Two a penny

.Lance Armstrong and Johan Bruyneel have defended their conduct within the Astana team during last year’s Tour de France after criticism from Alberto Contador.
Armstrong and Contador were team-mates at Astana last year, with Bruyneel their director.
Contador won his second Tour and Armstrong, the record seven-time champion, was third in his comeback year.
While Contador remains at Astana, Armstrong and Bruyneel are now at new American team RadioShack.
But there were clearly tensions within the team and Contador has since criticised Armstrong and Bruyneel, who have worked closely together for more than a decade.
“I’m a bit frustrated by the comments that he didn’t have any help.
“[Last year] was a clear example of a team working as a team, no matter whom they had to work for,” Bruyneel said on Saturday.
“That was absolutely not the case.
“The tension . …
“It was sometimes stressful, intense, but not close toly close to what has been written or said. was a lot less than everyone thinks,” he said.
“I just assumed from the start that the Tour de France is the hardest race in the world.
“I just assumed from the start that the Tour de France is the hardest race in the world.
“That’s why you have a head coach in sport, you don’t go off and make your own plan and do your own thing,” he said.”
Armstrong said the first person he listened to in the team during the Tour was Bruyneel, not Contador.
“Mentally he’s almost unbreakable – there were times in the Tour last summer that you saw that he had to be fractured mentally, because of things that were done in the race and the perception among the people, the fans and the peloton,” he said.
But the American has also praised Contador ahead of their head-to-head battle at this year’s Tour de France.”
– AAP

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“He never [cracked], he was always very, very tough – he’s a strong-minded young man