
There’s this trick in screenwriting/storytelling called “Saving the Cat” in which you have your protagonist do something good, say on page fifteen or so of your screenplay, that way when the movie ends, and your character beats back the bad guys, the audience will be glad for him, and feel contentment about the story they just experienced. It’s true in life too. It was troubling today, then, to see Alberto Contador bashing his teammate Lance Armstrong in a press conference in Spain. Contador won the Tour de France last week, and was supported by Team Astana, which had two other overall contenders in Levi Leipheimer and Armstrong. Armstrong, perhaps the crowd favorite, did have a realistic shot at winning his 8th Tour de France, but it wasn’t that realistic. Armstrong is now 37, more than ten years older than Contador. Contador proved aggressive from the start, breaking away from his own team on the first climb and gaining 8 seconds on Armstrong. This was not a move the team supported, but Contador was in it to win, and let everybody know it from the beginning. But cycling is a team sport. You need the other men on your team to [...]










