@Niels, "broken in half" in what way? Like the aluminum stanchion was separated from the body of the strut or the carbon strut had broken in half? I have what I'd call an above average number of experiences with Lefty strut systems and I've seen corrosion, leaking (air and oil), and various other issues but I've yet to see a proper broken one. Did he ship his bike to the Cape Epic? How was it packaged? How was it transported? Did it actually break while riding or did it break in shipping and then fail while riding?
I mean, on the one hand, everything breaks. But without context, it just sounds like one of those stories. Like the Fox 40 lowers I've seen that were twisted. I mean, I've seen hundreds of Fox 40s that weren't twisted, and the reason these lowers twisted was an insane crash that also wrote off a wheel and a handlebar. But I can certainly say, without context, that I've seen twisted Fox 40 lowers if that makes sense?
It's like your friend's Lefty struts. What generation? Were they updated? Who worked on them? I've seen so much sh*t come out of bike shops that should be sending suspension products to service centers - locally and from other places - that saying they were serviced before departure doesn't say anything. My Lefty 2.0 had an issue with an air leak but there was an update kit they provided for free that actually significantly improved performance at the same time. But you could only get that upgrade kit if your fork was being serviced at a Lefty service center. Maybe the struts were serviced at a Lefty service center and maybe there were bad seal kits, or the center did poor work, or whatever - not saying it's not possible. But I do think these conversations require more context.
In general - all brands - riders do a sh*t job of looking after their suspension. Like folks will have a fork with so much stiction they're having to under-pressurize it by 10, 15, 20psi to achieve say, and then instead of getting it serviced they'll buy a carbon OneUp bar to dampen vibrations. There are certainly some performance forks and shocks that are less reliable than others but I've read plenty of rants on the internet where I would have loved to jump in with some context because I knew the rider/product in question and folks tend to leave out important details.
For example, more than one rider complaining about their shock blowing up prematurely after a service, where in fact the frame bearings were all semi-seized which puts tons of extra loads into the shock it isn't designed for.