Cycling

Lance Armstrong and his probable loss of his seven Tour de France titles is the topic most everyone is talking about Friday morning. Everyone, that is, except the International Cycling Union (UCI), which released a statement Friday saying it would have nothing to say about Armstrong and the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency's decision to strip him of the titles until hearing from the USADA personally. “The UCI recognizes that USADA is reported as saying that it will strip Mr. Armstrong of all results from 1998 onwards in addition to imposing a lifetime ban from participating in any sport which recognizes the World Anti-Doping Code,” the Switzerland-based organization said, noting the "USADA has claimed jurisdiction in the case.

With Lance Armstrong likely to be stripped of his seven Tour de France titles, the keepers of the record books face this question: Who should get them? The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency announced Friday that it was taking away the victories, though the endgame remained unclear because Armstrong's attorneys contend that only the sport's governing body, the International Cycling Union, has that authority. In any case, throwing out the record books would be far easier than to trying to rewrite them.

Lance Armstrong is giving up his fight against the latest wave of charges by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, which will likely rule that the seven-time Tour de France winner should be banned from cycling for life and stripped of his titles. Armstrong, who never tested positive during his career, has denied using performance-enhancing drugs. Before retiring last year, the cyclist won the sport's ultimate contest from 1999 to 2005. “There comes a point in every man's life when he has to say, 'Enough is enough.' For me, that time is now,” Armstrong said in a statement released on his website.

Like many people, filmmaker David Koepp believes most movies are too long. "Premium Rush," a 91-minute look at New York City bicycle messengers, is Koepp's answer to the problem. "I wanted to do something contained, like 'Panic Room,'" said Koepp, who wrote that 2002 Jodie Foster thriller along with the Tobey Maguire "Spider-Man" and "Jurassic Park. " "And I am obsessed with maps, so I wanted to do a movie where a guy has to get from point A to point B in a limited period of time.

The bootleg DVD hawkers, the panhandlers and the pregnant women with toddlers pulling on their arms had all gone home. The TV went off, and it was just me, the attendant and a young man with a duffel bag full of clothes. I was at a 24-hour coin laundry in Westlake trying to figure out why on earth anyone would do laundry in the middle of the night. I'd been assured the parking lot would be closed and only people with laundry would be admitted. We were mere blocks from what used to be big bad MacArthur Park, site of a notorious "open-air drug bazaar," as authorities liked to call it during the crack epidemic.

Desert America Boom and Bust in the New "New West" Rubén Martínez Metropolitan Books: 337 pp., $28 In his new book "Desert America: Boom and Bust in the New 'New West,'" Los Angeles writer Rubén Martínez leaves the city behind for the beauty and desolation of the dry, sparsely populated corners of what he calls the "inner West. " He alights in northern New Mexico, a land of pueblos and piñon trees, of sweeping vistas and old adobes. Many an adventurer and seeker has come to this land before him: Spanish conquistadors, American artists, New Age spiritualists, clipboard-toting Realtors.

- Toward the end of a recent World Cup mountain bike race, Georgia Gould was leading until her leg cramped up and she was overtaken. In another Cup race, she had a flat tire, allowing two riders behind her to speed past and leave her in their dust. On Saturday in the London Olympics, Gould, of Fort Collins, Colo., was determined that no last-minute problem was going to knock her out of the third-place position she had maintained through most of the 4.7-kilometer race. "I definitely had that in mind.

With apologies to Disneyland, Disney World and any other Disney enterprise, the Olympic Velodrome was the happiest place on Earth on Friday. And not because Kobe Bryant was in the crowd. The British men's track cycling pursuit team successfully defended its 2008 Olympic gold medal, soundly beating the silver medalists from Australia and the bronze-medal bikers from New Zealand. Britain's Victoria Pendleton won the women's keirin gold medal. She held off a late surge from China's Guo Shuang by no more than the width of her bike tire.

LONDON -- Jennie Reed got her silver medal in the women's team pursuit Saturday. What she did not get was a chance to stand on the podium. Each team in this particular cycling event has four members, but uses only three at a time. Because the U.S. women were underdogs to the likes of Great Britain, Australia and Canada, they needed to keep fresh legs on the track. So after Reed teamed with Sarah Hammer and Dotsie Bausch to edge Australia in the first round, coaches replaced her with another American -- Lauren Tamayo -- for the gold-medal race.

LONDON -- Cyclist Kristin Armstrong, who will turn 39 in 10 days, looked formidable Wednesday afternoon, successfully defending her Olympic gold in the individual time trial event. She had come out of retirement to compete in the 2012 Games, but her participation seemed in question after she suffered a broken collarbone in late May. Armstrong crashed on a turn during a race in her hometown of Boise, Idaho, and managed to get up to finish the stage. Here, she owned the podium with an impressive performance, recording a time of 37 minutes, 34.82 seconds, winning by 15.47 seconds.