Sports Poets Society

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/125656-lance-armstrong-vs-paulkimmage-for-the-soul-of-professional-cycling Lance Armstrong v. Paul Kimmage: For the Soul of Professional Cycling MR X  - FEBRUARY 18, 2009 The biggest sporting story in the world this year took place last Thursday at the press conference for the Amgen Cycling Tour of California . Lance Armstrong, cycling's greatest ever athlete, was fielding questions from the media when an Irish journalist from the Sunday Times asked him a question. Having rehearsed this answer many times in knowing which question was coming, Armstrong reprimanded the journalist in an amazing exchange between the two. The question from Paul Kimmage that gave rise to Armstrong's meticulously prepared answer was about why Armstrong was welcoming back cyclists who had been proven to be cheats, or dopers. After asking, " What is it about these dopers you seem to admire so much ?", Armstrong rounded on Kimmage by stating, " You are n...

Kimmage is the focus of a new documentary  that tracks his ongoing fight against doping in cycling. Image: Billy Stickland /INPHO https://www.the42.ie/paul-kimmage-game-is-up-kind-of-journalism-i-practice-1591253-Jul2014/ The Irish journalist is the subject of a new documentary about his troubled relationship with the sport of cycling. Jul 27th 2014, 10:00 AM 38,771 Views  54 Comments   NEAR THE BEGINNING of the excellent new film Rough Rider — a documentary about former Irish cyclist and whistleblower Paul Kimmage — the 52-year-old sports journalist says: “Libels are the Oscars of our trade — unless you’re getting them, you’re not doing your job right.” It’s a wry remark, but its inferences undoubtedly ring true. Since of the publication of Rough Ride — Kimmage’s seminal exposé on the widespread use of performance-enhancing drugs in cycling — back in 1990, he quickly established himself as a journalist of considerable repute, mainly owing to the fearlessness that frequ...

Paul Kimmage pictured in the 1986 Tour de France. Image: ©INPHO https://www.the42.ie/barry-ryan-the-ascent-extract-5078802-Apr2020/ In this extract from ‘The Ascent,’ the fallout from Paul Kimmage’s ‘Rough Ride’ book is recalled. Apr 23rd 2020 -  11 Comments   THE FOLLOWING PASSAGE is an extract from ‘The Ascent’. (Cap. 18, pp. 296-306) One last lap and then goodbye to all that. On the last Friday of August 1989, as Paul Kimmage soft-pedalled over the Côte de Montagnole in the company of Sean Kelly, Martin Earley, Laurence Roche and John Brady, a Dubliner based as a professional in the United States, it was hard to ignore the occasional pang of regret. Kimmage still looked the part in his Fagor kit but he was already in the process of stepping off the field of dreams. Two days after Stephen Roche’s abandon at the Tour the previous month, he had climbed off his bike on the road to Montpellier, demoralised by the internal bickering at Fagor . After finishing the Giro, Kimmage ha...