Why Lance Armstrong would still have been an elite cyclist

Lance Armstrong is a great endurance athlete, and would have possibly won the tour De France, regardless of whether or not he blood doped.

Let's put this in perspective.

First of all, the sport is notoriously dirty. Many athletes claim "everyone was doing it," thus Lance felt he had to sacrifice (and harm his future health) to be the "best."

Secondly, Lance will pay a price for "using" what he did. The long terms effects of what he did to "cheat" are extremely detrimental. Lance chose to pay the consequences of using hormones in the long-term.

Lance's Drugs

Third, Lance trained. HE DID THE TRAINING in order to perform well. There is no "magic pill" that athletes can take to make them great. Hard work, sacrifice, and dedication are all part of the formula, and Lance worked extremely hard to perform as well as he did. How many people who are criticizing him can even imagine the amount of effort it took to compete at his level? Or even an amateur level? Fat, lazy Americans speaking of Lance cheating as though they could have won the Tour De France by doping or taking steroids is as laughable as hearing people talk about how they could have hit more home runs than Barry Bonds if they had taken anabolic steroids.

Fourth- Lance is a genetically gifted endurance athlete. I have always used Lance Armstrong as an example in my cardiac physiology lectures as an example of how VO2 max and lactate threshold influence endurance performance. Because maximal aerobic capacity is highly genetic, the fact that Lance has a high VO2 max theoretically means he would perform better than someone with a lower maximal VO2 (due to an increased ability to transport and utilize oxygen). The lactate threshold is the trainable component of aerobic endurance performance, but even if Lance is untrained and accumulates lactate at 40-50% of his VO2max, he would perform better than someone who isn't genetically gifted but who is trained and accumulates lactate around 80% of VO2max.

For example:

Maximal Aerobic Capacity

Lance- VO2 max: 80 mlO2/kg/min

Average Male- VO2max: 40 mlO2/kg/min

Lactate Accumulation Untrained:

Lance- VO2: 40 mlO2/kg/min

Average Male- VO2: 20 mlO2/kg/min

Lactate Accumulation Trained:

Lance- VO2: 64 mlO2/kg/min

Average Male- VO2: 32 mlO2/kg/min

As you can see, even when highly trained, an average male would not have the capacity to transport and utilize oxygen, without accumulating lactate, at the same level that Lance could perform at while untrained.


Lastly, examining how blood doping effects hemoglobin level (assuming doping does not increase blood viscosity to the point that negative effects such as increase BP negatively influence the cardiovascular system) can put things in perspective somewhat.

Each gram of hemoglobin in red blood cells can carry 1.36 ml of oxygen, the oxygen content of the blood (either arterial or venous) can be estimated by:

In males, assume an average hemoglobin concentration of 15 g/dl and an oxygen saturation of 99%. The oxygen concentration of arterial blood is approximately 200 ml of O₂ per liter.

Change the hemoglobin concentration to account for doping, and the values will reflect the change in oxygen content. But tthe cardiovascular system is much more complex than this equation. There are countless other variables are unaccounted for when using this equation. 

No one in the USA cared about the tour De France before Lance...he brought notoriety to the sport. In the USA, we believe in the American dream, and admire those who do all they can to be "the best." Why are we so quick to turn our backs on the athletes who sacrifice for our entertainment?

Kelly Brooks, Ph.D., CSCS*D, HFS, EPC