VIVE LE LANCE

Lance Armstrong was one of the reasons for my sudden interest in TOUR DE FRANCE ,i still remember the the days of July 1999 ,when the whole world was fascinated by the victory of a man was who had only 40% chance of surviving cancer three years ago in 1996.i was also fascinated by his story and followed the so called "boring" sport of cycling that only europeans followed.

Though his seven tour victories from 1999 to 2005 has been a record in the tour history but he isn't the only one who has achieved great feats in the world of cycling ,he may have broken the record of five consecutive tour victories of MIGUEL INDURAIN and five non consecutive victories of legends like Bernard Hinault, Eddy Merckx and Jacques Anquetil but it can always be argued was he the greatest cyclist ever??

The accomplishments of Eddy merckx far outweigh anyone's achievements in the sport of cycling ,legendary for his domination of one day classics like milan sen -remo which he won seven times .He is the only one who won the yellow jersey(over all leader),polka doted jersey(king of mountains),and green jersey(best sprinter) in the same edition of tour the feat which has not been matched by anyone else till date and probably will never be done ,he was like a beast on the bike and never relied much on support of his team mates as lance did over the years in tours ,he took TOUR DE FRANCE as just one of the races in the year but lance took it as the only race of the year ,clearly he was the best bike rider till today.

My admiration of lance goes much beyond cycling ,the way he fought through his cancer diagnoses and emerged as a stronger person both mentally and physically has always made me believe that one can come out and deal with any adversity in life and come out stronger and more focussed than he has been ,though his accomplishments in cycling can never be forgotten but his deeds off the pedals are more inspiring than on the bike,one can learn a lot from him about the preparation for a long and important task ahead ,he prepared for the tour nearly 300 days a year for that 21 days on the legendary roads of France in the month of July ,so that he can prove to people that he can do it again.The time he spent at the labs of MIT so that he could get the perfect bike for the tour is truly one of a kind in sports which had been never practiced till lance did it,beyond cycling his work in the field of cancer giving hope to millions of people around the world that they can fight this disease through the LANCE ARMSTRONG FOUNDATION is one of a kind.

As Armstrong quoted after winning the tour de france in 2005 ,his last triumph on the Champs-Élysées

"Finally the last thing I’ll say to the people who don’t believe in cycling, the cynics and the sceptics. I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. But this is one hell of a race. This is a great sporting event and you should stand around and believe it. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it. So Vive le Tour. Forever."

This sums up the true Armstrong we all know ,we all have admired over the past years ,as he said that people who don't believe in cycling cannot dream big ,but apart from them if u don't dream big you cannot achieve much in life , if Kekule had not dreamt we would never have seen the aromatic ring in benzene ,miracles do happen and will happen we just have to believe we can do it,as lance showed us the way.He brought cycling to the stage where people followed it all around the world ,not just in europe but in america and other parts .The true side of lance can be depicted by his autobiography "It's not about the bike,my journey back to life" ,which highlights the fact that fighting cancer is of more importance than winning races .

In the end i would like to sum up lance's story as the greatest come back in the history of sports ,he has shown us nothing is impossible if we believe in ourselves then we can accomplish any feat in this world ,so in the end i would only day vive le lance.LONG LIVE lance.

BRAVO BARCA!!!

Figure this..................

1.Manchester united - £14 million(AIG)
2.Chelsea-£10 million(Samsung)
3.Juventus-£15 million(Tamoil)

so when ................................................
FC Barcelona decided to end it's 107 year old tradition of not sporting any logo on their shirt's many big companies lined up to secure the deal as this would catapult them to the south american market where barcelona are followed passionately ,apart from europe and asia ,for instance internet gambling giant betandwin.com agreed on a £12 million deal with the club.so with which organisation did BARCA decide to enter into an agreement???

well it was no corporate giant ,but an international organisation we all know which was set up in 1953 ,to help in welfare of children known as UNICEF ,and how much did unicef decide to pay barcelona ,actually nothing to the contrary barcelona decided to pay 1.5 million euros per year for the next five years to unicef,and this year the money will be used to help children in swaziland suffering from HIV.it may suprise many people that barca decided to go with this deal ,but once we understand the club and their history it will not be a suprise to us.

Setup in 1899 by a group of english ,dutch and catalan supporters with the moto Més que un club (More than a club) ,it truly is more than a club for it's million of supporters worldwide ,it has become sort of a catalan institution where people of catalan region associate themselves with ,after their rights and freedom was reduced under the rule of FRANCO during the spanish civil war ,and this is one of the reasons of their great rivalry between REAL MADRID ,known as the EL CLASSICO de grande ,as it was supported by FRANCO under his rule .BARCA were not allowed to sport the catalan flag in their logo during the time of FRANCO.He tried to embodied real madrid as the spain he wanted to create and as a result it was known as the REGIME CLUB with barca being called as the opposition,another factor which lead to their rivalry was the dispute over argentine ALFREDO DI STEFANO who became one of the greatest footballers while playing for real madrid leading them to five straight european club triumphs in the mid 50's.

This brings us to a question whether "sports clubs are only there for money?",althought the monetary aspect of clubs cannot be put on the backburner as they need money to survive ,for eg.LEEDS UNITED were relegated from ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE because of bad debts which resulted in their players moving out of it ,but money should not be the only criteria as people associate their passion,joy and sadness with their clubs after all how would one account for these rivalries all over the world??

• boca juniors vs river plate(argentina)
• vasco vs flamengo(brazil)
• liverpool vs everton(england)

all these rivalries are a result of the passion of supporters who were instrumental in founding of these clubs in their early years.

Clubs bring happiness to the faces of people in adversities ,like a small town in belarus known as GOMEL ,which was devastated by the chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986 are avid supporters of their club FC GOMEL and they prove it by attending their matches in a huge no they are no 1 when it comes to fans attending matches in belarus league as it allows them to forget their sufferings for a few hours.

To conclude i would only say that although money is important but one should never hesitate to help people who are in more need than us,and if we have the means to do it.Well our cricket board BCCI can take a cue from barcelona as it boasts of the richest shirt deal for indian cricket team with sahara and nike by helping people who really need money and not just putting money in their lockers and not using them or being used by people who alreasy have it.