The Lance Armstrong legacy has been knocked down yet another peg as Nike announced this past week that they have ended their partnership with the seven-time Tour de France winner. Since Armstrong officially gave up his fight this past summer against proving himself innocent of doping allegations, Radio Shack, Trek Bikes, Giro Helmets, and Anheuser-Busch have all cut ties with the cancer survivor and now it was Nike’s turn to do the same. From there, Armstrong resigned as chairman of the Livestrong Foundation, the organization he created to benefit cancer patients and to top it all off, he’s been stripped of all seven of his Tour wins plus receiving a lifetime ban from cycling’s governing body. What was once a proud legacy is now a tarnished one.

Following his vast, not to mention incredible, success, Lance Armstrong has since been accused of doping during his reign as Tour de France champion from 1999 to 2005. It all came to a head this past August as Armstrong announced that he was giving up his fight to clear his name and with that, the floodgates busted open. For one, the United States Anti-Doping Agency has accused Armstrong of leading a massive doping program on his teams. But even before his many sponsors let the cyclist hang out to dry, so many skeptics were quick to condemn Armstrong. While an abundance of cyclists who have participated (and won) the Tour, it doesn’t justify what Armstrong did. In fact, the International Cycling Union found enough evidence against Armstrong and came down hard stripping the cyclist of all seven of his Tour de France titles in addition to slapping him with a lifetime ban and for it, he should be absolutely embarrassed.

One would be sorely mistaken if they expect me to sit here and excuse what Armstrong did during his on-course success. However, I am appalled at the amount of negative reaction spewed at Lance Armstrong for not only his doping charges while he participated in the Tour de France, but his decision a couple of months ago to quit any further legal action that would drag his name deeper through the mud. While the choice Armstrong made to use illegal substances during his cycling career is inexcusable, it is no less so the backlash the cancer survivor has been receiving since then.

From the sports echelon, we have witnessed an ugly truth within the last decade. From that spring day in front of United States Congress in 2005, countless Major League Baseball players have been caught using performance-enhancing drugs. Figures like power-hitters Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds have all had their images tarnished from such allegations. While McGwire was the only one of the three to admit to using any illegal substances, Bonds has since been indicted and Sosa, well, take a good look at his career numbers (not to mention his increased body size year-by-year) and you’ll see something suspicious. Yet, while many athletes (not just baseball players) have come out and admitted to using human-growth hormones and other illegal substances, we’ve come to a point in society where the issue is so frightfully commonplace that we have just learned to forgive and move on.

While the news of Armstrong is still fresh, there’s something very significant that many people seem to forget. It is unfortunate to see so many critics sitting atop their high horses without even stopping to realize what it was that made billions worldwide fall in love with the seven-time Tour winner in the first place. Sports have given us those feel-good stories — stories that leave you feeling better about yourself or a loved one. If you choose not to pull for an athlete based on merit alone, then that’s okay. Pulling for an athlete for any sentimental reason is good enough, if not better. It is great cheering for the guy who was deemed too small or the 20-year-old who grew up in a world of poverty or the troubled soul who witnessed a loved one being shot to death. While those are all justified reasons to root for the underdog, placing your allegiance behind a cancer survivor is in a stratosphere all on its own.

That Lance Armstrong was once on his death bed fighting multiple forms of cancer with the slimmest of chances of survival is hard to believe. To even participate at an event as disciplined as the Tour de France would have been newsworthy but to win to one, not two but seven-straight titles is simply beyond words. Only the NBA’s Boston Celtics had matched Armstrong’s longevity winning eight consecutive championships from 1958-59 through 1965-66. Not even the famed New York Yankees or the Montreal Canadiens have matched that. In that sense, Lance Armstrong was in a class of his own. Unfortunately with the doping scandal, those titles are now tainted. Nonetheless, Armstrong beat something far more daunting than most have ever had to endure. While some wore the famous Livestrong bracelets because yellow was their favourite colour, so many more wore said bracelets because in one way or another, whether directly or indirectly, their lives were affected by cancer. Even before my mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2001, she was right there supporting Armstrong through thick and thin and that was especially the case once she had been diagnosed. Sadly, my mother did not live long enough to see her hero win his seventh crown but nevertheless, Lance Armstrong brought her the greatest sense of inspiration that anyone could possibly imagine during her most difficult times fighting the disease. While that is my experience, I can safely assume that my mother was not the only person to feel that way during those years.

We can fold our arms and slowly shake our heads in disappointment at him, but Lance Armstrong came along when the human race needed that sense of prodigious euphoria. Armstrong’s incredible run wasn’t like the Summit Series where as a nation, Canada needed to restore its national pastime or Michael Jordan coming out of retirement to help his Chicago Bulls win three more championships, this was the story of all stories. With his wheels falling off (yes, pun intended) as of late, countless skeptics sold the cancer survivor down the river and have said good riddance to those years where Mr. Armstrong reigned supreme — yet, we forget why we fell in love with the American in the first place.

It wasn’t about politics, money or hard feelings – Lance Armstrong’s quest was about life and the value of it. Some would suggest that Armstrong’s title reign is now nothing but a bad dream. But it wasn’t a bad dream. In fact, it wasn’t a dream at all and that’s the whole point. It may be surreal to think about how what Lance Armstrong accomplished really happened and the same goes for what he went through before. According to the USADA, Armstrong’s on-course accomplishment may not mean anything anymore, but I do know that if my mother were alive to today, she would have none of it.

My mother was by no means no naive — nor am I — but the message Lance Armstrong sent to my mother in addition to all the cancer survivors out there was that anything is possible and, even if the experts tell you it isn’t so, don’t believe them for a second because life is simply worth living and creating some suspense along the way only makes the ride all the more exhilarating.

For those seven years, billions around the world could glue themselves to their television knowing that if a cancer patient can get up and conquer an event so grueling, then a cancer patient can do absolutely anything they set their mind to.

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Ryan Cowley is a writer at Toronto Standard. Follow him on Twitter @RyanACowley.

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