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Volunteer Weekend at the Botanical Garden St Eustatius National Parks Newsletter 1/2013 March 2013 Volunteer Weekend Red billed Tropicbirds 1 2 Staff matters 3 The Human Element 4 STENAPA Focus 5 7 Guided Hikes : Are available Botanical Garden : It is Humpback Whale watching season. Check out the view from the Lookout Garden Open from sunrise to sunset. Great for picnics. Find us on Facebook: Keep up to date with all the latest happenings Like our Inside this Publication... STENAPA Update REMINDER Lionfish are venomous and should only be removed by Marine Park Staff. If you have any questions or a Lionfish sighting please call us on 318 2884 There has been a period of serious drought on the island since last late year. Not only have we had no rain, we have had no international volunteers either! With high flight costs and financial issues across the world our numbers of volunteers from abroad have dropped significantly in the last couple of years. This is bad for all areas of the parks as we cannot carry out as much work as we would like where there is ALWAYS more work to do than people to do it! So, we decided this year to try a volunteer weekend and see if people from the local community were interested in helping out a few hours on a weekend. We held our first one in March as a tester to see what kind of interest there would be, we thought perhaps 5 or 6 people would come and that would be great, when 25 people showed up, it was awesome! So much work got done in the few hours the volunteers were working, more than would be achieved in a whole week with just the Garden Ranger and Intern working alone! There was a picnic to say thank you with sandwiches and cakes and overall it was a really nice weekend. Everyone who came said they would be happy to help out again and other people have contacted us already asking when the next one will be. We were especially pleased to see so many young people come along with their parents. They were really keen to help out and it was really refreshing to see there are a lot of people from the next generation eager to carry on the work with nature conservation on Statia. A HUGE thank you goes out to everyone who helped us. cess and we now plan to repeat the weekend every other month for the rest of the year. The next one is planned in May so if you are interested in helping out, keep an eye on the STENAPA facebook page for more details on when it will be. Volunteers from the Saturday morning showing off their handi work cleaning up around the entrance.
cameras are an ideal tool for this. All accessible birds (adults and chicks) have been banded with a unique metal band around the leg that will identify them to Statia. Should any birds fly to nearby islands, it will be possible to trace them back to Statia. The results of this study will be published in July. Should predation by cats be considered a serious problem, STENAPA will consider what steps to take to reduce or control the feral cat population. GvP student Jose Luis holding a tropicbird chick, no more than a week old, (photo by Hannah Madden) International Cooperation Last year National Park Ranger Hannah Madden attended a seabird workshop in the Bahamas, which resulted in Stenapa receiving a small grant to conduct its current tropicbird monitoring project. One of the speakers from the workshop, Dr. Pat Jodice of Clemson University, recently contacted Stenapa to ask if they were interested in collaborating on his own seabird research project, namely geolocators. Stenapa readily agreed, and for the past few days Madden and intern Andrew Red billed Tropicbirds Ellis have taken Dr. Jodice to the various nesting sites of Statia's Red billed Tropicbirds ( Phaethon aethereus ) in order to attach small geolocators to the legs of 18 adult birds. The units weigh around 2.5 grams and give very coarse information about the regional movements of these birds outside the nesting season (they do not give information about local movements). Very little is known about these seabirds and their movements, however it is believed that they travel far outside of the tropics. Stenapa hopes to be able to retrieve as many of the geolocators as possible in early 2014 when the birds return to nest once more in the rocky cliffs of Statia. Tropicbirds lay just one egg per season; if the chick successfully hatches the parents travel far out to sea to forage for food such as flying fish, which seems to be a staple part of their diet. The chicks are so well fed that they often outweigh their parents at the time of fledging. Statia's tropicbird population is currently being monitored for predation by feral cats and rats; the results of this study will be published by Stenapa in July, and Madden may travel to Grenada to annual regional meeting. NP intern Andrew Ellis holds a tropicbird while Pat attaches the geolocator (photo by H. Madden) Local Monitoring Efforts The Red billed Tropicbird nesting season is in full swing and STENAPA has begun a six month study on this species of seabird, funded by the Society for the Conservation and Study of Caribbean Birds (SCSCB). National Park Ranger Hannah Madden and intern Andrew Ellis, who hails from the UK, assisted by students from the Gwendoline van Putten high school, are responsible for finding and mapping accessible nests, marking them with individual numbers and banding and measuring the birds in each nest. The nests being monitored are in varying stages of development, ranging from an adult with an egg to an adult or just a nest with a chick. Some of the chicks have already started to fledge and may not return to Statia to nest for at least four years. STENAPA returns to each nest weekly in order to measure the progress of the chicks. Tropicbirds favour rocky outcrops, with Pilot Hill being the most popular nesting site on Statia. This makes access extremely difficult due to the steep and dangerous terrain, therefore only nests near the bottom of the cliff can be marked. However, around 100 nests have already been found and it is estimated that there could be up to twice that amount at higher elevations. Part of the project is to determine the risk of predation of these birds. On nearby Saba nests were monitored in 2011 and 2012, and sadly up to 100% of chicks were killed by rats and cats in one nesting site. Cameras have been set up in front of two nests in an attempt to capture photos of potential predators, and we just received a generous donation from NuStar to purchase ten additional cameras and a laptop in order to better monitor nests. STENAPA believes the predation rate on Statia is much lower than Saba, however this needs to be properly documented and the Page 2 STENAPA Update
Page 3 Newsletter 1/2013 Prizewinners Stenapa took three lucky prize winners out on the Blue Runner boat for a fun ride within the Statia National Marine Park. Makeda Vonk, Charisse Woodley Adams and her sister all enjoyed going out on the boat and exploring some of Statia's offshore coral reefs. The competition, held during Stenapa's first People & the Parks event in October last year, was to draw an animal or bird found on Statia. Many children entered in the age category 4 12 and three winners were selected. Marine Park Ranger Nadio Spanner drove the excited winners to Jenkins Bay, one of Statia's snorkel sites at the northern end of the island. Parents of the girls accompanied them on the trip and also got to enjoy views of the island and water. Following the success of last year's People & the Parks awareness raising event, Stenapa hopes to continue to host this on a yearly basis. In addition to this, Snorkel Club has begun once more and is being held every Monday afternoon, excluding holidays, from 2.15 to 4pm until the end of the school year. Space is available in the beginning and the advanced Snorkel Club. Any parents wishing to sign up their children aged 8 and above can do so at the Visitor's Centre on Gallows Bay, or call 318 2884. Photo: Prize winners on the boat heading to Jenkins Bay, by Fraukje Vonk When I tell most people I just completed a Permaculture Design Certificate course (PDC course) they say to me, Perma what now? Permaculture is an emerging movement but is gaining momentum and popularity among horticulturalists every year. In its most basic form it derives from the words permanent agriculture and the idea was developed Mollison and David Holmgren. It is, however, a little more involved than that. Permaculture design is about creating spaces like gardens, farms, business, communities using ecological and environmentally sustainable, agricultural practices. It has three main ethos, earth care, people care and fair share. Earth care is all about looking after the most important element in your garden, abusing it with intensive agricultural techniques, like massive mono culture needs, mulching, composting and not messing about with the delicate balance of life within the soil that makes artificial fertilizers and weed killer. People care focuses on our interaction with nature, working with nature and not against it to allow us to produce food, building materials and all the other things we need for a healthy and happy life. For example when you look at a design feature you need to install such as a windbreak, instead of just planting a whole bunch of ornamental plants and trees that cannot be used in some way, you would plant fruiting trees and bushes that produce berries or nuts that permaculturalists are known, love certain plants, things like Bamboo and Moringa trees that have multiple uses, building material, wind resistance, or that produce food or nutrients for the soil. The theory makes such good sense, why just plant a pretty garden, when you can plant a garden that looks pretty and will feed you too? Fair share is about sharing the wealth and sharing the bounty of the harvest. To me, growing up in a family where we Staff Matters always grew veggies and had fruiting trees in our garden, this is just part of growing your own food. When we had a bumper harvest of apples, we gave some to our neighbours, family and friends. If you get a huge crop of something you you share it out with the people you know, and of course, they share their have too many plums would you like building communities, sharing knowledge, building co operatives that benefit the people who do the work, things like fair trade products etc. The first PDC course was held this year in February and the field work was carried out at Green blends, Congo preserve and in the final week at the Botanical Garden. I have to say it was great experience and I picked up a lot of new skills. It gives you a different perspective on what you do and makes you realise your impact on the world around more. Leo Baxk from Aarwerk, who ran the course this year, will be back before Christmas (and the cold Dutch winter) to prepare for the second one and this time he will have an assistant, me! The PDC course qualifies you to teach permaculture so now we will be able to offer more training for the schools, workshops for local people and training for Interns and Volunteers who pass through. Making natural compost bins with Tan tan trees around the garden (photo and story by Claire Blair)
including Snorkel Club, Junior Rangers and Summer Club. These programs have been running since 2003 and have been so successful that many students asked for more. As a result, Stenapa created Advanced Snorkel Club and Junior Rangers 2 for students that had completed the first clubs but still wanted to come back for more. Given such demand, how could we say no? Photo: Snorkel Club students take a quick break Reaching out to younger children (ages 8 12) has never been a problem, however we noticed that interest among students quickly dropped off once they reached their teens. Stenapa is currently unable to offer additional after school activities due to the lack of a dedicated Education Officer. Our sister organisation, STINAPA Bonaire, has an excellent program that offers nature related activites up to age 18 and above, including PADI dive certification, first aid training and much more. Their graduates are well prepared to work in the fields of coastguard, ambulance and even may become park rangers themselves. This is something we at Stenapa look forward to being able to offer in the future. Photo: Junior Ranger students looking through a microscope for the first time Currently we encourage our Junior Ranger students to continue their interest in nature by offering a free Discover Dive courtesy of local dive operators, Golden Rock Dive and Scubaqua. Ideally we would like them all to become PADI certified, proficient divers. That will become enthusiastic spokespersons for the sport to their peers. Although Stenapa does not visit the local high school to give lessons, we were recently The Human Element requested to work with some students that wish to gain practical work experience. Of course, we readily accepted and now receive a number of students every week that assist us in the Botanical Garden and National Park. We hope that this collaboration with the school will continue to blossom into a fruitful relationship from both sides. Recently the boys assisted us with orchid surveys, tropicbird research and trail maintenance in the parks, and weeding and other tasks in the garden. We hope that in the future we can expand work experience opportunities to include the Marine Park. Photo: GvP student Geraldi counts orchid leaves in the Quill Looking even further beyond high school, we would like to offer internships to local persons that are interested in learning a specific trade related to nature conservation. Currently Stenapa brings in interns from overseas, but there is no reason why we cannot offer this to our locals as well. Positions within the National Park, Marine Park, Botanical Garden, and even administration, are all possible. We can train them how to be tour guides in the Quill or how to monitor sea turtles; the possibilities are endless for the right candidate. The future looks bright for us all! Photo: GvP students Jose Luis, Giovanni and Geraldi assist with tropicbird research and data collection on Zeelandia beach It is easy to get so wrapped up in our line of work that we sometimes forget the importance of human interactions with nature. What may be even more important is encouraging our young people to get outdoors and connect with their natural environment. All too often sensationalist result in an increased paranoia of nature, whereas it is important to embrace and celebrate our biodiversity. coined hypothesis Nature Deficit Disorder relates to the fact that people especially children are spending less time outdoors, possibly resulting in health and behavioral problems. Louv claims the causes for this phenomenon include parental fears, restricted access to natural areas, and the lure of the electronic screen. Recent research suggests there is a link between the declining number of visits to national parks and the increasing consumption of electronic media by children. Photo: getting our young people out into nature is a challenge we are facing head on therefore crucial starting with elementary school students and continuing all the way up through high school and beyond. Each month since 2009 we have been visiting all the elementary schools to give lessons on nature related topics. We aim to make the lessons fun and interactive, with the ultimate goal of eliminating any fear of nature altogether. Photo: playing games is a fun way to educate children about nature In addition to in school lessons, Stenapa hosts a variety of after school programs, Page 4 STENAPA Update
Page 5 Newsletter 1/2013 STENAPA Focus on Invasive Species On December 1 st 2010, the first lionfish was dive operator Scubaqua. The first specimen was brought in by marine park staff members and was measured at10 cm in length with unknown gender. Since then all specimens measured and dissected to determine stomach contents as well as gender. The largest individual to date has been measured at 36 cm. The stomach contents of the dissected lionfish usually contain juvenile wrasse, gobies and shrimps. The most interesting find was an ingested juvenile lionfish. During 2011, 190 lionfish sightings were reported and 102 fish were culled by Marine Park staff. Most of the culled lionfish were in the Northern Reserve, as were most of the sightings. Thanks to this information we are now able to better target the lionfish. New methods of control are being developed and lionfish specific traps are being experimented on throughout the wider Caribbean region. These might make it possible for us to use in less accessible areas, such as the Atlantic It is vital that marine park users continue to report each lionfish sighting. Reporting of lionfish provides us with information on which areas to target and helps us improve efficiency. The information can be used to assess the impact of this invasive species on our reefs surrounding the island in the future, as well as develop new techniques to target and eradicate them as much as possible. Trials are being conducted to find more efficient ways to catch lionfish and their larvae. There have been reports that lionfish enter fish traps; therefore prototype traps for lionfish are being tested. There are also attempts to try to evaluate and catch lionfish larvae with light traps. If any of these methods work this is something we will consider in the future. One idea is to promote the lionfish as an edible commercial fish, both for the island and regionally. Unfortunately, some lionfish that were sampled with a basic test for ciguatoxin showed positive results (St Maarten Nature Foundation). According to researchers, however, the test that was used does not actually measure ciguatoxin but another toxin that is sometimes found along with ciguatoxin, so the results could be misleading and wrongly interpreted. In addition, the ciguatoxin test only gives a positive and negative result, not the range of toxin present that could influence toxicity to humans. Photo: Although the lionfish itself has venomous spines, its flesh should be safe to eat Therefore, a collaborative research project to analyse levels of ciguatoxin in lionfish is required. The St. Maarten Nature Foundation has applied for a grant to conduct a broader lionfish study, including genetic analysis, prey fish analysis and a more complete ciguatoxin check. The neighboring islands of St Martin tius will all be involved by sending in samples from their waters for analysis. Photo: MP intern with a live captured lionfish Biological invasions are a leading cause of biodiversity loss and represent a substantial contribution to human induced global change. While invasions by marine fishes are relatively uncommon and their ecological effects are largely unknown, introductions of predatory freshwater fishes have often proven to be devastating to native communities. Lionfish (family Scorpaenidae) are striking and attractive reef fishes. They are very popular among aquarists and highly recognizable because of their ornate striped coloration and Xamboyant dorsal and pectoral Wns. The two best known species, Pterois volitans and Pterois miles (referred to collectively as lionfish) are venomous, predatory reef fishes native to Indo Pacific waters, but because of their popularity as aquarium fish they have been widely distributed and now occur in aquaria on six continents. This worldwide aquarium trade is likely responsible for introducing lionfish to the wild outside their native range, and has been identified as the source of the invasion of lionfish in the western Atlantic. Photo: Red lionfish Photo: Black lionfish Lionfish reproduce by releasing free floating egg masses that develop into planktonic larvae. It is during these early life history stages that dispersal by ocean currents occurs. The floating egg mass may enhance survival by reducing predation from other planktonic organisms, and it also facilitates broad and rapid dispersal by keeping the eggs concentrated at the surface where wind driven currents are stronger than they are at depth. These characteristics have likely promoted the fast and wide spread dispersal of lionfish in the western Atlantic.
south on its six month journey through the Lesser Antilles. Blogs and updates are available on the official website http://www.islandbiogeography.org/ Photo: Dr. Lauren Esposito holding a tailless whip scorpion ( Phrynus goesii ) in the Quill crater by Hannah Madden Appeal to the Public! We are currently trying to raise funds to buy a new wood chipper or garden shredder for the Botanical garden. This is a vital piece of equipment for us as it allows us to process all our garden debris and make compost, mulch and reduce our waste. Compost is so important, we use it in the shade house to make good quality potting soil, we add it to the garden flower beds to improve the soil and it means that we can recycle so much of the grass clippings, leaves and weeds that we remove from the garden. Mulching is when you spread a layer of organic material over the surface of the soil. It can be leaves, wood chips, compost or even things like shredded newspaper or cardboard. It is important because it suppresses weed growth and helps to retain moisture in the soil, both of which is really important to us at the Botanical Garden. The shredder we have is broken, rusted and basically dead (and has been for years now). We desperately need a new one and the kind we will need will cost around $2500. Of course we do not In Other News..... have that kind of money sitting in the donation box so we are appealing to the public and have approached some local businesses to try and raise funds. If you would like to contribute please visit or contact the STENAPA office in Gallows bay. Thank you Rivers Enterprises On Tuesday, February 12, 2013, Rivers Enterprises generously donated a water cooler to the St. Eustatius National Parks Foundation (STENAPA) Visitor Center. This was gratefully accepted by Claire Blair, Botanical Garden Ranger. In the photo (l to r) Claire Blair (STENAPA), Patsy Patrick, Mr Gibbs and Avril Maduro (Rivers Enterprises) Thank You Nustar Terminals A generous donation from Nustar Terminal has allowed STENAPA to finally replace our old dingy and outboard with a new dingy and outboard from Budget Marine. The old dingy was worn out and needed constant repair. This new, dependable dingy will allow STENAPA to spend more time on the water fulfilling our mandate to manage the St Eustatius National Marine Park. Ranger Nadio Spanner and intern Steve Leeming (photo by Anna Maitz) Arachnid Survey Visits Statia This February STENAPA hosted a team of scientists travelling the Lesser Antilles to collect arachnids. This is a five year project initiated by Dr. Ingi Agnarsson (University of Vermont) and Dr. Greta Binford (Lewis & Clark College), funded by the National Science Foundation, in order to document arachnids from across and beyond the Caribbean archipelago. The region is a Conservation International hotspot of biological diversity, yet detailed processes that generate species diversity on the islands are complex and poorly understood. The project aims to test hypotheses about how the age and dispersal ability of lineages and the geological history of islands interplay to generate biodiversity hotspots by sampling 70+ arachnid lineages; analysing biogeographical and diversity patterns within and among lineages and relating them to dispersal ability of taxa; and generating a synthesis of Caribbean island biogeography. STENAPA National Park Ranger and project collaborator Hannah Madden, who travelled to Puerto Rico in 2011 to participate in initial fieldwork, took the scientists to different areas of St. Eustatius in order to collect a variety of arachnid specimens. Leaf litter was collected and sifted from the Quill and Gilboa Hill, and the team also went out at night to collect nocturnal species. Given the enormity of this project, the results will not be published for some years, however Dr. Lauren Esposito (University of California, Berkley) who is heading up the current expedition believes they made some interesting discoveries, with possibly at least one new species of spider. STENAPA's Junior Rangers students also helped out by collecting specimens during their after school programs, which Madden gave to the team before they left. STENAPA will continue to collect arachnids on an ad hoc basis and send them off for documentation and analysis. The expedition left by yacht this week for St. Kitts/Nevis and will be continuing Page 6 STENAPA Update
STENAPA would like to thank the following businesses for supporting us. Their donations make it possible for us to continue our mandate of managing the protected areas of Saint Eustatius. Each of the following has made a contribution to the Friends of STENAPA. We would like to encourage all of you who receive this newsletter to support these businesses. Individuals who join Friends of STENAPA will receive the following discounts from our supporting businesses. drink by lunch or dinner Golden Era Hotel, Bar, Restaurant and Conference Centre: 10 % off dinnerbill higher than $60, Yummy Tummy Bar and Restaurant: 10 % off dinner bill Fay Bar & Restaurant: 1 beer or soda with dinner more than $ 10, I.F. Rivers Enterprises N.V.: 10 % discount on merchandise STENAPA is an environmental not for profit foundation on St Eustatius and was established in 1988. The purpose of the Foundation is the acquisition, preservation, protection and administration of parcels of land/water on Sint Eustatius, worthy of preservation, due to; a. its scenic beauty and/or presence of flora and fauna important in scientific and cultural respect or valuable from a geological or historical point of view; b. its purpose to serve for the well being, the education, and the recreation of the Sint Eustatius population as well as that of visitors, all this with due observance of the primary requirement of preservation. STENAPA is legally mandated by the Island Council to manage the St Eustatius National Marine Park, The Quill / Boven National Park and the Miriam Schmidt Botanical Gardens President: Irving Brown Vice President: Treasurer: Ruth Pandt Secretary: Linda Berkel Gallows Bay z/n Lower Town St Eustatius, Dutch Caribbean Phone: +599 318 2884 E mail: email@example.com St Eustatius National Parks www.statiapark.org of STENAPA Friends Duggins Shoppingcentre 4piek Travel Agency. Statiahousingandservices (harbervieuwapp University of St. Eustatius School of Medicine Blue Bead Restaurant Golden Era Hotel, Bar, Restaurant & Conference facility The Old Gin House Yummy Tummy Bar & Restaurant Chamber of Commerce & Industry St. Eustatius & Saba. Super Burger ice cream and shakes place) I.F. Rivers Enterprises N.V. Original Fruit Tree bar & restaurant Scubaqua Dive Centre Coolcorner: Golden Rock Mini Market Dutch Plumbing Services Golden Rock Dive Center Hai Zhu N.V. Julie Supermarket Modentes Tandtechnisch laboratorium All Run supermarket.


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The $10 million estate of Lance Armstrong's dreams is hidden behind a tall, cream-colored wall of Texas limestone and a solid steel gate. Visitors pull into a circular driveway beneath a grand oak tree whose branches stretch toward a 7,806-square-foot Spanish colonial mansion.
The tree itself speaks of Armstrong's famous will. It was once on the other side of the property, 50 yards west of this house. Armstrong wanted it at the front steps. The transplantation cost $200,000. His close friends joke that Armstrong, who is agnostic, engineered the project to prove he didn't need God to move heaven and earth.
For nearly a decade, Lance Armstrong and I have had a contentious relationship. Seven years have passed since his agent, Bill Stapleton, first threatened to sue me. Back then, I was just one of the many reporters Armstrong had tried to manipulate, charm or bully.
I've interviewed him one-on-one in five countries; on team buses that smelled of sweat-soaked Lycra at the Tour de France, in swanky New York City hotel rooms, in the backs of limousines, in soulless conference rooms; and for hours by telephone.
Now, in the spring of 2013, after his whole world has come crashing down and moving trucks are en route to dismantle his beloved estate, I've come to visit him at home in Austin, Tex., for the first time.
Yes, fine, come on out, he said. Troubled by endless obituaries of his celebrated (and now fraudulent) career, he wanted to ensure that I wrote "the true story."
John Thomas Neal — a man who would come to know Armstrong better than anyone, better than even Armstrong himself — was an independently wealthy real estate investor and massage therapist, a husband and father, who worked as a soigneur in elite cycling. Soigneur is a French term meaning "one who cares for others." In cycling, that person gives the riders massages, prepares their lunches and water bottles, cleans their uniforms and transports their baggage. A fixer, nurturer and wise counselor, Neal had worked with professional athletes on the beach volleyball tour and with swimmers at the University of Texas. But his passion was cycling because he loved the sport and the travel.
Though he had a law degree, legal work didn't satisfy him and he didn't stick with it. Anyway, he could afford to quit because he had married into money. So in Austin, he volunteered to work with the athletes at the University of Texas. In time, he had made enough connections and had cultivated a reputation in the Olympic sports world for being so good at his job that he was hired as a soigneur for the Subaru-Montgomery professional cycling team. Eddie Borysewicz, a former United States Olympic cycling coach, was in charge of the team, owned by Thomas Weisel, an investment banker who would eventually own the United States Postal Service cycling team.
When he first signed on, Neal worked races only in the United States and hadn't heard much about doping, except that performance-enhancing drug use among cyclists was prevalent in Europe.
He met Armstrong in 1989 at a Texas triathlon, after Borysewicz told him to look out for the budding cycling star. Armstrong's all-out effort at the 1989 junior worlds in Moscow had caught Borysewicz's eye. The coach convinced Armstrong to switch to cycling from triathlon because cycling was an Olympic sport.
Armstrong, perhaps the hottest up-and-coming cyclist in the world, later landed a spot with the Subaru-Montgomery team. By then, Neal and Armstrong knew each other well.
Nearly a dozen athletes in Austin — both men and women — still say they were closer to Neal than to their fathers. He brought them into his family and gave them stability. Armstrong was just the latest athlete in need. Neal also became close friends with Armstrong's mother, Linda.
Armstrong was relocating to Austin from Plano because its hilly terrain was perfect for training. At a steeply discounted rate, Armstrong moved into an apartment complex owned by Neal. Near downtown — among tall trees, 20 paces from Neal's office — it was a comfortable, safe place that Armstrong could call home. Later, Armstrong told The Dallas Morning News his apartment was "killer ... s-o-o-o nice!" He and Neal met every day, sometimes several times a day, for massages and meals. It gave Neal satisfaction to know that he could have a positive impact on a teenager who needed some guidance.
Neal's first impression was that the kid's ego exceeded his talent. Armstrong was brash and ill-mannered, in desperate need of refinement. But the more he learned of Armstrong's home life, the sorrier Neal began to feel for him. He was a boy without a reliable father. Linda Armstrong wrote in her 2005 autobiography that she was pleased that her son had found a responsible male role model, and that Neal had lent a sympathetic ear to her while she dealt with the rocky transition between marriages.
Neal soon recognized that Armstrong's insecurities and anger were products of his broken family: He felt abandoned by his biological father and mistreated by his adoptive one. Armstrong didn't like to be alone, so Neal often met him for breakfast at the Upper Crust Cafe, just down the street from Neal's house, and for lunch at a sports bar called the Tavern. Armstrong ate dinner with the Neals, including their three children, several times a week. It was nothing fancy — sometimes just slow-cooked beans eaten with plastic utensils out of mismatched mugs, as if they were on a camping trip. But they were a family.
Frances, Neal's wife, and Armstrong were the group's jokers. They might chase each other around the dinner table. They might sing parts of "Ice Ice Baby" by the Dallas rapper Vanilla Ice, a song that then sat atop the music charts. One would sing, "Ice ice baby!" and the other would reply, "Too cold, too cold!" On some days, they would bring their show to the Neals' motorboat, where they would spend the day swimming or water-skiing.
It was arguably the happiest, most uncomplicated time in Armstrong's life. He no longer had to worry about his adoptive father, Terry Armstrong, whom he considered overbearing, and his mother's current marital woes were 215 miles north on Interstate 35 in Plano. His world centered on Austin and Neal, who gladly opened his home or apartments to national team cyclists — like Armstrong's future Postal Service teammates George Hincapie, Frankie Andreu, Chann McRae and Kevin Livingston — who wanted to train with Armstrong in the Texas Hill Country.
The day after Armstrong moved into his new apartment, the Neals saw him ride in Lago Vista, 35 miles from Austin. Armstrong did poorly and admitted to Neal that he'd been up late the night before, drinking at an Austin strip club named the Yellow Rose. Neal passed it off as his being just another rambunctious teenager testing his newfound freedom.
In 1996, Neal was found to have multiple myeloma, a rare cancer of the plasma cells that inhibits the production of healthy blood cells. Several months later, Armstrong discovered that he had testicular cancer. The two of them grew even closer while enduring chemotherapy together.
In the last two years of Neal's life, from spring 2000 to fall 2002, in hopes of writing a book, he recorded 26 hours of audiotape. The tapes recreate and comment on the most exciting times of his life, primarily the years when the young Lance Edward Armstrong rose from obscurity to superstardom.
Neal, who died of cancer just after Armstrong had survived his bout with the disease, never finished the book. Long after his death, the tapes remained hidden in the bedroom closet of his son, Scott. Nobody in the family had listened to them, but I was given the tapes, along with permission to use Neal's words in this book. While in Austin to transcribe the recordings, I met with Armstrong and asked him about his former best friend.
"J. T. Neal? Forget about that. Don't go chasing that," he told me.
He dismissed Neal's importance, saying Neal hadn't known anything about his doping because his drug use had started after they had grown apart. But in just a few hours, I was sitting in the Neal household, headphones on, listening to the first tape that Neal had recorded.
It brought Neal's voice to life: "Today is the 12th of April, and this is the beginning of my recollections on Lance Armstrong ... "
One call from Armstrong to Neal came before dawn in August 1991. Could Neal pick him up in San Marcos? Armstrong wasn't stranded on the side of the road in the Texas outback. He had not blown out a tire on his bike in a marathon training ride. He was in jail.
The night before, 30 miles from Austin, Armstrong had partied with some women from Southwest Texas State University. As they frolicked in an outdoor Jacuzzi at one women's apartment complex, they made so much noise that the police came. But that was only Armstrong's first meeting with officers that night. The second was the big one. Pulled over for driving erratically, he thought he could talk his way out of trouble. So what if he had appeared drunk and refused to take a Breathalyzer test? He was sure the officer would be impressed when he told them who he was: the best young cyclist in the country.
Had he been a quarterback, maybe the ploy would have worked. But a Texas police officer could not care less about a guy's boasting about his prowess on a bike. No, it was off to the county lockup.
Neal, always concerned about Armstrong's drinking and driving, picked him up from the San Marcos jail the next day. Months later, upon receiving a notice that his driver's license could be suspended, Armstrong forwarded it to Neal. On the envelope, he wrote: "J. T. — This came today?? Have a great Xmas! Lance." Now acting as his lawyer as well as his friend, Neal helped Armstrong beat the charges and keep his license.
In turn, Neal received from Armstrong something rare and precious: Armstrong's trust. Armstrong sent him postcards from training trips and races — such as a note dated Aug. 16, 1991, from Wein-und Ferienort Bischoffingen, Germany.
"J. T. — Hows it going? Well, Germany is very nice. As you probably know the worlds are a little over a week away and Im nervous as hell. At least I'm riding good now! Wish you were here! The boys say 'hello.' Lance"
Neal loved that the national team riders and American pro cyclists knew who he was. Some even called him for advice. In Hincapie's case: I was stopped by customs with a suitcase filled with EPO and other drugs, what should I do? Some of them, like Armstrong and Hincapie, were open with him about their drug use. Whether Neal was complicit in any of their doping is unclear. He said, though, that soigneurs in the United States had a different job from those in Europe, where an intimate knowledge of pharmaceuticals had long been required. Neal learned that from soigneurs who had worked overseas.
According to Neal, Armstrong relied on shots and intravenous drips for recovery and prerace boosts of energy. On the eve of the road race at the 1992 Olympics, fellow cyclist Timm Peddie walked into Armstrong's hotel room and saw Neal and a gaggle of USA Cycling officials standing around Armstrong as he lay on a bed, hooked to an IV.
Peddie was astonished at the openness of the procedure. Everyone there stared at the unexpected guest until Peddie left as quickly as he had come in. He wasn't sure what he had seen. Maybe a blood transfusion? An infusion of electrolytes or proteins? He only knew that he had never received an IV before a race. Armstrong was, evidently, special.
At Christmas 1993, the year Armstrong won a world championship and a million-dollar bonus, Armstrong thanked Neal with several gifts. One was an autographed jersey. In black marker, he signed it: "J. T. I'm very fortunate that our paths have crossed. You're truly my righthand man! Not to mention my best friend! Lance Armstrong."
He gave Neal a Rolex watch inscribed "To J. T. From LANCE ARMSTRONG."
Neal accepted the watch as a symbol of Armstrong's gratitude, even his love. For a number of years, Neal wore it with pride — until the day came that he decided to never put it on his wrist again.
Throughout the 1990s, Neal was Armstrong's main soigneur at some domestic races and at national team training camps. But in Europe and at the big races, the honor of rubbing down Armstrong went to John Hendershot.
Among soigneurs in the European peloton (another French word, one that refers to professional riders generally as well as the pack during a race), Hendershot was at once the cool kid and the calculating elder. Other soigneurs envied the money he made and the cachet that came with the cash. Wherever he walked — through race crowds or at home in Belgium — people turned to catch a glimpse. Teams wanted him. Armstrong wanted him. Neal said he was "like a god to me" and called him "the best soigneur that ever was."
Hendershot, an American who lived in Belgium to be closer to the main cycling circuit, was a massage therapist, physical therapist and miracle worker. His laying-on of hands would bring an exhausted, aching rider to life. Eating at Hendershot's direction, sleeping according to his advice, a rider began each morning reborn. He came with all the secrets of a soigneur and an unexpected skill developed over the years. In Neal's words, Hendershot took to cycling's drug culture "like a duck to water." But his enthusiasm for and skills in chemistry would be remembered as his special talent.
Before speaking to me last year, Hendershot — who had retired from the sport in 1996, shortly after Armstrong's cancer diagnosis — had never told his story to a reporter. After all the years of silence, he seemed relieved to finally share it.
For most of a decade, in the 1980s and '90s, Hendershot sat in his makeshift laboratory, preparing for races. There he mixed, matched and mashed up drugs, always with one goal in mind: to make riders go faster.
The mad scientist conjured up what he called "weird concoctions" of substances like ephedrine, nicotine, highly concentrated caffeine, drugs that widen blood vessels, blood thinners and testosterone, often trying to find creative ways to give a rider an extra physical boost during a race. He'd pour the mix into tiny bottles and hand them to riders at the starting line. Other times, he'd inject them with it. He wasn't alone in this endeavor. Soigneurs all across Europe made homemade blends of potentially dangerous mixes and first drank or injected those potions into themselves. They were their own lab rats.
Hendershot, who had no formal medical or scientific training, knew a concoction was way off when he felt his heart beating so fast and so loud, it sounded like a runaway freight train. That wouldn't work for riders under extreme physical stress. He wanted "amped up," but not to the point of a heart attack.
It wasn't long before Hendershot tried his potions and pills on the riders, including Armstrong. When Armstrong turned professional after the 1992 Olympics, he signed a contract with Motorola, one of the two major American teams. Because Armstrong wanted the best soigneur, he was immediately paired with Hendershot. It was a match made in doping heaven. Both soigneur and rider were willing to go to the brink of danger.
"What we did was tread the fine line of dropping dead on your bike and winning," Hendershot said.
Hendershot said the riders on his teams had a choice about using drugs. They could "grab the ring or not." He said he didn't know a single professional cyclist who hadn't at least dabbled in doping. The sport was simply too difficult — and many times impossible, as was the three-week Tour de France — for riders who didn't rely on pharmaceutical help.
When Armstrong arrived at Motorola in 1992, a system that facilitated riders' drug use was firmly in place on the team — and most likely in the entire sport. Hendershot said he would take a list of drugs and bogus prescriptions for them to his local pharmacist in Hulste, Belgium, to get them filled and to obtain other drugs, too.
Cycling has been one of Belgium's most popular sports for generations, and the pharmacist didn't question Hendershot's request for such large quantities of drugs. In exchange, Hendershot would give the pharmacist a signed team jersey or all-access passes to big races. Then he would leave with bags filled with the blood booster EPO, human growth hormone, blood thinners, amphetamines, cortisone, painkillers and testosterone, a particularly popular drug he'd hand to riders "like candy."
By 1993, Armstrong was using all of those substances, as did many riders on the team, Hendershot said. He remembered Armstrong's attitude as being, "This is the stuff I take, this is part of what I do," and Armstrong joined the team's program without hesitation because everyone else seemed to be doing it.
"It was like eating team dinner," Hendershot said, adding that he had a hunch that virtually every person knew — doctors, soigneurs, riders, team managers, mechanics. He called the drug use casual and said he never had to hide any of it. After injecting the riders at a team hotel, he'd toss a trash bag filled with syringes and empty vials into the garbage can.
Although Hendershot said he never administered EPO or growth hormone to Armstrong, he did give them to other riders on the team and said he was aware that Armstrong was using those drugs. Hendershot said his wife had driven a stash of those two drugs from Belgium to one of the team's 1995 training camps in southern France.
Riders like Armstrong could get drugs several ways, Hendershot said — from him, from their personal doctors or a doctor who worked with the team, or by buying them over the counter. Each rider would take his drugs to Hendershot, who would administer them by mixing a potion for the rider to drink or inject, or by injecting them into IVs the rider would receive, based on the doctor's instructions. Sometimes, the drugs came in pill form, and Hendershot doled those out, too.
Hendershot was always worried that he was administering something that would hurt the cyclists — or even possibly kill them — especially when they injected the substances into their IVs or when their personal doctors would prepare concoctions for Hendershot to give. He was concerned that he would be culpable if anything ever went wrong. Even as he provided drugs to riders, Hendershot said, he told himself: "You're not a drug dealer. This isn't organized. This is no big deal."
He knew he was lying.
Hendershot rationalized the lie by saying the doping process was overseen by Max Testa, an Italian doctor who is still working in the sport and running a sports medicine clinic in Utah. In 2006, Testa told me that he gave his riders the instructions to use EPO but never administered drugs to those riders. In 2014, he said he didn't want to discuss anything about the cyclists he had worked with, to protect the privacy of his patients. Still, if drug use was not mandated by the team, it appeared to be at least quasi-official. Hendershot trusted Testa to make sure the riders were staying safe, believing that Testa — unlike other doctors in cycling — actually cared for the riders' health, and cared less about winning or money.
Hendershot, however, put it this way: A doctor who refused to give riders drugs wouldn't last in the sport.
Armstrong liked Testa so much that he moved to Italy to be near the doctor's office in Como, north of Milan. Not long after joining Motorola, Armstrong began living in Como during the racing season. He brought along his close friend Frankie Andreu, and in time several other riders joined them, including George Hincapie, a New Yorker, and Kevin Livingston, a Midwesterner. All became patients of Testa. All later became riders on Armstrong's Tour de France-winning United States Postal Service teams.
Hendershot said all those riders probably believed they were doing no wrong by doping. The definition of cheating was flexible in a sport replete with pharmacology: It's not cheating if everybody is doing it. Armstrong believed that to be the dead-solid truth. For him, there was no hesitation, no second-guessing, no rationalizing.
As Hendershot had done, Armstrong grabbed the ring.
It's June 2013, and Armstrong doesn't want to move, he has to. His sponsors have abandoned him, taking away an estimated $75 million in future earnings. He would owe more than $135 million if he lost every lawsuit in which he is a defendant. To "slow the burn rate," as he calls it, he has stopped renting a penthouse near Central Park in Manhattan and a house in Marfa, Tex. Next to go is this Austin estate, traded for a much more modest abode near downtown.
His former sponsors — including Oakley, Trek Bicycle Corporation, RadioShack and Nike — have left him scrambling for money. He considers them traitors. He says Trek's revenue was $100 million when he signed with the company and reached $1 billion in 2013.
"Who's responsible for that?" he asks, before cursing and saying, "Right here." He pokes himself in the chest with his right index finger. "I'm sorry, but that is true. Without me, none of that happens."
After his sponsors cast him aside, he tossed their gear. There's a chance you could catch a glimpse of one of his Dallas friends wearing Armstrong's custom-made yellow Nike sneakers, with "Lance" embroidered in small yellow block letters on the black tongues. A Goodwill outlet in Austin is supplied with his Nike clothes and Oakley sunglasses. The movers will have to contend with whatever brand-name gear is left in his garage: black Livestrong Nike caps, black Nike duffel bags with bright yellow swooshes, Oakley lenses and frames and a box of caps suggesting "Yes on Prop 15," a 2007 Texas bond plan for cancer research, prevention and education supported by Armstrong.
Armstrong loves this house. He loves its open spaces and floor-to-ceiling windows. He loves the lush landscaped yard where his children play soccer, and the crystalline pool (a "negative-edge pool, not an infinity pool, get it right," he said). Behind the house are rows of towering Italian cypresses.
He moved here in 2006 after winning a record seventh Tour de France. He once said the place was his safe house — inside it, "nobody's going to mess with me." Having eluded continual attempts to expose his doping, he could take a left down the main hallway, then a quick right, and disappear into his walk-in wine closet to grab a bottle of Tignanello and toast his good luck.
Seven years ago, he told his three children from his failed marriage — Luke, Grace and Isabelle — that they would graduate from high school while living in the house by the big oak tree. He owed them that. They had followed him from Texas to France to Spain countless times. At last they could plant some roots. "I promise," he said. "Dad's not moving again."
But now the movers are coming. It's June 6, 2013, five years before Luke's expected graduation. The next morning, a line of black trucks will pull into his driveway and out will spill workers in black short-sleeve shirts. The atmosphere is funereal. A week earlier, the movers emptied the 1,633-square-foot guesthouse, a minimansion, with its matching tan facade and burnt orange roof.
I return the next day to see those workers clear the main house. They take Armstrong's Tour trophies from their illuminated shelves, cover them with green bubble wrap and place them in blue boxes. In a box marked #64, one mover places a silver frame containing a 5x7 photograph of Armstrong's 2005 Discovery Channel team sitting at a dinner table after his seventh and final Tour victory. He, his teammates and his longtime team manager Johan Bruyneel are holding up seven fingers. A yellow rubber Livestrong bracelet hangs from each man's wrist. A table is littered with half-empty wineglasses. A former life.
Box 64 goes onto the truck with the rest. I follow the movers into the media room. Wearing white cotton gloves, they take down the seven yellow Tour leader's jerseys framed above the couch.
In the dark before dawn, Armstrong left the big house for good. At 4:15 a.m. on June 7, 2013, with his girlfriend, Anna Hansen, and his five children, he drove to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport for a commercial flight to Hawaii, where they would remain for the first part of the summer.
Armstrong tells me he didn't look back at the house he had built. He says sentiment has never been his thing. The move means only that part of his life has ended and another will begin. That's all it is, he says.
Several days later, only two of his possessions remained on his estate. One couldn't fit in the moving truck: a 1970 black Pontiac GTO convertible given him by the singer Sheryl Crow, with whom he had a very public romance that ended when he pedaled away just before she got cancer. The car, with its evocations of another Armstrong failure, carries a price tag of $70,000.
And, finally, left over in the living room of the guesthouse was a fully assembled drum kit. Just another piece of the man's discarded life. Oh beat the drum slowly and play the fife lowly, I thought while I looked at the set, lyrics from "Streets of Laredo," a song I know from my time working in Texas.
Take me to the valley, and lay the sod o'er me,
For I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong.

subset: commoncrawl


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Among non-Indian cricketers - Curtly Ambrose, Wasim Akram, Courtney Walsh, Adam Gilchrist, Brian Lara, Allan Donald, Waqar Younis, Steve Waugh and to an extent Shane Warne...
Just realised - all of them are from 90s mostly...
Among non-Indian cricketers - Curtly Ambrose, Wasim Akram, Courtney Walsh, Adam Gilchrist, Brian Lara, Allan Donald, Waqar Younis, Steve Waugh and to an extent Shane Warne...
Just realised - all of them are from 90s mostly...
"Cricket is an art. Like all arts it has a technical foundation. To enjoy it does not require technical knowledge, but analysis that is not technically based is mere impressionism."
- C.L.R. James
Yup, all 90s for me too. I am pretty sure it is because the packaging on TV improved so much, and we could connect with the on-field drama in a much more real, dramatic and fun way. Ambrose, Saqlain and Sachin are my favorites.
Saqlain because he was the only bowler I hated any of the Indian batsmen to get out to. It used to make me cross, and I especially detested Moin Khan yelling "Saqi" or a similarity all the time. Ambrose because of the awesome reactions, smiles and glint-in-his-eye when he got wickets. Sachin because of, well.
Last edited by harsh.ag; 18-11-2012 at 04:08 AM.
Sachin followed by Dravid, Sehwag, Steyn and Donald.
And smalishah's avatar is the most classy one by far Jan certainly echoes the sentiments of CW
Yeah we don't crap in the first world; most of us would actually have no idea what that was emanating from Ajmal's backside. Why isn't it roses and rainbows like what happens here? PEWS's retort to Ganeshran on Daemon's picture depicting Ajmal's excreta
Kallis, Gilly.
Now Steyn, Morkel.
Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.
Walt Whitman
Originally Posted by Axl Rose
RIP Craigos. A true CW legend. You will be missed.
Undoubtedly my favourite boxer.
Proud member of the Twenty20 is boring society
E-Mail - firstname.lastname@example.com
MSN - email@example.com
My first favourite cricketer was Michael Slater.
Mathew Sinclair for favourite ever though, comfortably. I supported him as a player with greater passion than I've supported any team in any sport, I think.
EDIT: Heh, just noticed the M.S. thing. Cool. My second most loathed cricketer ever is MS Dhoni though.
Last edited by Prince EWS; 18-11-2012 at 12:02 PM.
wow.....MS Dhoni is your second most loathed cricketer EVER?
Who is your most loathed cricketer ever?
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Paul Cooper
Greenway High Greenway, AR Class of 1949
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