Armstrong Is Not Exactly Tiger in CBS’ Eye

The first one made him the most remarkable human-interest story in sports.

The second one proved the first one wasn’t a fluke.

The third one threw him into a vicious circle of rumor and innuendo that has yet to be substantiated--or completely shaken.

And now, what are we to make of Lance Armstrong’s fourth consecutive victory at the Tour de France?

The world media, at this point, remain divided.

According to various reports over the weekend, Armstrong is:

a) Batman. “With his golden tunic flying behind him in the wind,” cycling commentator Paul Sherwen says, “he resembles a Caped Crusader.”

b) Superman. As Armstrong blew away the field in Saturday’s Stage 19 time trial, Sherwen’s broadcast partner, Phil Liggett, christened the 30-year-old Texan as “the Superman of world cycling.”

c) Robin Hood. Sherwen, not satisfied with scope of 20th-century superheroes available for comparison, came back Sunday to describe Armstrong and his United States Postal Service teammates as “Robin Hood surrounded by his merry men.”

d) A higher power than all of the above combined.

During a wrap-up montage of the three-week-long Tour, CBS’ cameras focused on a bit of graffiti painted on a stretch of French blacktop:

“LANCE IS GOD”

If so, CBS kept Sunday services to the barest minimum--one hour, including commercial breaks for the deity’s host of corporate sponsors.

You might think the Armstrong story is worthy of more, especially if you happened onto CBS’ sports Web site Saturday and studied the results of a fan poll asking, “Whose accomplishments have been more impressive, Lance Armstrong or Tiger Woods?”

Armstrong beat Woods, 76.8% to 23.2%.

CBS could easily devote more than an hour to Tiger and a bucket of balls at the driving range. But Armstrong, a cancer survivor who has won the world’s most demanding sporting competition four years running, gets only the quick canned-and-cut treatment on Tour Sundays. CBS leaves the everyday grunt work to the tiny Outdoor Life Network, which features Liggett and Sherwen providing colorful commentary, provided your cable provider provides the Outdoor Life Network.

Then again, whose presence at a major provides the most drama and suspense? Woods dominates his sport like no one before him, yet as the British Open recently confirmed, he’s always susceptible to an out-of-nowhere blowout.

Not Armstrong. He has made the Tour de France, with its hairpin curves and lung-bursting mountain climbs, as predictable as an assembly line. His riding style, predicated on a consistent rhythm he actually measures with a “cadence sensor,” is mechanical, robotic, unstoppable. Liggett likens it to a metronome.

By now, even the most casual observers have learned to tell time according to Armstrong.

If Armstrong is hanging back in the pack, laying low, the Tour is in its first week.

If Armstrong is heading for the mountains, the rest of the Tour is in trouble.

If Armstrong is riding into Paris, the other riders are already planning for next year.

It’s tough drumming up enthusiasm for a foregone conclusion. CBS’ Armen Keteyian gave it a go, setting the stage for Sunday’s telecast this way:

“Lance Armstrong has stared long and hard into the valley below. [Swelling, melodramatic music wafts in the background.] Since then, he’s never looked anywhere ... but up. [More strings, more horns.] For three weeks every year in France, it’s best not to look away. [Cue heroic trumpets.] Rather come away with the wind lifted up ... by an ever-advancing armada of warriors on wheels.”

A rough start, but Keteyian, an award-winning investigative reporter, seemed poised to rally during a prerecorded interview with Armstrong.

Finally, a surprise. Armstrong and his Postal Service team were booed and heckled at various stages during the tour, greeted by chants of “Dop-AY! Dop-AY!” during Thursday’s ride up Mount Ventoux. Yet, Keteyian asked no questions about the doping suspicions that have followed Armstrong more relentlessly than any Tour rider despite Armstrong’s perfect record in passing drug tests.

Armstrong points to that record and declares the doping speculation a non-issue. But how the host country reacts to the four-time champion of its premier sporting event is an issue. CBS chose to ignore it entirely, simply piling onto the celebratory bandwagon instead.

Keteyian did ask Armstrong if he could assess his standing among cycling’s greats, now that Armstrong has churned his way into their company. Only four riders have won the Tour five times, and only one, Spain’s Miguel Indurain, has won five in a row. Armstrong can equal that mark with another victory in 2003.

Armstrong hemmed and hawed and said, “I still look at myself as a current cyclist. I don’t look at myself as someone who broke a record or joined an elite club.... At the end of the day, it’s better to let others do that.”

At the end of the day, at this rate, Armstrong could very well look up and find himself with more Tour championships than anyone who has pedaled before him. And at the moment, the end of the day is nowhere on the schedule.

“There’s no point trying for the Tour de France,” British cyclist David Millar told the BBC, “until Lance retires.”