"Steve" wrote in message
...

And when my closest rival hits the deck and has to spend a minute
getting untangled from that spectator who got in his way, well, sorry
pal, but I'm turning on the jets.
snipped a lot

There was a live online chat with Sally Jenkins on the Washingtonpost.com on
Friday 7/25. Here's the link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Jul24.html

There were some good questions and several innocent questions displaying the
general ignorance about cycling here in the US. One kind of mirrored the
attitude displayed above and I think she answered it nicely. Here's the
question and the answer.


" Arlington, Va.: Lance is a great story but I don't get the sport. What is
the point of having a team when the winners of stages and the tour are
individuals? If someone crashes, fairly or unfairly, why on earth would his
competitors stop to let him recover?

Sally Jenkins: They stop to let the leader recover because in a race of two
thousand miles and three weeks and all that suffering, it's unthinkable to
the competitors that the stupidity of a spectator who won't get out of the
road should determine the outcome of the race. The cyclists want the
strongest man to win. Not the luckiest. They HATE luck. "

It's not sportsman like to beat up on your opponent when they are down.
Even boxing has rules for this. I don't know the rules for real wrestling,
but I know there's certain parts of each other's body they avoid. Of
course, if you opponent is out for good, you go ahead and take your win, but
winning by default can't be as satisfying as beating a healthy and worthy
opponent. I think it is sad if it has become American to do whatever
possible to make the contest unfair.