With just a one-word Tweet, Lance Armstrong has re-opened a controversial cycling scandal in spectacular fashion.
@TrekSegafredo Luigi!!
— Lance Armstrong (@lancearmstrong) August 11, 2016
The disgraced cyclist, stripped of his seven Tour de France victories following a doping scandal, caused outrage on social media when he replied to a tweet from the Trek-Segafredo cycling team congratulating Fabian Cancellara for his Olympic time trial win.
Why should tweeting “Luigi!” rile people? It has to do with the Operation Puerto doping case, the series of raids in 2006 that found hundreds of bags of blood and plasma in the offices of Spanish cycling doping doctor Eufemiano Fuentes. It wound up implicating road cyclists along with other sportspeople . Earlier this summer a Madrid appeals court ruled their contents could be released to anti-doping authorities.
“No. 24 Clasicómano Luigi” was a codename allocated to one of the blood bags recovered from Operation Puerto. Speculation has long linked the bag to Cancellara, or another former pro, Thomas Dekker.
Cancellara has always denied any link to Fuentes or doping. Meantime Dekker replied to Armstrong’s tweet with a concise denial:
. @lancearmstrong Wasn’t me.. ????????
— Thomas Dekker (@thomasdekker) August 11, 2016
“Luigi” could also be a reference to Luigi Cecchini, the Italian sports director who worked with Bjarne Riis at the CSC team that Cancellara rode for a decade ago. Tyler Hamilton has alleged that Cecchini was party to doping; Cecchini has denied the charge.
Armstrong’s message to Trek-Segafredo and Cancellara provoked a furious response on Twitter:
@lancearmstrong you lost the right to Insinuate others were doping when you doped, lied, and bullied people & then came back to try again
— james stout (@jamesstout) August 12, 2016
@thomasdekker who cares if it wasn’t you…we already knew you were a doper, and you were caught. You’re old washed up news
— Kelly R (@super_quads101) August 12, 2016
@lancearmstrong @TrekSegafredo Haha and this from the biggest cheater in sport-history ????
— RoFr (@ri_ra_ro) August 12, 2016
