Armstrong on doping past: 'I wouldn't change a thing'

[Tony T]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-c...-idUSKCN1ST2Q8

(Reuters) - Former cycling champion Lance Armstrong has said he “wouldn’t change a thing” about the doping that led to him being stripped of his record seven Tour de France titles, according to details of an interview that will air next week on NBCSN.

The network, owned by NBC Sports Group, said on Thursday it would broadcast a 30-minute interview next Wednesday called “Lance Armstrong: Next Stage” in which the 47-year-old American discusses his career and the decisions he made.

“We did what we had to do to win. It wasn’t legal, but I wouldn’t change a thing: whether it’s losing a bunch of money, going from hero to zero,” said Armstrong, who overcame cancer to win the first of his seven consecutive Tour de France titles 20 years ago, said in an excerpt of the interview provided by NBC Sports.

Armstrong was stripped of his Tour de France titles and banned from the sport for life in 2012 after the International Cycling Union ratified the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency’s sanctions.

The American later admitted to cheating in a January 2013 televised interview with Oprah Winfrey.

Armstrong, once a hero to millions, suffered a spectacular fall from grace that costs him millions of dollars in lawsuits and endorsements.

“I wouldn’t change a thing. I wouldn’t change the way I acted. I mean I would, but this is a longer answer,” he said.

“Primarily, I wouldn’t change the lessons that I’ve learned. I don’t learn all the lessons if I don’t act that way. I don’t get investigated and sanctioned if I don’t act the way I acted.

“If I just doped and didn’t say a thing, none of that would have happened. None of it. I was begging for, I was asking for them to come after me. It was an easy target.”

Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto; editing by Ken Ferris
Our Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

[fiamme red]

So he's glad that he was caught and stripped of his wins?

[makoti]

Nutshell: "I wouldn't have changed doping, but I wouldn't have been such a douche, which led to me getting caught."

[rwsaunders]

Of course he wouldn’t change a thing...he achieved rockstar status and became quite wealthy in most part because of his activities, which weren’t legal as he mentioned. He didn’t mention anything in the article about setting a fine example for his kids, did he? Oh well, water over the proverbial dam.

[FlashUNC]

It's almost like he's incapable of remorse.

[Tickdoc]

He can quit doping, but he’ll always be an A-hole.

[GregL]

Originally Posted by FlashUNC

It's almost like he's incapable of remorse.

Some people simply aren’t capable of remorse. They’re so fragile that admitting fault would destroy them. It’s like a house of cards. Pull one off the bottom row and...

Greg

[texbike]

Meh. This is just a broken record. Same stuff - different day.

I'm not an Armstrong fan - not as much due to his cheating, but for the lack of contrition that he's shown for it. The Oprah interview was the breaking point for me in supporting him. It was his chance to come completely clean and show remorse for taking the path that he did. He didn't do it then and this is just an extension of that same mentality.

And of course he isn't sorry for his cheating and being an a$$, it made him a small fortune and gave him rockstar status. However, where does he go from here? What does he think he's going to gain by revisiting this now? Is this just his usual yearly drivel right before the beginning of the TdF to stay in the dimming spotlight? Is it a way of driving traffic to his podcasts or ?

Texbike

[bcroslin]

Armstrong is a sociopath. I won't click the linked story. The media eats this crap up because they know it's going to piss off a lot of people and they get clicks and ad money.

[fiamme red]

More here:

https://www.bbc.com/sport/cycling/48393491

Armstrong reiterated that he knew doping was widespread in cycling at that time.

He added: "I knew there were going to be knives at this fight. Not just fists. I knew there would be knives.

"I had knives, and then one day, people start showing up with guns. That's when you say, do I either fly back to Plano, Texas, and not know what you're going to do? Or do you walk to the gun store? I walked to the gun store. I didn't want to go home.

"I don't want to make excuses for myself that everybody did it or we never could have won without it. Those are all true, but the buck stops with me. I'm the one who made the decision to do what I did. I didn't want to go home, man. I was going to stay."

Then he ended up owning the biggest gun store himself.

[XXtwindad]

Originally Posted by FlashUNC

It's almost like he's incapable of remorse.

But isn't that the definition of a sociopath? Is this surprising?

[redir]

Textbook narcissism 101.

[XXtwindad]

Originally Posted by fiamme red

More here:

https://www.bbc.com/sport/cycling/48393491

Then he ended up owning the biggest gun store himself.

But these are facts, right? Armstrong's prism is different than the rest of us. I'm guessing the vast majority of us possess neither his prodigious athletic ability nor his skewed moral code. Expecting him to express contrition in a way that's familiar is futile.

[OtayBW]

“We did what we had to do to win. It wasn’t legal, but I wouldn’t change a thing

I reckon I'll just leave it right there....





Sorry - I do have to add just one thing in hindsight: This really punctuates the need for a 'head-slap' or a 'face-palm' smiley around here. Just saying....

[charliedid]

Regardless of the history books Lance internalizes all of it knowing he still won all those races and despite the law feels it was a fair and equal fight.

He has a point.