German opinions of Jan Ullrich

As a keen follower of professional cycling, I was wondering what the view of native German members here is, of Jan Ullrich?

Jan Ullrich won the 1997 Tour De France and he also won the Vuelta Espana, Tour de Suisse, Olympic titles, numerous other races.
Raised in Rostock, Jan Ullrich is one of Germany's greatest ever sportsmen.
Sponsored by Deutsche Telekom, "Der Kaiser" had a phenomenal career.
he is currently retired and living in Switzerland, after being named in the doping scandal Operation Puerto.

Any thoughts?

A sportmen, be definition, doesn´t cheat by taking drugs.

That wasn't his only connection with drugs of course. There was a stimulant incident earlier in his career. There's ambivalence towards him (and Zabel and the rest). No sympathy when they cry in their press conferences - yet they still get feature spreads of their weddings in Bunte etc.

My family and a lot of other Germans I know are certainly far, far more cynical about the use of drugs in sport than Brits. See anyone successful and it's/he must be doped". I think that extends to much of "mainland" Europe. Certainly, in the 2007 incident and its endless press coverage, it got to the point of - enough, not listening to the excuses / evasion any more, just crawl away, please.

As well as cycling, a lot routinely assume all of those sports that strangely seem to have little problem (football, tennis etc) are riddled with it. However, the context of that is that part of the country had a state-run sports doping regime for 30 years of course. That cynisicm extends to current sports persons bought up in East Germany for whom there is no evidence at all of drugs (one current world record holder - not in cycling - springs to mind). The history (coaches of curent athletes etc) rumbles on.

I can understand the anti-jan ullrich sentiments : all I can say is that having been involved in the sport for many years (amateur level), I saw Ullrich ride as an amateur.
Ullrich destroyed all opposition - and I trained several great talents who raced against Ullrich as an amateur - and Ullrich literally blew them off the road!

At the professional level, I have no doubt that drugs play their part.
To go out and race day after day, at the Tour de France for example, is near on impossible without taking something
(and I'm not condoning doping).

He's a loser. Lance Armstrong is a winner (and my personal hero).

My German husband is still bitter about Jan. I'd rather not get into discussing Floyd Landis. **cry**

Let's face it, the sport is tainted.

Armstrong is without a doper.
I was at the 1995 Tour deFrance.
I was at the roadside of all of the mountain stages : Armstrong was completely fucked climbing those mountains.
He could barely pedal the mountains ------------- while Indurain and Pantani were blasting the field (and each other) miles ahead up the road.

No disrespect...but Armstrong is a fully fledged doper.

They are ALL fully fledged dopers, and it is why I don't follow the sport as closely as I used to. The drug drama killed it for me (and literally killed Pantani!). It's a shame someone as awesome as Landis had to be the fall guy.

Armstrong was "f*cked", eh? How come he won so many times, then? The man is simply an awesome, well-oiled machine. And he's crazy (have you read any of his books?). I think you HAVE to be crazy to win such a grueling race, several times. Mind over matter [muscle], baby!

And Lance is still racing, at nearly age 40. Where is Jan? Fat now, doing squat with his life? You have to respect Lance's work for cancer research $$...

Landis! Please.

Look I raced many years ago and I have coached in recent years.
In terms of the sport, the greats always show their hand early.
Coppi, Merckx, Hinault, Fignon, LeMond, Ullrich : all these guys were class riders at the amateur level and each of them debuted at the very highest level when the went professional.
Each of them in their first Tour deFrance, finished in the top 10 (Merckx, Hinault being the exceptions, won their first TDF at their first go).

Regarding Armstrong, he only managed to finish one Tour De France between the years 1992-1996.
In each other year, he abandoned the race, unable to finish.
He literally died a thousand deaths in the mountains - like in 1995 when I saw him myself.
Ironically he did manage to finish the 1995 Tour deFrance.
1hour 30 minutes down on the eventual winner Miguel Indurain.

1 hour 30minutes is too huge a time gap to even attempt to quantify.

The reasons Armstrong won the Tour de France - after he got cancer, I might add - is because he doped.
Six separate samples from the 1999 Tour de France were, subsequently found to contain, rEPO.
rEPO is a performance enhancing banned doping product used to improve aerobic/anaerobic performances.

Just because he raised money for charity, doesn't exonerate from having doped.

They ALL dope. You Europeans just can't seem to like Lance, and THAT IS OK. We Americans are getting used to being hated.

The guy is a frigging miracle. You go and get cancer, win the TdF several times, and then we will talk.

My Dad won Gold & Silver at the Senior Olympics... was still riding 35 miles a day when he died last month of heart failure at 76. Now THAT, for me, is awesome (and he was my biggest hero).

If they all dope, why is Lance a standout? His career indicates that he doped after his illness.

I think he won the TdF because he had cancer. Seriously... medications and doping go hand in hand.
He wasn't good enough to win it, before he got cancer. And suddenly he has a leap.

I don't hate Armstrong ---------------- but I do know that a donkey can never become a Ferrari! (even a Michele Ferrari).

Raced against many Germans...Tave Schur would have been the best well known German rider i raced against.

Your dad was a cyclist...I probably never raced against him given the age disparity...I raced against plenty of yanks though.
35 miles a day at 76 years old is bloody good going.
Sounds like a man after my own heart.

Wasn't good to finish it...never mind win it.

So you started a thread asking humbly about German views of Jan Ullrich, only as a cover to glorify him yourself, have I got that right, Muller?

But while we're on the subject, I haven't followed pro cycling too closely in the past few years, but once upon a time I lived with an avid amateur cyclist, so I did follow then. I remember Ullrich throwing a lot of elbows.

I was genuinely curious to see how the Germans here viewed Ullrich.

Ullrich would not be my favourite rider : Miguel Indurain, Sean Kelly, Bernard Hinault are my favourites.

I liked Indurain, too; he was successful during the time I was dating the cyclist. My boyfriend's favorite was Greg Lemond.

For a while, Jan Ullrich had superhero status in Germany, but through the doping affair he unfortunately dismantled himself completely. Today, he is just a paling memory. I don't know much about cycling as a sport, but it is a fact that doping has happened at the Tour de France for many decades (I think I read in the early days, some used cocaine), and although one shouldn't cast the shadow of general suspicion on every cyclist, the attractiveness of the sport for the public has suffered tremendously. Public German TV stations stopped broadcasting the Tour de France after the last doping discovery with several German cyclists involved.

Perhaps Ullrich had to train too hard too early in his life in the GDR, so that he had burnout symptoms halfway down his career (which could have contributed to the decision to use doping)?

You may have raced against my brother (road and track)... he now owns a bike shop (we are in our 40s) and used to build his own frames (called... gee, guess what... Lovett). I used to be sort of a bike race "groupie".

My Dad was one tough cookie. I'm still reeling as to how he could have had a heart attack.

Some people peak later in life... Lance was/ is one of those. As someone who once faced possible cancer (partly why I read his book), I can tell you that it's life changing. You realize that you have things you need to accomplish in life, and you'd better do it as your days may be numbered. It can be very motivating. I still need a catamaran, and to go river rafting in the Sierras (among MANY other things)... unfortunately, my husband isn't so interested. ho hum.

btw, yes, I do ride. I have a Campy eq'd Tommasini and a Breezer mtn bike (ever heard of Joe Breeze?). And a 1961 Schwinn tandem, all original parts!

I am cycling with Greg leMond later this month : he's doing a charity cycle here in Ireland.
He's one of the alltime greats.

I'm 43.
Not blowing up my own reputation but I was in LA in 1984 for the Games.
Did not get to race in the road race however.
Alexi Grewal won the gold medal that year.

I would have connie carpenter, grewal etc.
Just trying to recall some names of the US riders who I would raced....such a long time ago.
America has produced superb riders like LeMond and Andy Hampsten : Hampsten was superb.
Davis Phinney was a good rider as well.

Your dad was a tough guy alright -------------- all those riders are tough hombres.

Yes, Ullrich was allegedly more popular that Michael Schumacher with the German public.
And races like the Hennigen Turn and the Tour of Germany got renewed coverage because of Ullrich's success.

I always like the Deutsche Telekom team ( Ullrich/Zabel/Aldag/Bolts).
great riders all.
And I know that TV stations like ADR refused to show the Tour de France in light of the doping allegations.

You could be right about the GDR and Ullrich.

Those were great riders... more recently we have Hincapie, Hamilton, Levi Leipheimer! Yes, all drug addicts... LOL.

My Dad was Mormon -- I can assure you that he did no drugs.

Well Muller, given your age, you might want to check out the Senior Olympics?

ML : there is no way that I would consider riding in competition! Too unfit!
But seriously, you know that even though these riders are considered "senior", they're all as fit if not fitter than younger
riders.

No, I know my limits!

Can you ride to work? Dad did that for his entire 30 year career... and it was a long ride. He was "green" before that was fashionable (and his car stayed like new!). I am your exact age and quite fit (apart from being fairly lazy while in DE) -- you have no excuse. Just Do It!

My problem for cycling has also been that I have a 4 year old. But soon he will be in school and that means more time on the bike. I got one of those "tag-alongs", but it of course won't work on my Tommasini nor my Breezer, so I got a low end Giant for this purpose. Too many bikes... not enough garage space!

Hey, any advice for getting him off training wheels? DH doesn't seem interested, so it will be up to moi. I think my Dad just pushed us and said GO.

Unfortunately using the bike to commute to work is not feasible - i have a very long commute.

In terms of fitness, I do get out at the weekends and long summer evenings.
I get about 100 miles in over the weekend.
In winter I use the indoor trainer and do 1 - 1.5hrs.
I hate the trainer it's boring.

keep pedalling

I hate trainers too (so I sold mine), but I'm back in California now, so there's really no need for one.

This just arrived in my inbox:
Remembering Lance's first TdF victory

He won't win the TDF this year.

This years TDF winner will be one of the following : Alberto Contador, Danilo DiLuca, Denis Menchov and/or Cadel Evans.

I think that Ullrich was a great sportsman who had the bad luck to ride at a time when his sport got under huge criticism and he was furthermore eclipsed by the giant Armstrong.

The first point is more decisive and in my opinion totally hypocritical. Everybody knew that nobody won the Tour for the last decades without doping and the penalties for cyclists for being catched doping were little more than a slap on the wrist in comparison to other sports. That changed a few years ago and everybody behaves as if this was something new and oh so surprising.

Top cyclists dope. They're still great sportsmen. I mean, no matter what you gave to me, I wouldn't even reach the mountains, much less climb them :-)

Do you think the WWF [s]wrestlers [/s] artists are also great sportsmen?