Very good interview with Lance on Dutch TV this week. This was recorded a few months ago, but lots of good stuff that came out of it. I only heard the audio did not see the video of it.
Lance really wants to win a classic, but does not care which one though he mentioned Flanders more then any other. He said for the past few years winning 6 Tours was the big goal. No matter what he might have said in interviews about one Tour at a time, that winning 6 was always the big goal. The impression he gave was that seven was not the big deal six was.
He ruled out both the Giro and Vuelta. He said with the sporting fraud charges over his head in Italy (I think it is witness intimidation not sporting fraud) he can’t risk racing there. He said he had done the Vuelta before, and in his mind the Giro is bigger. The interviewer and I disagreed, but Lance said the crowds and drama in the big Giro stages are bigger then in Spain.
I was happy that he admitted, “Our sport has created a monster out of the Tour de France”. The Tour is so big and so important that it overwhelms other races. A team and the riders are judged more by those 3 weeks in July rather then anything else.
My last impression is that Lance really does pay attention to everything that is written and said about him. He echoed many comments that have been made in commentaries both in print and on the Internet, and given some responses. So he is very aware of everything both good and bad that is said about him and files it away, or as he put it “stored it on the hard drive”
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