Because of his character, because of his comeback from cancer, Lance believed in his bones that, if he worked hard, he was entitled to win every single race. Now, Lance is one hell of a bike racer, Edgar or no Edgar. But here he was wrong, because sports don't work that way. The reason we love them—the reason I got involved in the first place—is that they're unpredictable, surprising, human. To me, that turned out to be Lance's problem: he couldn't let go of this idea that he was destined to be a champion, and he couldn't let go of the power that allowed him to control his performance so precisely. It's the oldest paradox: Lance could withstand just about anything, but he couldn't withstand the possibility of losing. And that, in my opinion, is not normal.
(Tyler Hamilton and Daniel Coyle, The Secret Race: Inside the Hidden World of the Tour de France [New York: Bantam Books Trade Paperbacks, 2013], 146 [footnote omitted])
