My fascination with
cycling, like many people, began with Lance Armstrong. A man who won seven Tour
de France titles after beating a cancer that nearly killed him. However, unlike
most it was not this story that drew me in, instead it was his downfall, this
great and untouchable man brought to his knees by a "reasoned
decision."
"The
UCI will ban Lance Armstrong from cycling and the UCI will strip him of his
seven titles. Lance Armstrong has no place in cycling." - Pat McQuaid,
President of the UCI 2012
 |
| Back in Austin and just layin' around |
“If you look at the books and you look at the
records, he won seven Tours in a period where everybody thought, where
everybody was dirty. If I win again, they're not going to - they can't say
that. They cannot. Well, you can, but there'd be a few dickheads who'd say
that, trust me, but… no way.” – Lance Armstrong 2009
Gibney
began following Armstrong's comeback year in 2009. He was given unprecedented
access to the cyclist - filming his drug tests, training regimes and even his
family life in the run up to the 2009 tour. Initially, Gibney wished to explore
why Armstrong came back and what he is out to prove, but following the
federal investigation into doping Gibney sat on the footage and waited. By 2013,
Armstrong's lie was outed; he was disgraced with his reputation in tatters, and
so Gibney organised one more interview to set the record straight.
“Lance tried to dominate my film too. He had
lied to me, straight to my face, all throughout 2009. When the truth came out I
told him he owed me an explanation on camera”- Alex Gibney
In the
documentary Gibney presents his own personal story, a story of how he was drawn
in to the lie. He uses interviews with Armstrong from his comeback years and
following the Oprah interview. Interviews with colleagues and journalists are
interspersed throughout, fellow teammates including Frankie Andreu and George
Hincapie, and long-time critics like David Walsh.
The first
part discusses the history of doping in cycling from alcohol; the first
performance enhancing drug (PED), to the emergence of EPO and blood
transfusions, before moving on to Armstrong, his cancer battle, recovery, his
tour wins and elevation to superstardom. It discusses his charity and work to
raise cancer awareness, and importantly it presents his doping denials and the ruthless dismantling and discrediting of his opponents.
"If Lance is clean, it's the greatest comeback in the history
of sports, if he isn't, it would be the greatest fraud." – Greg LeMond, 1st
American Winner of the Tour de France 2001
“Greg [LeMond], who I know has serious
drinking and drug problems, is, was clearly intoxicated.” – Lance Armstrong 2005
In the
second part Gibney charts Armstrong's comeback year, from the announcement, to
his ride at the Giro d'Italia and finally his Tour. During this Gibney manages
to do something extraordinary, he makes you believe the lie. You see
Armstrong's confidence that he can win an eighth tour, his sadness when he's
beaten in the first stage and his acceptance that he isn't good enough when
Alberto Contador (rival, teammate and fellow drug cheat) takes him on and wins.
“I don't blame Contador one bit. He didn't
trust anybody on that team, and he wanted to make sure that he had that yellow
jersey firmly on his shoulders. He learned this from Lance. When you have a
chance to seize the yellow jersey, and take time out of your opponents, you do
it. Alberto was doing textbook Lance Armstrong, it just backfired on Lance.” –
Frankie Andreu, Armstrong's former teammate 2013
Armstrong’s
comeback story comes to a head on Mt Ventoux, a legend of the Tour de France -
the mountain Froome climbed solo in last year’s race - and one that had always
defeated Lance. Armstrong needs to finish with his rivals to secure a podium
position and I, along with Gibney, am there cheering him on, hoping he can do
it...and he does. Gibney cites this as the point where he believed the lie completely,
and I wanted to believe it too, despite all I knew. You're almost pleased when
you see on the podium, he did it.
Gibney
sets you up and then knocks you down, showing you how he felt when the lie came
crashing down. Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton speak out, the US government
goes after him, and then finally USADA (United States Anti-Doping Agency) - we
all know what happened next. The rug is pulled from under our feet, much like
it was for Gibney, he'd been lied to constantly just like the whole world. He
reveals that Armstrong may have transfused blood before his triumph on Mt
Ventoux, the final piece of hope snatched away.
OPRAH: And your comeback, do you regret now
coming back?
LANCE: I
do. We wouldn't be sitting here if I didn't come back.
In the
post-Oprah interview Armstrong is still defiant, he rejects that he was ever
offered a deal by USADA, he rejects that he doped in his comeback and most
poignantly he rejects that history will see him as a cheat - he is still the
winner of seven Tour de France titles. Gibney finds it difficult to sympathise,
he had been lied to before why not again? But he still finds it difficult to
reject completely, Gibney still wants to believe in the Armstrong lie.
You know, at some point people will say,
"OK, here's what happened." And then... judge for themselves. I mean,
I don't know what people will think in 20, 30, 40, 50 years. Is the record book
still going to be blank for seven years, I guess it... I guess it will be, I
don't know. Or do people go... they look at this thing in, in the context that
it is and say, "Well… yeah…he won the Tour de France seven times." –
Lance Armstrong 2013
This
documentary answers my initial question, how could people not see the evidence?
The answer, Armstrong himself, he creates a story; a cancer survivor becomes
one history’s greatest athletes whilst destroying those who dispute it.
Gibney's personal story is incredibly effective and will be seen as a
definitive documentary on the subject - how history’s greatest cheat deceived
the entire world and almost got away with it.
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