Certainly, to many of those suffering a cancer diagnosis, Lance’s foundation has been a valuable resource, and Lance himself something like the second coming of Christ. Through numerous private gestures he has made over the years, which he did not try to publicize, he boosted the spirits of strangers living through their darkest moments, and sometimes offered concrete assistance, too. Responding to messages from cancer patients, he has sent personal e-mails and practical advice, often with specific recommendations about which doctors to consult. Occasionally, he’d go beyond that. If a testicular cancer patient couldn’t get in to see the best doctors, well, he might send an e-mail or a text to the doctor himself, paving the way for a patient to get an appointment.
Yet a return to his foundation seems unlikely in the near term. In fact, the foundation has taken yet more steps to distance itself from Lance. In early 2013, it moved its yearly Livestrong Day from the October 2 anniversary of Lance’s cancer diagnosis, to the May 11 date when Nike introduced its yellow Livestrong wristband.
The foundation’s effort to create an identity completely separate from Lance may be a necessary part of its survival strategy. Due to flat contributions, the foundation board slashed its 2013 budget by about 10 percent, forcing it to end its title sponsorship of the Austin Marathon just three years into what was a planned ten-year partnership. CEO Doug Ulman told Vanessa that he felt certain the foundation would survive, but that for a while it was likely that things would be “bumpy, challenging, turbulent.”
And that was before the most recent round of bad news, which was delivered in late spring. With consumers starting to turn against the Livestrong brand, Nike executives made the decision to pull the Livestrong clothing and sneakers line. Since the foundation had licensed the Livestrong brand to Nike, in an arrangement that had accounted for about a quarter of its average yearly revenue from 2004 to 2012, this will constitute a formidable blow to its budget.
For a long time, Americans just couldn’t get enough of Lance. His yellow bracelet was ubiquitous; his sayings like “Pain is temporary, quitting lasts forever” were quoted like gospel. His relationships were constant tabloid fodder. Millions persisted in believing in him until it became impossible to do so. Why?
That may be a question harder to answer than why his teammates and coaches, his sponsors and financial backers, collaborated in the lie. But society’s gullibility in the face of ever-mounting evidence probably has something to do with its need for a certain kind of hero. Looked at this way, Lance is the inevitable product of our celebrity-worshipping culture and the whole money-mad world of sports gone amok. This is the Golden Age of fraud, an era of general willingness to ignore and justify the wrongdoings of the rich and powerful, which makes every lie bigger and widens its destructive path. Having put Lance up on a pedestal, the public was reluctant to depose him, until, of course, it had to—at which point it fell upon him with such fury that even Travis Tygart and Bill Bock were shocked by the rapidity with which he was toppled, the speed of the desertions.
Within our culture, there is a tendency to instantly vilify those whom we have idolized, and that is certainly what has happened to Lance. But as we hope our book has made clear, Lance does not bear sole responsibility for the enterprise that became Lance Inc. And the fact that he is the villain of the moment doesn’t mean that he is necessarily finished, either. Just as Lance said to Travis Tygart in a moment of fury back in December 2012, he really does hold the keys to his own redemption. Whether he will use them, for the sake both of his own soul and the soul of the sport he once loved so much, remains to be seen. He is a man of great strength, determination, and resilience, and we truly hope that he will use those qualities to make a moral comeback as complete as the physical comeback he effected from the cancer that nearly killed him. Time will tell.
Hal Boggan
At thirteen, Lance (center) was a City of Plano Swimmer, along with his best friends. Here, he is at a meet at the Forest Park public pool in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1985, with his neighborhood friends Chann McRae (left) and John Boggan (right).
Scott Eder
Lance (right), at fifteen, with Rick Crawford (left), before Lance’s breakthrough performance at the 1987 President’s Triathlon at Las Colinas Country Club, near Dallas. Lance placed sixth, beating many of the country’s top pros. Rick became Lance’s first cycling coach and, in 2012, would confess to providing EPO to some pro riders but not to Lance.
Hal Boggan
Lance ran for the Plano East Senior High School Panthers for the 1988–89 season. He was the second finisher overall in this cross-country meet, when he was a senior. Administrators asked him to withdraw from Plano East before graduation that spring, after Lance missed too many classes while training with the Junior National Cycling Team.
Hal Boggan
Lance and his mother, Linda, before a Dallas-area triathlon, 1989.
Hal Boggan
Lance is exhausted following a triathlon as a teenager, 1989.
Paul Landis
Floyd Landis was raised amid cornfields of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, in a family of Mennonite faith. Here’s Landis in his hometown of Farmersville, more than a decade before he moved to California to take his shot at racing professionally.
Both: John Boggan
By the summer of 1992, Lance had been an amateur cyclist for three years. His Olympicard touted his victory in the 1991 win in Italy’s eleven-day Settimana Bergamasca, which launched his career but led to bad feelings with his team, Subaru-Montgomery. He had a contract to ride for Motorola before the Olympics.
Courtesy of Velo News
In 1993, Lance won $1 million put up by Thrift Drug, a chain owned by JC Penney, as a promotional gimmick that nobody actually thought could be won. It was reportedly the biggest prize ever offered in bike racing.
John Boggan
In Barcelona, Lance greets his mom, Linda; J. T. Neal (with bag); and his grandfather PaPa (in sun visor), before the 1992 Olympic Games men’s road race. Lance would place fourteenth.
Jason Herman
In the 1996 Olympic Games, in Atlanta, Lance finished sixth in the time trial.
Douglas Bank
In early 1998, Lance announced he would marry Kristin Richard, shown here in Austin that year.
Douglas Bank
Lance signs posters in Austin at the first Ride for the Roses, in March 1997, raising $20,000 for the new Lance Armstrong Foundation.
Douglas Bank
Jim Ochowicz, Lance’s close friend and the godfather to his son Luke. Och played a key role in Lance’s career while he was Motorola team manager. Here he wears his old Motorola team kit at the 1998 Ride for the Roses, in Austin, Texas.
Paul Landis
Floyd Landis during the 2003 Tour de France, outside the team bus.
Paul Landis
The US Postal team poses during the 2004 Tour de France.
Joseph Papp
EPO, a synthetic form of the natural hormone erythropoietin, typically must be refrigerated. While in Europe in the mid-1990s, some riders spent several hundred dollars for one month’s EPO supply, purchased at pharmacies in Switzerland.
Anonymous
A testosterone patch used by George Hincapie during the 2003 or 2004 season.
Henny Ray Abrams /Reuters/Corbis
Lance (second from left) prepares to ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange in April 2005. He is joined by NYSE President Robert G. Britz (far left), Bristol-Myers Squibb CEO Peter R. Dolan (second from right), and Lance’s agent, Bill Stapleton (far right), of Capital Sports & Entertainment.
Both: Brian Phillips
Lance loved his Gulfstream G-IV jet, Mellow Johnny’s Aviation, shown here in 2011.
Timothy Archibald
Thomas Weisel and some of the elite, bike-loving executives who put roughly $1 million annually into USA Cycling for training young American bike racers, 2006.
Dennis Kleiman
David “Tiger” Williams
of Williams Trading LLC, 2006
First and Second: Raftermen Photography
US Anti-Doping Agency chief executive Travis Tygart (after), and USADA general counsel William “Bill” Bock (before).
Tim De Waele/TDWsport.com/Corbis
Lance (right), with Johan Bruyneel, the directeursportif of Team RadioShack, after his last Tour de France, in 2010. Lance finished in 23rd place, 39 minutes and 20 seconds behind Alberto Contador. Contador was later disqualified after failing a doping test.
Edward Borysewicz
Polish defector Eddie Borysewicz, who opened an office at the US Olympic Training Center in Squaw Valley, California; introduced the concept of team tactics; and whipped American riders into shape, often telling them they were too fat.
Betsy Andreu
Betsy and Frankie Andreu at their home in Dearborn, Michigan, 2012.
Reed Albergotti
Greg LeMond with his three Tour de France trophies in his home in Minneapolis, 2013.
Courtesy of Jeff Tillotson
Lance Armstrong insists he never used performance-enhancing drugs during a 2005 sworn deposition in Austin, Texas. He sued SCA Promotions when it refused to pay some of his bonus money for his victory in the 2004 Tour de France.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Wheelmen, at times, felt like our own version of the Alpe d’Huez climb, with our hearts pumping our vast quantities of blood and our VO2 max sustaining us. We never would’ve made it to the ARRIVEE banner without the contributions of many people who played significant roles in helping us get there.
Thanks to Sam Walker foremost for giving us a flying start. As The Wall Street Journal’s sports editor, Sam first brought us together as partners in the newsroom years ago, and he edited all of our coverage in the Journal. When we began working on Wheelmen, Sam kindly spent many hours reading drafts of what we wrote. His pep talks and nurturing support motivated us. He was wise, warm, funny, and incredibly generous. We owe Sam our heartfelt gratitude.
Thanks are also due to our literary agent, Elyse Cheney, and to Alex Jacobs at Elyse’s firm, for their help. Elyse and Alex strategically spread the word about our project, and they patiently offered us guidance about the journey ahead.
We owe thanks to Bill Shinker, president and publisher of Gotham Books, for pulling the trigger on the start gun. Our talented book editor, Megan Newman, was our valuable literary directeur sportif. She helped to shape the finished work, and Gabrielle Campo, editorial assistant at Gotham Books, assisted us with a multitude of details in our final spurt.
Our newsroom bosses Joanna Chung and Gabriella Stern allowed us to take occasional vacation days from our day jobs, making it possible for us to travel to meet with sources and to write. We thank them for their patience and understanding. We are grateful to News Corp chief executive Robert Thomson, who allowed us to go forth with our idea for a book, and to several members of our family and friends, including Ellen Schultz, Geoffrey Blatt, Shelly Branch, and Jason Gay, who read drafts of our manuscript, offering suggestions for improvement.
Most of all, however, we are indebted to the many people who shared their insights, knowledge, memories, and personal photos.
We thank you for your time, your trust, and for your understanding that we couldn’t write exactly the book that any of you might have liked. We are humbled by your generosity and we hope you recognize your contributions in making Wheelmen as fair and balanced as possible.
NOTES AND SOURCES
OUR APPROACH
Our account is based mainly on interviews with people who were directly involved in the events described. When possible, we searched for documents, such as e-mails, financial records, and photos, to back up their accounts. In many cases we are drawing from sworn statements given by people intimately familiar with the situation and from publicly available court documents.
When Jeff Novitzky of the Food and Drug Administration began investigating Armstrong and his former cycling team in the spring of 2010, he interviewed dozens of witnesses, imploring them to keep their discussions with him, as well as any testimony before the grand jury, secret. In February 2012, the US attorney in Los Angeles closed its criminal investigation. There was never a courtroom hearing or a single public document filed in relation to the case. In fact, the only official, public evidence that there ever was an investigation came in the form of a US Attorney’s Office press release—announcing that it was over.
We pieced together many of the details of the investigation by, in large part, interviewing witnesses. We agreed to grant anonymity to those who could make a good case that it was warranted. Under federal law, witnesses in a grand jury investigation are free to talk about it, but their lawyers generally advise against it because they believe prosecutors and judges will punish their clients for going public.
In October 2012, the US Anti-Doping Agency released its “reasoned decision” in the Lance Armstrong case, together with supporting information. Its file is in excess of one thousand pages and includes sworn testimony from twenty-six people, including fifteen riders with knowledge of the US Postal Service team and its participants’ doping activities. The documents can be found online at www .cyclinginvestigation.usada.org, and include documentary evidence of financial payments, e-mails, scientific data, and lab test results. The file also includes links to the hearing transcripts and exhibits in the 2005 arbitration case brought by Armstrong and Tailwind Sports against SCA Promotions. For some of our narrative, we consulted newspapers, magazines, and books to glean information about the personalities and points of view of characters. Many of the races and triathlons in this book were widely reported by dozens of publications, and video of the events exists in abundance on sites like YouTube. In addition to interviews with people who were there, we relied on these sources in order to recount what happened.
Abbreviations of Sources
AP—Associated Press
AAS—Austin-American Statesman
CN—Cycling News
DMN—The Dallas Morning News
HC—Houston Chronicle
IHT—International Herald Tribune
LAT—Los Angeles Times
NYT—The New York Times
VN—VeloNews
WSJ—The Wall Street Journal
Tailwind Sports, “due diligence contract binder,” April 2002, showing team financial information, sponsor contracts, and riders’ salaries for the US Postal Service team.
Tailwind Sports, board meeting presentation, 2/1/02, Scottsdale, Ariz., which includes Tailwind capitalization table, and fiscal 2002 financial results.
Books
Armstrong, Kristin. Lance Armstrong. Grosset & Dunlap, 2000.
Armstrong, Lance. Comeback 2.0. Touchstone, 2009.
Armstrong Lance, with Chris Carmichael. The Lance Armstrong Performance Program. Rodale, 2000.
Armstrong, Lance, with Sally Jenkins. Every Second Counts. Broadway Books, 2003.
Armstrong, Lance, with Sally Jenkins. It’s Not About the Bike. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2000.
Armstrong, Lance, with Graham Watson. Images of a Champion. Rodale, 2004.
Brandt, Richard L., with Thomas W. Weisel. Capital Instincts. John Wiley & Sons, 2003.
Bruyneel, Johan. We Might As Well Win. Mariner Books, 2009.
Burke, John. One Last Great Thing. Free Press, 2012.
Coyle, Daniel. Lance Armstrong’s War. HarperCollins, 2005.
Drake, Geoff, with Jim Ochowicz. Team 7-Eleven. VeloPress, 2012.
Dzierzak, Lou. The Evolution of American Bicycle Racing. Falcon Guides, 2007.
Fainaru-Wada, Mark, and Lance Williams. Game of Shadows. Gotham Books, 2006.
Hamilton, Tyler, and Daniel Coyle. The Secret Race. Bantam Books, 2012.
Kelly, Linda Armstrong, with Joni Rodgers. No Mountain High Enough. Thorndike Press, 2005.
Landis, Floyd. Positively False. Gallery Books, 2007.
Millar, David. Racing Through the Dark. Touchstone, 2012.
Ungerle
ider, Steven. Faust’s Gold. Thomas Dunne Books, 2001.
Walsh, David. From Lance to Landis. Ballantine Books, 2007.
Walsh, David. Seven Deadly Sins. Atria Books, 2013.
Wilcockson, John. 23 Days in July. Da Capo Press, 2004.
Wilcockson, John. Lance. Da Capo Press, 2009.
ENDPAPER
The artwork, by Otto Steininger, presents a sampling of Armstrong’s business and personal links from 1997 to fall 2012. Because it is intended to reflect past relationships, before Armstrong’s downfall, some of the links shown may no longer be current, including the links between Lance Armstrong and the foundation, as well as the links between Armstrong and his sponsors. Although this illustration is based on our own reporting and research, it was inspired by the work of Dave Marsdin, who created a comprehensive network of Armstrong’s business ties, and posted his rendering on the website Cyclismas in 2012.
Attempted donations to USADA: Interview with Tygart and former USADA CEO Terry Madden; in an interview with 60 Minutes Sports that aired 1/9/13, Tygart said an individual “representing Armstrong tried to give USADA a large sum of money sometime in 2004.” Tygart called the gesture “totally inappropriate.” Armstrong, in his Oprah interview, denied that his representative made the offer to USADA, saying he “asked around” among his camp and “would know” if such an offer had been made. Bill Stapleton said he didn’t recall making an offer. A spokeswoman for Amgen, which manufactures Epogen brand EPO, said, “To date, Amgen hasn’t provided a direct donation to USADA.”
Wheelmen: Lance Armstrong, the Tour De France, and the Greatest Sports Conspiracy Ever Page 39