Lance Armstrong... greatest doper there was or ever will be

That's probably unreasonable speculation, even from an oncologist.

What might be more reasonable speculation is that the masking agents masked the early detection of the cancer.

Again, speculating unreasonably, late detection may have contributed to its aggressive spread.

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US cycling doping program didn't work out so good for the other riders who came through with Armstrong either.

Ernie Lachuga (testicular cancer) Ernie was one of Americas top under 23 riders and a member of the same U23 team that included Lance Armstrong,until late in 1998 he too was diagnosed with testicular cancer.

David Francis (healthy) member of the US U-23 cycling team. Whilst remaining healthy he submitted testimony at the lawsuits of Stock and Kaiter that Wenzel (René Wenzel - former coach of USA Cycling's national junior team), submitted them to "doses of vitamins and 'extract of cortisone.

Greg Stock (auto immune problems)

Erich Kaiter (chrohns disease)

Strock says the doping began in France, when he was racing poorly because of a bad cold. His condition improved rapidly after the U. S. team coach gave him pills that were supposedly vitamins and an injection which he says the coach calledextract of cortisone.But there's no such thing as an extract of cortisone. Cortisone is a cortico-steroid, banned in the kind of injections that Strock describes. In large doses, cortisone depresses the immune system, and Strock says those injections became routine.Strock thought he was alone until he filed his lawsuit eight months ago and gota call from someone he hadn't seen in 10 years - Erich Kaiter, his teammate at U.S.A. Cycling."We were given the same injections at the same times, and we raced together pretty much at every race during that year," Kaiter said. "And I became very ilwitha lot of the same symptoms that I now know Greg suffered."They don't know what was in those syringes, and they don't recall taking a drugtest in those days. But they say the injections were given by the U.S.A. Cyclingstaff, including coach Rene Wenzel, trainer Angus Fraser and, according to documents, coach Chris Carmichael.

edit Also

After Armstrong's cancer diagnosis, former teammates say, even Ferrari questioned his methods. "I remember when we were on a training ride in 2002, Lance told me that Ferrari had been paranoid that he had helped cause the cancer and became more conservative after that," says Landis. (Ferrari, again, declined to talk to SI for this story.)