certainly agreements. During my career there were some agreements.”

Read the full article on 2r, download here

If you like this interview by Paul Kimmage, you’re going to love what’s in store for Cyclismas fans in the future.

Kimmage has signed on with us to do The Big Interview with Paul Kimmage, a one hour in-depth video interview show to be broadcast on Cyclismas and on Kimmage’s own website. In addition, a new Cyclismas website with improved functions, ease of use, and other features will be unveiled in March, with the first Kimmage show to be broadcast shortly after the Tour de France, where the Cyclismas crew will be on hand for the historic 100th edition of the storied Grand Boucle.

As Operations Director Aaron Brown told Carlton Reid of BikeBiz, “Paul’s ability to interview one-on-one is unmatched in cycling and he provides an incredible platform for cycling fans to discover more about their favourite stars in the sport. We’ll be creating two hours of high quality content each month.”

Stay tuned…

North Korean leader will be switching from horses to bicycles in support of McQuaid (Photo courtesy of KRT via Reuters)

In a video interview released by North Korean television, the current supreme leader of the totalitarian-ruled nation had words of encouragement.

“Freedom is humanity’s great lie. Humanity was meant to be repressed, subjugated  controlled, mocked, and abused.  This has been our policy for many, many decades. The people of North Korea belong to the state. We do with them as we wish. They are cattle who will receive punishment for challenging my divine right to rule them with an iron fist. I have gladness to see another regime adopt a similar attitude. It gives me hope for sport. I am happy to see the UCI attempt to flex their repressive muscles to gain control of cycling,” declared Jong Un.

Jong Un went on to identify the behavior which gave him “hope” for cycling.

“Pat McQuaid, while supporting our neighbors to the south with UCI-sanctioned races, has shown his true alignment with our culture. Calling those who oppose his power ‘scumbags.’ Attacking those in his sport who break ranks from the UCI party line. Silencing his critics with legal wars.  McQuaid’s long-held dream of world cycling dominance over all other sports justifies his actions. The ends always justifies the means when we achieve our goals. It is with honor. It is how my regime acts today,” continued Jong Un.

The UCI, after taking a beating the past five days in the press, was thrilled to have the support of anyone, even if it was a North Korean dictator.

“Finally, someone understands where I am coming from. I have the best intentions to make the cycling nation the strongest, most powerful, and best-funded sport on the planet. But this is not enough. I want to control cycling throughout the galaxy, throughout the universe. It is my divine right handed down by Hein Verbruggen himself to rule the sport with an iron fist. To crush those who oppose my dreams of a world filled with nothing but bicycles, and to declare war on all other forms of transportation and sport,” frothed McQuaid.

When asked if corruption, collusion, cronyism, and general bad behavior were excusable due to his greater aims, McQuaid was succinct.

“Yes,” stated McQuaid as he thumped his shoe on his gold-encrusted desk.

Pundits around the cycling world were quick to comment on the statements.

“He’s completely nuts,” stated a commentator who may or may not have been David Harmon.

Phil Liggett was also asked to weigh in on the statements by both Jong Un and McQuaid

“I’m still a little vulnerable over the Armstrong business. I think I’m just going to say, “no comment,” go on a short trip to Mali, and hope this has all blown over by the Tour Down Under,” stated Liggett.

Greg LeMond, in the wake of his open letter to Pat McQuaid, was unable to offer any commentary as he was busy purchasing torches and pitchforks for an apparent Swiss Holiday on December 12th.

Wiggins has certainly enjoyed his red carpet ride around France, courtesy of Froome and the rest of Sky’s serfs (photo courtesy of ITV)

“I’ve always been someone who wishes to move on to new challenges. Now that I’ve conquered my first Tour de France it’s time to attempt a feat that has only been accomplished three times in the history of the Tour. I want to wear yellow from the prologue all the way to the Champs-Elysées next year,” declared Wiggins.

As an avid student of cycling history, Wiggins stumbled upon the legend of Ottavio Bottecchia – the first person to wear the yellow jersey from start to finish as winner of the 1924 Tour – via a conversation with famed Scottish cycling journalist, Richard Moore. Moore was turned on to the story of Bottecchia by Herbie Sykes over an espresso in 2006 during a very animated Giro d’Italia.

“I know that I’ve promised Chris (Froome) that he could have a shot at the Tour in 2013 and that I’d support him, but I think my goals are more important than his. After all, I’m higher on the seniority scale in GB Cycling and I don’t feel I’ve reached my peak yet,” continued Wiggins. “I think I have a chance at equalling a feat only done three times in Tour history, and one that hasn’t been accomplished since 1935.”

Team Sky boss David Brailsford confirmed his support for Wiggins in his plan for 2013.

“Considering that Brad and Fabian were the only two to wear the yellow jersey in the entire 2012 Tour, and the fact that we pretty much intimidated every single team in this race, it is distinctly possible that Brad could wear yellow from start to finish in 2013. No one can match our team strength on any stage on any day,” mused Brailsford.

Eurosport cycling pundit David Harmon concurred with Brailsford.

“Until the rest of the peloton grows a backbone, or Contador stays out of doping troubles, cycling is Wiggins’ domain to plunder as he wishes. He rides on the front for the sprints, and otherwise sits third wheel the entire race. He is a throwback to the great Kings and Queens of England. He truly is the king of cycling, no offense to Mark Cavendish or Sir Chris Hoy,” declared Harmon.

Former Tour de France champion Greg LeMond weighed in with his thoughts.

“Wiggins could lead the race, but only if Team Sky buys Alberto Contador’s and Andy Schleck’s contracts to sit them out of the Tour de France for the rest of their careers, or have them ride the front in support of Wiggins like they forced Froome to do this year. It’s what Hinault did, and also wanted to do to me back in the 80s,” stated LeMond.

When asked about Wiggins’ statement, Chris Froome refused to comment directly.

“We’ll start with the Vuelta and the Olympics, and see what happens from there. Anything is possible for 2013,” said a muted Froome.

Stage 19 is Saturday, which should be the 53.5 km time trial coronation of Wiggins into his role as King of the Tour de France.

Likewise, there has been an evolution in the organization of professional cycling events in the United States – from the Coors Classic in the 70s and 80s to the Tour DuPont in the 90s, both of which faded away due to sponsorship challenges in their respective eras. This void was soon to be filled by the emergence of a stage race on the West Coast, aided by corporations based in the state of California, signalling a shift from Colorado and the East Coast to a newly created center of cycling activity.

There are three companies that have become synonymous with the Tour of California: Amgen, the title sponsor; AEG, the owner of the event; Montgomery Securities, the company behind Tailwind Sports that gave Lance Armstrong his chance to come back to cycling. These three companies also have history of connection outside of cycling that dates back to the 1980s. The unfortunate by-product of their joint involvement has been scandals that have circled cycling since Armstrong’s first Tour win. One company in particular has emerged to become an indirect influential force in the globalization of cycling.

In 1983 a small biotech firm by the name of Amgen was in the midst of taking their company public with a risky IPO in a financial climate hostile to the biotechnology field. As noted in her book, From Alchemy to IPO, author Cynthia Robbins-Roth noted the difficulties Amgen had in raising funds. Magically undeterred by this difficult environment, Amgen co-founder George Rathmann somehow managed to secure $43 million for their IPO that was underwritten by three investment firms. Two of these firms were the well-established companies Smith Barney and Dean Witter.

The third company was a relatively new creation, founded in San Francisco in 1978 with only a five-year track history prior to helping underwrite the Amgen IPO. Called Montgomery Securities, it was founded by a dynamic man by the name of Thomas Weisel who had developed a strong group of contacts in the San Francisco area. Weisel had joined the firm in 1971 back when it was known as Robertson, Colman, and Siebel. He later led a mutiny at the firm which led to the departure of Robertson and Colman in 1978. A bitter rivalry ensued between Robertson and Weisel after this episode, one which continues to this day. It is also interesting to note that Weisel’s formal involvement with cycling began with Montgomery Securities’ sponsorship of Eddie Borysewicz and his cycling team, called Montgomery-Subaru, in 1989. In its second year of operation, the team welcomed one Lance Armstrong into its ranks.

Weisel's office reflected his affinity for cycling and for Armstrong (photo Chronicle/Michael Maloney)

Amgen has a long interconnected involvement with cycling. Beyond the sponsorship of the Tour of California, the Amgen product Epogen had been credited by Lance Armstrong as saving his life during his cancer treatment in the late 90s. The history of Epogen has been one filled with question marks involving the potential use of those specific products by the PDM team in 1990 that led to several high-profile deaths. Could the alleged experimental use of Epogen by cycling teams in the late 80s and early 90s be interpreted as a “field study” of the drug and its applications? The former doctor of the PDM team, Wim Sanders, had been investigated in the Netherlands in the late 1990s, and the name of both the company and its product surfaced during that investigation, which indicates the answer to the question could be yes.

Edmund R. Burke, who had ties to the blood-transfusion debacle in the 1984 Olympics and received sanctions for his part in the transfusing of American athletes at those Olympics, noted the impact of EPO on professional cycling. In his book entitled Dope: A History of Performance Enhancement in Sports from the Nineteeth Century to Today, Daniel M. Rosen discusses Burke’s conclusions that EPO held enormous benefits for cyclists, however if used improperly, it could kill. Amgen was seeking approval of Epogen in Europe in 1990 and the coincidence of cycling deaths related to heart failure – a major side effect of improper Epogen usage – is impossible to ignore. It should also be noted that Burke had a close relationship with “Eddie B,” the aforementioned directeur sportif for Weisel’s first cycling team incarnation, Montgomery-Subaru, which later evolved into the US Postal Service cycling team in the mid 90s. Burke passed away in 2002 due to heart failure during exercise.

Amgen has been the focus of criticisms over the years, with one chief critic being Merrill Goozner, who in 2006 wrote “The Amgen Rip-Off” where he cited the expenditure of Medicare on the Epogen drug far exceeded any other drug expenditure by the organization. The same article noted the decrease in life span of the individuals who used the product, and the increased incidence of cancer occuring in those who used the drug to help raise their hematocrit levels while on kidney dialysis. Amgen also faced criticism of their product’s benefits in an article entitled, “Pharmaceutical Erythropoietin Use in Patients With Cancer: Is It Time to Abandon Ship or Just Drop Anchor?” by Ayalew Tefferi. Tefferi questions the validity of the use of Epogen, and noted that one study on the drug was abandoned:

The study was terminated early because of a significantly worse 12-month survival rate in Epo-treated patients who displayed increased rates of disease progression and thrombotic and vascular events.

 

In addition to backing Amgen, Weisel’s Montgomery Securities had financial relationships with other firms in the biotechnology sector, including 5am Ventures, the company that in 2002 brought together as its managing partners Andrew Schwab, a former VP at Montgomery Securities, and Scott Rocklage, a former CEO of Nycomed Salutar. This interesting connection has significance to cycling, as the US Postal team was revealed by French journalists to be using Actovegin, a Nycomed product, when US Postal employees carelessly dumped trash during the 2000 Tour de France.

While some might say that these relationships could merely have been passing fancy or coincidental contact, the significance of the relationship between Amgen and those involved with Montgomery Securities is still felt today. Lewis Coleman, a former executive at Montgomery Securities, sits on the Board of Directors with current Amgen CEO Kevin Sharer at the well-known aerospace/shipbuilding/electronics firm Northrop Grumman. And 5am Ventures is still active to this day with former Montegomery Securities employees operating within the company structure.

Based on this information, the sport of cycling could be construed as a leading edge of biotechnology experimentation. No other sport in the world demands of its athletes the same sort of sustained physical exertion over a 12-month period. And with its unique characteristic of athletes pushing their bodies to the very limits of physical ability for extended periods of time, the peloton has been the perfect petrie dish for field testing all sorts of biotech products under the guise of performance-enhancement. From caffeine to cocaine, amphetamines to cryotherapy, cycling has been a testing ground for biotech and drug companies since before World War II.

There was a side bonus to the Weisel-driven Postal bus, and that was the fact that Armstrong’s star factor opened doors for not only Weisel, but also for Weisel’s various companies to network with an ever-expanding sphere of influence. Reed Albergotti and Vanessa O’Connell chronicled this phenomenon in their article for the Wall Street Journal on December 18th, 2010, entitled “For Cycling’s Big Backers, Joy Ride Ends in Grief.” In it, they noted the fact that US Postal was a money-losing venture surrounded by the doping cloud of suspicion. But many powerful people in American industry enjoyed the fact that they could rub shoulders with Lance Armstrong and ride alongside him at various charity and PR events, something that wasn’t possible in other sports, like baseball spring training, for example.

However, the benefits for the biotechnology field, if the suppositions are to be believed, far outweighed the losses associated specifically with the “money losing venture” of the US Postal Cycling Team.  To this day, Amgen touts the endorsement of Lance Armstrong and the use of Epogen in his cancer treatment. The backers of the US Postal team, however, chose to view the bigger picture beyond the monetary losses associated with the team as a new component to the equation was introduced.

In 2002, Mike Plant, then head of USA Cycling, brought Hein Verbruggen, then president of the UCI, to meet a gentleman from Colorado who had an avid interest in cycling. That man was Philip Anschutz, billionaire backer of mega-deals involving American firms such as Qwest Communications, and founder a sports entertainment empire with the purchase of the Los Angeles Kings hockey team. In 1995 Anschutz had established his company, AEG, and soon became involved with entertainment facility management, concert promotion and sports promotion.

Anschutz had an impressive track record of seeing the bigger picture and identifying business opportunities. He had a deep appreciation for cycling, and with his corporation, AEG, developed the HomeDepot Center on the campus of California State University where the 2005 UCI World Track Championships were held.  Anschutz recognized the value of Lance Armstong’s impact on cycling, and leveraged that popularity with the assistance of Mike Plant (currently a UCI Management Committee member) to meet with Verbruggen to pitch the idea of the Tour of California, to commence in 2006, the year after the track championships.

So how was it that Amgen became a title sponsor of a race established by Anschutz’s AEG corporation with the help of Plant and the approval of Verbruggen? Beyond the yearbook answers given by various people involved with the starting of the race, there is always the interesting back story that is revealed by examining the board of director appointments of the corporations involved. The name that seems to consistently appear, connecting the three companies directly, is that of Lewis Coleman.

Coleman was a former senior managing director at Montgomery Securities. He was also appointed to the board of directors of Regal Entertainment Group, which is owned by Philip Anschutz. Coleman currently sits on the board of directors of Northrop Grumman with the current CEO of Amgen, Kevin Sharer. The appointments do not occur for random reasons, and certainly demonstrates the close ties between all three companies.

Coleman seems to be the common link that ties the relationship between Anschutz, Amgen, and Montgomery Securities –three companies that have provided the financial backing for the sport of cycling to accelerate into the public’s consciousness via the mighty feat of Armstrong’s unprecedented seven Tour de France victories.

The question remains – What course will American cycling ultimately take? – as Amgen’s involvement in cycling beyond the Tour of California title sponsorship and their cancer charity has not increased since their initial stake in 2006, and Thomas Weisel has ridden off into the semi-retirement sunset following the purchase of his current company, Thomas Weisel Partners, by Stifel Financial.

It would seem that of the three corporations involved with cycling’s evolution through the late 90s and early in the new millennium, AEG has taken their impact beyond the shores of the United States, managing facilities in Muscat, Qatar, and throughout Australia. In fact, AEG announced in 2011 a partnership with companies in China to manage a facility in Shanghai, and their crowning achievement in Beijing with the former Olympic basketball venue that became the first Chinese venue to issue naming rights, which went to Mastercard. The Beijing venue also has developed a working arrangement with NBA International, managed by Heidi Ueberroth, daughter of Peter Ueberroth, the man behind the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. What remains to be seen is if AEG will continue their commitment to develop cycling on the shores of the United States, or if their founder’s meeting with Verbruggen and Plant began their emergence as a world player in the sports entertainment field at the expense of the US cycling community.

What can be concluded, though, is the fact that without the efforts of Amgen, AEG, and Montgomery Securities, U.S. cycling would not have influenced the sport on a global level from 1999 to 2006. The efforts of these three raised the sport’s profile in the United States to the mainstream and helped it evolve from the nascency that was American cycling during LeMond’s European successes.