The Lance Armstrong interview: What’s your take?

January 18, 2013 • Posted by: Michael McKisson

Lance Armstrong signs autographs during a Radioshack training camp in Tucson.

Lance Armstrong finally admitted to what many people suspected. Armstrong used banned drugs and blood transfusions during each of his seven titles.

In the interview he said he didn’t believe he wasn’t cheating because he didn’t believe he was getting a leg up on his competition. The insinuation is that everyone else was using it at the time and that he didn’t think it was possible to win the Tour de France without using performance enhancing drugs.

The interview touched on how he viciously attacked people who tried to tell the truth about his doping.

“To be honest, Oprah, we sued so many people,” Armstrong said. “It’s a guy who expected to get whatever he wanted and control every outcome. It’s inexcusable.”

He said he has been reaching out to the people he attacked to try to make amends.

Did you watch the interview? Anything surprise you about the interview? Leave a comment. You can watch part one here. Check out the Storify below more reactions around the internet.

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5 comments

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Frank Tellez

Saw the interview today. Looks like he did it. Sad. Now the sport is rife with it. Still fun to watch and learn from tho.

Red Star

On some level Red Star doesn't care about the doping, PED, the bullying, creepy USADA, creepy and sly enablers, the longevity of the con. What bothers Red Star is that for so long so many people looked outside themselves for a hero rather than being their own hero. Can you find yourself in the debris a con artist leaves behind?

Bobroberto

Most annoying is that Lance made, depending on who you listen to, from 40 to 100+ million bucks form a rigged game.It's all about the money and marketing a fake hero. He came across as not caring all that much since he's got all the money, for now. Here's hoping he's made penniless from the forthcoming avalanche of legal hassles. It's the American way. If he does compete publicly again, I can't imagine he will be welcomed and may create more problems just showing up. At least the old guys like Coppi admitted freely to drug use, but only when necessary, and that was most of the time.

silverpedals

His comments seemed off, as if he doesn't get the magnitude of what he did to people. Doping is one thing, but bullying and suing people who were telling the truth is much much worse. What he said about and to Betsy Andreu and Emma O'Reilly is incredible. Maybe he's a sociopath who puts fame, fortune and success way above relationships

Martha Retallick

Back in the 1990s, I worked in a Tucson bike shop. I can remember my boss commenting on an NPR interview with Armstrong. The boss' take: "He's not very bright." Boss then went on an extended romp through all of the things Armstrong said. Let's just say that the boss was not impressed with Armstrong's ability to string a coherent sentence together. I hope this doesn't rub anyone the wrong way, but when you're not terribly bright, you're more vulnerable to things that smarter people would stay away from. Being unable to resist the siren song of doping being one of those things.