Lance Armstrong.

[diddl]

What on earth is going on?

If he hasn´t failed a drug test, how can he be found guilty just because he can´t be bothered to fight any more?

Is it an admission of guilt?

If the USADA has evidence-where is it-why haven´t they produced it or is it all just rumour/hearsay?

[WidowWadman]

mayorquimby - I wouldn't call cycling a morally bankrupt sport - it has done a lot to clean up its act. At the time of LA's biggest successes, it probably was more so, and he's a major reason for that, even if he doesn't admit to that (yet)

You don't hear much about doping in football or tennis - is it because they don't dope, or is it because the testing is woeful?

The whole interview was self-serving shite. No real apology and utter disregard for the people he trampled over.

[AitchTwoOhOneTwo]

i'll never understand why people cheered him, he was always a scumbag. even when we didn't know he was cheating, he was still unsportsmanly and arrogant and the way he concentrated so hard on the tour de france while skipping the other races in the season was always effectively 'cheating'.

[PartTimeModel]

He used his reputation, boosted considerably by his 'victory' over cancer to back up his status and reputation, and to discredit anyone who tried to take him on. Plus he bullied anyone who tried to oppose him or who did not toe his line of lies. It's thoroughly despicable and disgusting behaviour.

He's only sorry he got caught. And now he dares to claim what he did was OK because 'everyone else was doing it' - what are you Lance? 4 years old?

Throughout his downfall, time and time again I've felt strong parallels between his behaviour and that of Jimmy Saville (and similar creeps). Using his fame and celebrity to cover up disgusting behaviour, and discredit anyone who dares to question his 'authority'. The sheer arrogance of their personalities!! The forcefulness against anyone who opposed or questioned them. He must be believed because he survived cancer/visited sick children/is famous/is a leader etc etc. Of course it's a different kind of harm, and hurt he caused, but he did harm people, he did hurt people, he did manipulate and control people and he used his celebrity & power as a forcefield of protection.

I'm amazed one body can contain the amount of arrogance that Armstrong (and Saville) must have and still function and be believed. Though of course those closes to them knew the truth - but the offenders were well protected by their strong and highly manipulated public persona. Even the press couldn't effectively break through and expose the truth (for so long).

It's also interesting that Lance chose the 'celebrity' confession with Oprah in an attempt, no doubt, to win sympathy and maximum coverage and perceived humility. And he did this over actually confessing and apologising to those closest to him, who supported him and believed him through thick and thin, and who will now be paying the personal price for their faith and belief in him.

Did he get paid by Oprah I wonder?

How can anyone believe a word this man says ever, when his whole career has been based on lies and intimidation. He lied re the drugs and I think he's lying when he says he's sorry.

[Viviennemary]

I wonder how much he was paid for his appearance on the Oprah prgramme. this is what it's all about, money. He wants to build some sort of new career writing a book or in the media. And this is his first step. He shouldn't be getting encouragement. That's my opinion. He certainly didn't get any sympathy from me. I never gave him a thought before but now I simply think who wants to hear from this conniving self-confessed cheat.

[Nancy66]

He always came across as being a very unpleasant man - way before the cheating allegations really snow-balled. It seemed the fact the was a cancer patient gave him licence to be a cunt.

He always came across as very aggressive, rude and with a horrible attitude to women.

I've seen clips of the interview with Oprah and he still seems so reluctant to accept any blame or show any true contrition.

I get the distinct feeling that he did the interview on the advice/orders of his: lawyers, agents and PR people who advised that it was the first step on his road to redemption.

[Nancy66]

he's regularly called his female accusers things like

'mad bitches'

'stupid sluts'

[VivaLeBeaver]

I do get that because everyone else was cheating/doping he felt he had to or he wouldn't have a hope in hell. I can kind of forgive that.

However I can't forgive the fact he seems to be such a nasty cunt.

[WidowWadman]

"I do get that because everyone else was cheating/doping he felt he had to or he wouldn't have a hope in hell. I can kind of forgive that."

It would be potentially forgiveable if

a) he hadn't been so instrumental in ensuring that it was that way
b) he hadn't lied about it for so long
c) he wouldn't still be lying about a)

[TessOfTheBaublevilles]

Apparently he wasn't paid.

This from the BBC website...

A spokeswoman for the Oprah show said that Armstrong had not been paid to appear and that Winfrey had been free to ask any question she wanted.

[TheOneWithTheHair]

Dh too wore a LiveStrong band for years. It went in the bin when the USADA report came out. He was a figurehead and a hero to so many and that hurts. I remember using him to ds1 as an example of successfully overcoming the odds. :(

Armstrong does not seem to have considered all the people who felt the same way at all.

[Zavi]

How awful for his kids to have to grow up with everybody knowing what a liar and a cheat their dad is. How mortifying for them!

I'm not impressed by his coming clean. He spent many years doping and denying it, he bullied his team mates into doping too, he even sued people who tried to expose his doping.

It's only now, with his back completely against the wall, that he is "coming clean".

He has zero credibility left.

I hope they will be able to award his 7 TdF titles to someone else. Someone who deserves it/them.

[coldinthesun]

He lied, cheated, became famous and made a fortune of it.

So now, even if he confesses, does free interviews and gets sued he STILL has some sort of career and a way of making money.

He owns a chain of very nice bike shops - all funded from his winnings of course - and will have that to fall back on. If he had been smart, he'll have put ownership of something in his wife's name too.

So he'll always be in a better position than any of the non-cheats he competed against, even after finding out.

He's ruins the dreams of people in the sport and fans who supported him. And STILL doesn't feel guilty about it as he's justified it all in his head.

It wasn't an apology. That takes remorse. He's only doing it cos he got caught.

In my book that just makes him a Grade A Cunt.

[AitchTwoOhOneTwo]

he was on the best of the best cocktails of drugs, he had team-mates who would have beaten him if they too had been on the best stuff. so no, he wasn't interested in a level playing field. he's just a straight-up cheat.

[ivykaty44]

There is an interesting article/interview with Nicole yesterday. Can't find her interview from yesterday with all the publicity that the idiot twat has now got this one has been written today

It does make me sick to think he has lied, cheated and is now going to make money from fraud and cheating.

A prison sentence would be more apt and then a ban on media coverage on him would be far more fitting

did he lie on oath which would be contempt of court?

[coldinthesun]

Holy Hell. Just reading an article on this, which has quotes from the interview:

uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/news/cycling-wetzel-thankful-never-met-jerk-090941739.html

He will not get the same treatment as he dished out. He can't even remember who he sued as he sued so many!

[EldritchCleavage]

The cheating isn't actually the worst of it.

The bullying-no, the oppression of others in this sport, the gaslighting and vindictiveness, the active promotion of a whole industry of cheating and attempts to compromise the ruling body and anti-doping structure, that's the worst of it.

And Oprah was poor. I'd like to see Paxman get a go at Armstrong.

[LittleAbruzzenBear]

I had no idea he was like that towards women. Not nice.

[LittleAbruzzenBear]

I fully understand why the French never liked him now. I always assumed it was just the being American that they didn't like, but I was wrong. They knew. Thinking about it, like the last Tour, for example, Thomas Voeckler (whom I really like) would win a very difficult stage and you would see it hurting him as he was riding and he was giving everything, but the next day, he would (understandably) be at the back of the pelaton and knackered. Lance would ride the same every day.