Lance Edward Armstrong (né Gunderson; born September 18, 1971) is an American former professional road racing cyclist. He achieved international fame for winning the Tour de France a record seven consecutive times from 1999 to 2005, but was stripped of his titles in 2012 after an investigation into doping allegations found that Armstrong used performance-enhancing drugs over his career. Armstrong has been banned for life from all sanctioned bicycling events since 2012, though he retired from professional cycling in 2011.
At age 16, Armstrong began competing as a triathlete and was a national sprint-course triathlon champion in 1989 and 1990. In 1992, he began his career as a professional cyclist with the Motorola team. Armstrong had success between 1993 and 1996 with the World Championship in 1993, the Clásica de San Sebastián in 1995, Tour DuPont in 1995 and 1996, and a handful of stage victories in Europe, including stage 8 of the 1993 Tour de France and stage 18 of the 1995 Tour de France. In 1996, he was diagnosed with a potentially fatal metastatic testicular cancer. After recovering, Armstrong founded the Lance Armstrong Foundation (now the Livestrong Foundation) to assist other cancer survivors.
Returning to cycling in 1998, Armstrong was a member of the US Postal/Discovery team between 1998 and 2005 when he won his seven Tour de France titles. Armstrong retired from racing at the end of the 2005 Tour de France, but returned to competitive cycling with the Astana team in January 2009, finishing third in the 2009 Tour de France later that year. Between 2010 and 2011, he raced with Team Radio Shack and retired for a second time in 2011.
Armstrong began to be accused of doping after winning the 1999 Tour de France, allegations that he denied for more than a decade. In 2012, a United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) investigation concluded that Armstrong had used performance-enhancing drugs over the course of his career and called him the ringleader of "the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen". Armstrong professed his innocence but chose not to contest the charges, citing the potential toll on his family. He received a lifetime ban from all sports that follow the World Anti-Doping Code, ending Armstrong's competitive cycling career. The International Cycling Union (UCI) upheld USADA's decision and decided that his stripped wins would not be allocated to other riders. In January 2013, Armstrong publicly admitted his involvement in doping. In April 2018, Armstrong settled a civil lawsuit with the United States Department of Justice and agreed to pay US$5 million to the U.S. government after whistleblower proceedings were commenced by Floyd Landis, a former team member.
Early life
Armstrong was born Lance Edward Gunderson on September 18, 1971, at Methodist Hospital in Richardson, Texas. His mother, Linda Armstrong Kelly (née: Gayle Mooneyham), grew up in Oak Cliff. Armstrong was named after Lance Rentzel, a Dallas Cowboys wide receiver. His parents divorced in 1973 when Lance was two, and when his mother remarried Terry Keith Armstrong, Lance took his stepfather's surname. He attended Plano East Senior High School.
Career
Early career
In the 1987–1988 Tri-Fed/Texas ("Tri-Fed" was the former name of USA Triathlon), Armstrong was ranked the number-one triathlete in the 19-and-under group; second place was Chann McRae, who became a US Postal Service cycling teammate and the 2002 USPRO national champion. Armstrong's total points in 1987 as an amateur were better than those of five professionals ranked higher than he was that year. At 16, Lance Armstrong became a professional triathlete and became national sprint-course triathlon champion in 1989 and 1990 at 18 and 19, respectively.
Motorola: 1992–96
In 1992, Armstrong turned professional with the Motorola Cycling Team, the successor of 7-Eleven team. In 1993, he won 10 one-day events and stage races, but his breakthrough victory was the World Road Race Championship held in Norway. Before his World Championships win, Armstrong took his first win at the Tour de France, in the stage from Châlons-sur-Marne to Verdun. He was 97th in the general classification when he retired after stage 12. Armstrong collected the Thrift Drug Triple Crown of Cycling: the Thrift Drug Classic in Pittsburgh, the K-Mart West Virginia Classic, and the CoreStates USPRO national championship in Philadelphia. He is alleged by another cyclist competing in the CoreStates Road Race to have bribed that cyclist so that he would not compete with Armstrong for the win.
In 1994, Armstrong again won the Thrift Drug Classic and came second in the Tour DuPont in the United States. His successes in Europe occurred when he placed second in Liège–Bastogne–Liège and the Clásica de San Sebastián, where just two years before, Armstrong had finished in last place at his first all-pro event in Europe. He finished the year strongly at the World Championships in Agrigento, finishing in seventh place less than a minute behind winner Luc Leblanc.
In a 2016 speech to University of Colorado, Boulder professor Roger A. Pielke Jr.'s Introduction to Sports Governance class, Armstrong stated that he began doping in "late spring of 1995".
Armstrong won the Clásica de San Sebastián in 1995, followed by an overall victory in the penultimate Tour DuPont and a handful of stage victories in Europe, including the stage to Limoges in the Tour de France, three days after the death of his teammate Fabio Casartelli, who crashed on the descent of the Col de Portet d'Aspet on the 15th stage. After winning the stage, Armstrong pointed to the sky in honor of Casartelli.
Armstrong's successes were much the same in 1996. He became the first American to win La Flèche Wallonne and again won the Tour DuPont. However, Armstrong was able to compete for only five days in the Tour de France. In the 1996 Olympic Games, he finished sixth in the time trial and twelfth in the road race. In August 1996, following the Leeds Classic, Armstrong signed a two-year, $2 million deal with the French Cofidis Cycling Team. Joining him in signing contracts with the French team were teammates Frankie Andreu and Laurent Madouas. Two months later, Armstrong was diagnosed with advanced testicular cancer.
Cancer diagnosis, treatment, and recovery
On October 2, 1996, at the age of 25, Armstrong was diagnosed with stage three (advanced) testicular cancer (embryonal carcinoma). The cancer had spread to his lymph nodes, lungs, brain, and abdomen. Armstrong visited urologist Jim Reeves in Austin, Texas, for diagnosis of his symptoms, including a headache, blurred vision, coughing up blood, and a swollen testicle. The next day, Armstrong had an orchiectomy to remove the diseased testicle. When Reeves was asked in a later interview what he thought Armstrong's chances of survival were, Reeves said, "Almost none. We told Lance initially 20 to 50% chance, mainly to give him hope. But with the kind of cancer he had, with the X-rays, the blood tests, almost no hope."
After receiving a letter from Steven Wolff, an oncologist at Vanderbilt University, Armstrong went to the Indiana University medical center in Indianapolis and decided to receive the rest of his treatment there. The standard treatment for Armstrong's cancer was a "cocktail" of the drugs bleomycin, etoposide, and cisplatin (or Platinol) (BEP). The first chemotherapy cycle that Armstrong underwent included BEP, but for the three remaining cycles, he was given an alternative, vinblastine etoposide, ifosfamide, and cisplatin (VIP), to avoid lung toxicity associated with bleomycin. Armstrong credited this with saving his cycling career. At Indiana University, Lawrence Einhorn had pioneered the use of cisplatin to treat testicular cancer. Armstrong's primary oncologist there was Craig Nichols. On October 25, his brain lesions, which were found to contain extensive necrosis, were surgically removed by Scott A. Shapiro, a professor of neurosurgery at Indiana University.
Armstrong's final chemotherapy treatment took place on December 13, 1996. In January 1997, Armstrong unexpectedly appeared at the first training camp of the Cofidis team at Lille, France, riding 100 km (62 mi) with his new teammates before returning to the United States. In February 1997, he was declared cancer-free. In October, Cofidis announced that his contract would not be extended, after negotiations broke down over a new deal. A former boss at Subaru Montgomery offered him a contract with the US Postal team at a salary of $200,000 a year. By January 1998, Armstrong was engaged in serious training for racing, moving to Europe with the team.
US Postal/Discovery: 1998–2005
Before his cancer treatment, Armstrong had participated in four Tour de France races, winning two stages. In 1993, he won the eighth stage and in 1995; he took stage 18 which he dedicated to teammate Fabio Casartelli who had crashed and died on stage 15. Armstrong dropped out of the 1996 Tour after the fifth stage after becoming ill, a few months before his cancer diagnosis.
Armstrong's cycling comeback began in 1998. He entered the 1998 edition of Paris–Nice but could not compete at elite level and abandoned the race. Armstrong and his fiancée then left Europe and returned to Texas where he contemplated retirement. Not long after returning to the United States, Armstrong entered seclusion near Beech Mountain and Boone, North Carolina with former Tour de France rider Bob Roll as well as Chris Carmichael and trained in the Appalachian Mountains. In May 1998, Armstrong held his second charity race for cancer research in Austin, Texas: The Race for the Roses. Greg LeMond, Irish cycling legend Sean Kelly, and five time Tour champion Miguel Induráin were the most important cyclists at the event. LeMond said it was a good reason to get cyclists together, that life does not always deal the cards out equally, that no one could know if Armstrong would get back to the highest level, and that Armstrong might conceivably retire the following year. During an interview, Armstrong said the rider he admired most was Laurent Jalabert, saying that when he was riding well, he was the fiercest competitor in the bunch.
Armstrong then entered and won the Tour of Luxembourg. During the 1998 Vuelta a España Armstrong shocked the cycling world by finishing in the top five during one ITT, the top 10 in another and for the most part staying with the GC contenders in the mountains en route to finishing fourth overall. His credibility as a threat was confirmed when he finished fourth in both the road race and time trial at the World Championships. As a result of these efforts, Armstrong finished third in the voting for the Vélo d'Or. In 1999, he won the Tour de France, including four stages. Armstrong beat the second place rider, Alex Zülle, by 7 minutes 37 seconds. However, the absence of Jan Ullrich (injury) and Marco Pantani (drug allegations) meant Armstrong had not yet proven himself against the biggest names in the sport. Stage wins included the prologue, stage eight, an individual time trial in Metz, an Alpine stage on stage nine, and the second individual time trial on stage 19.
In 2000, Ullrich and Pantani returned to challenge Armstrong. The race began a six-year rivalry between Ullrich and Armstrong and ended in victory for Armstrong by 6 minutes 2 seconds over Ullrich. Armstrong took one stage in the 2000 Tour, the second individual time trial on stage 19. At the Summer Olympics 2000, Armstrong raced to third place in the Men's road time trial. In 2013, he was stripped of the bronze medal and third place title by the IOC after he was found guilty of doping. In September that year, Armstrong returned his medal to Olympic officials.
In 2001, Armstrong again took top honors at the Tour de France, beating Ullrich by 6 minutes 44 seconds. In 2002, Ullrich did not participate due to suspension, and Armstrong won by seven minutes over Joseba Beloki. During stage eleven and twelve of this Tour is when the race was won as US Postal had Vuelta champ Roberto Heras lead Armstrong up both climbs, breaking the peloton in the process. Then, when Heras' work was done, Armstrong took off to claim the stage wins only having to contend with Beloki.
The pattern returned in 2003, Armstrong taking first place and Ullrich second. Only a minute and a second separated the two at the end of the final day in Paris. U.S. Postal won the team time trial on stage 4, and on stage 9, Armstrong nearly crashed out of the Tour while defending the yellow jersey. He was less than a minute ahead of Beloki and Alexander Vinokourov was on a solo attack threatening to overtake Armstrong in the standings. While traversing the Côte de la Rochette Beloki crashed violently and hard, ending his Tour and sending him to the hospital with serious injuries. Armstrong narrowly avoided the same fate by reacting in time to avoid Beloki, but to do so he went off the road and ended up on a foot trail which led downhill through a field. He survived upright on his bike nearly to the end, at which time he picked it up and carried it the rest of the way to the road at the bottom of the hairpin turn, essentially losing no time as a result. He could have been fined or penalized for taking a shortcut, but it was deemed unintentional. Armstrong maintained a gap of only +0:21 over Vinokourov, but Ullrich was emerging as the most likely rider to overthrow Armstrong. Armstrong then took stage 15—despite having been knocked off on the ascent to Luz Ardiden, the final climb—when a spectator's bag caught his right handlebar. Ullrich waited for him, which brought Ullrich fair-play honors.
In 2004, Armstrong finished first, 6 minutes 19 seconds ahead of German Andreas Klöden. Ullrich was fourth, a further 2 minutes 31 seconds behind. Armstrong won a personal-best five individual stages, plus the team time trial. He became the first biker since Gino Bartali in 1948 to win three consecutive mountain stages; 15, 16, and 17. The individual time trial on stage 16 up Alpe d'Huez was won in style by Armstrong as he passed Ivan Basso on the way despite having set out two minutes after the Italian. He won sprint finishes from Basso in stages 13 and 15 and made up a significant gap in the last 250 m to nip Klöden at the line in stage 17. He won the final individual time trial, stage 19, to complete his personal record of stage wins.
In 2005, Armstrong was beaten by American David Zabriskie in the stage 1 time trial by two seconds, despite having passed Ullrich on the road. His Discovery Channel team won the team time trial, while Armstrong won the final individual time trial. In the mountain stages, Armstrong's lead was attacked multiple times mostly by Ivan Basso, but also by T-mobile leaders Jan Ullrich, Andreas Klöden and Alexandre Vinokourov and former teammate Levi Leipheimer. But still, the American champion handled them well, maintained his lead and, on some occasions, increased it. To complete his record-breaking feat, he crossed the line on the Champs-Élysées on July 24 to win his seventh consecutive Tour, finishing 4m 40s ahead of Basso, with Ullrich third. Another record achieved that year was that Armstrong completed the tour at the highest pace in the race's history: his average speed over the whole tour was 41.7 km/h (26 mph). In 2005, Armstrong announced he would retire after the 2005 Tour de France, citing his desire to spend more time with his family and his foundation. During his retirement, Armstrong diverted his attention away from the happenings in professional cycling; however whilst at a conference, in 2008, Armstrong saw Carlos Sastre's win on Alpe d'Huez and "felt a pang".
Comeback
Astana Pro Team: 2009
On September 9, 2008, Armstrong announced that he would return to pro cycling with the express goal of participating in the 2009 Tour de France. VeloNews reported that Armstrong would race for no salary or bonuses and would post his internally tested blood results online.
Australian ABC radio reported on September 24, 2008, that Armstrong would compete in the UCI Tour Down Under through Adelaide and surrounding areas in January 2009. UCI rules say a cyclist has to be in an anti-doping program for six months before an event, but UCI allowed Armstrong to compete. He had to retire from the 2009 Vuelta a Castilla y León during the first stage after crashing in a rider pileup in Baltanás, Spain, and breaking his collarbone. Armstrong flew back to Austin, Texas, for corrective surgery, which was successful, and was back training on a bicycle within four days of his operation.
On April 10, 2009, a controversy emerged between the French anti-doping agency AFLD and Armstrong and his team manager, Johan Bruyneel, stemming from a March 17, 2009, encounter with an AFLD anti-doping official who visited Armstrong after a training ride in Beaulieu-sur-Mer. When the official arrived, Armstrong claims he asked—and was granted—permission to take a shower while Bruyneel checked the official's credentials. In late April, the AFLD cleared Armstrong of any wrongdoing. He returned to racing after his collarbone injury at the Tour of the Gila in New Mexico on April 29.
On July 7, in the fourth stage of the 2009 Tour de France, Armstrong narrowly failed to win the yellow jersey after his Astana team won the team time trial. His Astana team won the 39 km lap of Montpellier but Armstrong ended up just over two tenths of a second (0.22) outside Fabian Cancellara's overall lead. Armstrong finished the 2009 Tour de France on the podium in third place. The only riders able to drop him were Andy Schleck who was able to defeat him by +1:13 and his own Astana teammate Alberto Contador, who won the Tour by more than four minutes over Schleck.
Team RadioShack: 2010–11
On July 21, 2009, Armstrong announced that he would return to the Tour de France in 2010. RadioShack was named as the main sponsor for Armstrong's 2010 team, named Team RadioShack. He made his 2010 season debut at the Tour Down Under, where Armstrong finished 25th out of the 127 riders who completed the race. He made his European season debut at the 2010 Vuelta a Murcia, finishing in seventh place overall. Armstrong was also set to compete in several classics such as the Milan–San Remo, Amstel Gold Race, Liège–Bastogne–Liège, and the Tour of Flanders, but bouts with gastroenteritis forced his withdrawal from three of the four races.
Armstrong returned to the United States in mid-April to compete in the Tour of Gila and May's Tour of California, both as preparation for the Tour de France. However, he crashed outside Visalia early in stage 5 of the Tour of California and had to withdraw from the race. He showed fine shape after recovering from the Tour of California crash, placing second in the Tour of Switzerland and third in the Tour of Luxembourg.
On June 28, Armstrong announced via Twitter that the 2010 edition would be his final Tour de France. Armstrong put in an impressive performance in the Tour's prologue time trial, finishing fourth. Only time trial specialists were able to better Armstrong's time and he was the highest placed of the GC contenders with a young, relatively unknown rider, Geraint Thomas, finishing one second behind him and Contador four seconds slower. In all eight of Armstrong's Tours since his comeback in 1999 he always had the requisite good luck early in the Tour and never got involved in crashes or mechanicals, which could cost him serious time. In 2010 his luck ran out early as he lost serious time due to the aftermath and peloton splits caused by a crash on stage 3, and then another crash on stage 8. He rallied for the brutal Pyrenean stage 16, working as a key player in a successful break that included teammate Chris Horner. He finished his last tour in 23rd place, 39 minutes 20 seconds behind former winner Alberto Contador. He was also a key rider in helping Team RadioShack win the team competition, beating Caisse d'Epargne by 9 minutes, 15 seconds.
In October, he announced the end of his international career after the Tour Down Under in January 2011. He stated that after January 2011, he will race only in the U.S. with the Radioshack domestic team.
On February 16, 2011, Armstrong announced his retirement from competitive cycling "for good" while still facing a US federal investigation into doping allegations.
Collaboration of sponsors
Armstrong improved the support behind his well-funded teams, asking sponsors and suppliers to contribute and act as part of the team. For example, rather than having the frame, handlebars, and tires designed and developed by separate companies with little interaction, his teams adopted a Formula One relationship with sponsors and suppliers named "F-One", taking full advantage of the combined resources of several organizations working in close communication. The team, Trek, Nike, AMD, Bontrager (a Trek company), Shimano, Sram, Giro, and Oakley, collaborated for an array of products.
Doping allegations, investigation, and confession
For much of his career, Armstrong faced persistent allegations of doping. He denied all such allegations until January 2013, often claiming that he never had any positive test in the drug tests he had taken over his cycling career.
Armstrong has been criticized for his disagreements with outspoken opponents of doping such as Paul Kimmage and Christophe Bassons. Bassons was a rider for Festina at the time of the Festina affair and was widely reported by teammates as being the only rider on the team not to be taking performance-enhancing drugs. Bassons wrote a number of articles for a French newspaper during the 1999 Tour de France which made references to doping in the peloton. Subsequently, Armstrong had an altercation with Bassons during the 1999 Tour de France where Bassons said Armstrong rode up alongside on the Alpe d'Huez stage to tell him "it was a mistake to speak out the way I (Bassons) do and he (Armstrong) asked why I was doing it. I told him that I'm thinking of the next generation of riders. Then he said 'Why don't you leave, then?'".
Armstrong later confirmed the story, stating on the main evening news on TF1, a national television station: "His accusations aren't good for cycling, for his team, for me, for anybody. If he thinks cycling works like that, he's wrong and he would be better off going home." Kimmage, a professional cyclist in the 1980s who later became a sports journalist, referred to Armstrong as a "cancer in cycling". He also asked Armstrong questions in relation to his "admiration for dopers" at a press conference at the Tour of California in 2009, provoking a scathing reaction from Armstrong. This spat continued and is exemplified by Kimmage's articles in The Irish Independent.
Armstrong continued to deny the use of illegal performance-enhancing drugs for four more years, describing himself as the most tested athlete in the world. From his return to cycling in the fall of 2008 through March 2009, Armstrong claimed to have submitted to 24 unannounced drug tests by various anti-doping authorities.
Working with Michele Ferrari
Armstrong was criticized for working with controversial trainer Michele Ferrari. Ferrari claimed that he was introduced to Lance by Eddy Merckx in 1995. Greg LeMond described himself as "devastated" on hearing of them working together, while Tour de France organizer Jean-Marie Leblanc said, "I am not happy the two names are mixed." Following Ferrari's later-overturned conviction for "sporting fraud" and "abuse of the medical profession", Armstrong claimed that he suspended his professional relationship with Ferrari, saying that he had "zero tolerance for anyone convicted of using or facilitating the use of performance-enhancing drugs" and denying that Ferrari had ever "suggested, prescribed or provided me with any performance-enhancing drugs".
Though Ferrari was banned from practicing medicine with cyclists by the Italian Cycling Federation, according to Italian law enforcement authorities, Armstrong met with Ferrari as late as 2010 in a country outside Italy. According to Cycling News, "USADA reveals an intimate role played by Dr. Michele Ferrari in masterminding Armstrong's Tour de France success". According to the USADA report, Armstrong paid Ferrari over $1 million from 1996 to 2006, countering Armstrong's claim that he severed his professional relationship with Ferrari in 2004. The report also includes numerous eyewitness accounts of Ferrari injecting Armstrong with EPO on a number of occasions.
L.A. Confidentiel: 2004
In 2004, reporters Pierre Ballester and David Walsh published a book alleging Armstrong had used performance-enhancing drugs (L.A. Confidentiel – Les secrets de Lance Armstrong). Another figure in the book, Steve Swart, claims he and other riders, including Armstrong, began using drugs in 1995 while members of the Motorola team, a claim denied by other team members.
Among the allegations in the book were claims by Armstrong's former soigneur Emma O'Reilly that a backdated prescription for cortisone had been produced in 1999 to avoid a positive test. A 1999 urine sample at the Tour de France showed traces of corticosteroid. A medical certificate showed he used an approved cream for saddle sores which contained the substance. O'Reilly said she heard team officials worrying about Armstrong's positive test for steroids during the Tour. She said: "They were in a panic, saying: 'What are we going to do? What are we going to do?'".
According to O'Reilly, the solution was to obtain a pre-dated prescription for a steroid-based ointment used to treat saddle sores from one of the team's compliant doctors. O'Reilly said that she would have been aware if Armstrong had saddle sores as she would have been responsible for administering any treatment. O'Reilly said that Armstrong told her: "Now, Emma, you know enough to bring me down." O'Reilly said that she was also asked to dispose of used syringes for Armstrong and to pick up strange parcels for the team.
Allegations in the book were reprinted in The Sunday Times (UK) by deputy sports editor Alan English in June 2004. Armstrong sued for libel, and the paper settled out of court after a High Court judge in a pre-trial ruling stated that the article "meant accusation of guilt and not simply reasonable grounds to suspect". The newspaper's lawyers issued the statement: "The Sunday Times has confirmed to Mr. Armstrong that it never intended to accuse him of being guilty of taking any performance-enhancing drugs and sincerely apologized for any such impression." The same authors (Pierre Ballester and David Walsh) subsequently published L.A. Official and Le Sale Tour (The Dirty Trick), further pressing their claims that Armstrong used performance-enhancing drugs throughout his career.
On March 31, 2005, Mike Anderson filed a brief in Travis County District Court in Texas, as part of a legal battle following his termination in November 2004 as an employee of Armstrong. Anderson worked for Armstrong for two years as a personal assistant. In the brief, Anderson claimed that he discovered a box of 'androstenin' while cleaning a bathroom in Armstrong's apartment in Girona, Spain. 'Androstenin' is not on the list of banned drugs. Anderson stated in a subsequent deposition that he had no direct knowledge of Armstrong using a banned substance. Armstrong denied the claim and issued a counter-suit. The two men reached an out-of-court settlement in November 2005; the terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
In November 2012, Times Newspapers republished all of Walsh's articles as well as the original "LA Confidential" article by Alan English in Lanced: The shaming of Lance Armstrong. The Times was said to be considering taking action to recoup money from Armstrong in relation to the settlement and court costs.
In December 2012 The Sunday Times filed suit against Armstrong for $1.5 million. In its suit, the paper sought a return of the original settlement, plus interest and the cost of defending the original case.
In August 2013, Armstrong and The Sunday Times reached an undisclosed settlement.
Tour de France urine tests: 2005
On August 23, 2005, L'Équipe, a major French daily sports newspaper, reported on its front page under the headline "le mensonge Armstrong" ('The Armstrong Lie') that six urine samples taken from the cyclist during the prologue and five stages of the 1999 Tour de France, frozen and stored since at "Laboratoire national de dépistage du dopage de Châtenay-Malabry" (LNDD), had tested positive for erythropoietin (EPO) in recent retesting conducted as part of a research project into EPO testing methods.