Michael Creed: Why I never doped and my future in the sport

By: Daniel Benson, Cycling News

There’s an American hero in town and he’s lighting up a bike race with a performance soaked in everything that makes racing so exciting. It’s a ride of panache, guts, grace and a pure bloody-mindedness that says, today I’m going to leave everything out on the road.

This isn’t Lance Armstrong winning one of his seven Tours, nor Greg LeMond trailblazing through Europe as he skittles through the opposition.

Instead, a second-year professional is dazzling the crowd at the Barclay’s Global Investors Grand Prix in San Francisco on a sunny summer’s day in 2005. He won’t win the race and despite his antics he’s about to be swallowed up by a hungry bunch. In fact by the end of the day a big DNF will sit next to his name in the results sheet. Yet for now, for the briefest of moments, he and the thousands of fans on Fillmore Hill don’t care. They’re cheering as if he’s dropped everyone on the Tourmalet, soared away from Marco Pantani or smashed Laurent Fignon in a time trial.

Five years later, the summer of 2010, and the same rider picks up the phone in his home in Colorado Springs. “So, do you want me to write the truth or do you want me to write what you want people to think about you?” I ask.

He’s not yet had his morning coffee and his gravelled voice trickles through the receiver. “Shit man, you can’t give me that as your first question. Come on, dude. Come on.”

We’re back to that summer’s day in 2005, and Mike Creed stops at the top of the Fillmore Hill and the crowd reach fever pitch. He unclips, gets off his bike and in the same movement lifts his frame above his head. The race is a circuit of 12 miles covered 10 times and for the last three laps, Creed, who knows the game is up, has pulled the same stunt.

“Go Creed. Go Creed,” they chant.

Finish story here.