Lance Armstrong: 'I Look Forward To Being Vindicated'

ADELAIDE, Australia -- Lance Armstrong says he will be vindicated by a U.S. Anti-Doping Agency investigation of claims raised by a report in Sports Illustrated.

Armstrong used Twitter on Friday to suggest that USADA may probe allegations published by the magazine this week in an article entitled "The Case Against Lance Armstrong."

"Great to hear that USADA is investigating some of SI's claims. I look forward to being vindicated," the seven-time Tour de France winner said.

Great to hear that @usada is investigating some of @si's claims. I look forward to being vindicated.less than a minute ago via ÜberTwitterLance Armstrong
lancearmstrong

Armstrong is currently competing in the Tour Down Under in South Australia and has refused to comment on the Sports Illustrated report, other than to say he has nothing to worry about "on any level" from its claims. He would not speak to reporters after the fourth stage on Friday and could not be contacted later in the evening.

No immediate confirmation was available Friday that USADA has launched an investigation into the report. The agency's website contained no information about any pending investigation.

Sports Illustrated reported that when Italian authorities raided the home of Armstrong teammate Yaroslav Popovych last November in Italy, they found texts and e-mails linking their Radio Shack team with Dr. Michele Ferrari as recently as 2009.

Armstrong publicly severed his connection with Ferrari in 2004, amid accusations the doctor aided another rider in using performance-enhancing drugs. Ferrari was convicted and then later cleared of criminal charges on appeal.

Armstrong spokesman Mark Fabiani called the Sports Illustrated report "old news from the same old, discredited sources."

A federal grand jury in Los Angeles has been hearing evidence for months on cheating in professional cycling. The investigation turned toward Armstrong - and several of his associates have testified - since former teammate Floyd Landis accused him of systematic doping.

Armstrong won the Tour de France every year from 1999 to 2005. He is currently 85th overall and nearly 4 minutes behind the leader after four stages at the Tour Down Under, which he has said will be his final race outside the United States.

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Comments

[checkmoot]

10:21 AM on 01/24/2011

He has been tested. tested and tested and came up clean every time. In every race and probably more than any one else in the sport. There is not even any smoke, much less fire. Anyone can accuse anyone of anything. Armstrong has the proof. His multiple tests.

[wonderfullone]

08:51 AM on 01/24/2011

Where there's smoke there's fire!

[Dr Confuso]

10:03 PM on 01/23/2011

Where's Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson when you need her?

[susie1776]

06:35 PM on 01/23/2011

I don't believe that a man who suffered through the hell of chemotherapy and brought himself back to form would do ANYTHING to jeopardize himself. I also think that even if he had, someone, long ago would have done something. It would have been too big a story. This stuff coming out now is so much sour grapes by people who were envious of his success. I BELIEVE Lance.

[AbeMartin]

08:24 AM on 01/23/2011

Lance Armstrong elevated road racing from an esoteric sport dominated by strangely muscled athletes who were obscure to most Americans, to a sports phenomenon.  In this way, he is much like Billie Jean King, Mohammad Ali, Michale Jordan and Tiger Woods.  The other athletes, with whom they played or competed, have made millions in winnings and endorsements.  And that is why Lance, whether he doped (which is endemic in sports) or not, will be given a pass.  And why eventually, at least some of the dopers who helped Major League Baseball become enormously popular will be elected the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.

After years, and dozens of allegations--mostly pushed by the French who control the Tour--they have yet to make a single charge stick.  Floyd Landis got caught and he was stripped of his championship.  Lance was able to avoid detection.  And that should be the end of the story.  As I learned in Sociology 101--there are two types of teenagers:  juvenile delinquents and those who don't get caught.

[FlangeSqueal]

10:38 AM on 01/23/2011

Good post, full of cogent arguments....except I think you can drop Tiger Woods' name from any 'champions list,' as he's show he has feet of clay and a soul that matches.

[freddsky]

12:36 PM on 01/23/2011

FlangeSqueal I can sort of tell by your smarmy, droll horseshit attitude that you are probably from Utah and are probably a member of this silly cult.

Country bumpkin, rejected by his local Masonic Lodge, finds golden tablets when a White Salamander leads him to them.

Yeah - go on pretending you have an education.

You only have a "degree" from BYU.

That's the same as a high school diploma in any other state.

[seriousbidness]

05:09 PM on 01/23/2011

Tiger Wood's is probably the greatest golfer of his time . . period. He cheated on his wife which is a personal flaw. That flaw aside he is the best golfer ever and elevated a sport to global proportions seemingly over night.

He is a champion!

[samuraifrog37]

01:31 AM on 01/23/2011

All you haters should save it for another victim. Your talking out your backsides.

[cliffhammond]

05:59 PM on 01/22/2011

Maybe the first thing he should do is stop running with Matthew McConaughey, who got so loaded one night his neighbors called Austin PD because he was in his back yard naked, screaming and drumming on his New Age tom-toms.

The next thing he should do is convince TPTB that the dozen or so witnesses lined up against him are all disgruntled cyclists.

[Dr Confuso]

10:09 PM on 01/23/2011

Ooooh... being naked in your own back yard...how awful! You've gotta be one of them nosy, right wing christian conservative Texans who has to comment on everybodys business.

[Earl Davis]

02:07 PM on 01/22/2011

Lance will do a Roger Clemens style Congressional hearing in about ten years. He takes more drugs than the DEA.

[samuraifrog37]

01:26 AM on 01/23/2011

As if you know that to be true...maybe but maybe not.

[cookerman45]

01:09 PM on 01/22/2011

a scratch in the Teflon?

[SoutheastBeast]

11:42 AM on 01/22/2011

Lance was doping. I used to run track at a high level and EVERYONE was doping. It's the same in cycling. Armstrong can appeal to a public that knows little about how things really work at the elite levels of cycling but those of us who have been involved in similar sports have never believed he was clean. None of the top athletes is clean in these sports. I'm not even condemning him for trying to compete on a level field. That's what the best athletes do in track and cycling. But the sheer inventiveness of his lies is disappointing.

[Decipherer]

12:10 PM on 01/22/2011

OK, so how many more times are you going to subject the rest of us to your "wisdom?"

[samuraifrog37]

01:28 AM on 01/23/2011

Ok then...Guilty. Next.

[SoutheastBeast]

11:41 AM on 01/22/2011

Lance was doping. I used to run track at a high level and EVERYONE was doping. It's the same in cycling. Armstrong can appeal to a public that knows little about how things really work at the elite levels of cycling but those of us who have been involved in similar sports have never believed he was clean. No one is clean in these sports. I'm not even condemning him for trying to compete on a level field. That's what the best athletes do in track and cycling. But the sheer inventiven ess of his lies is disappoint ing.

[TRichards]

11:38 AM on 01/22/2011

Maybe there isn't a fire. I don't know. I just know this:

o There has been a helluva lot of smoke from multiple sources.
o Armstrong, who breaks commitments regularly when something better comes along, doesn't show the highest of characters in some respects.
o He strikes me as being SO competitive that I suspect that, if he's guilty, he would never admit it until compelling evidence were produced.

On principle, he gets the benefit of an enlarging doubt. But, if he turns out to be another lying athlete rationalizing his behavior with the convenient but false "they all do it", I won't be in the slightest bit surprised.

His "character moment," fighting back from cancer, was all about him. For himself, he'll do anything -- as consistent with an ego-maniacal personality as cheating with drugs. But, where is the wife who stood behind him during those hard times? You got it. Discarded. Other fish to fry.

[SoutheastBeast]

11:30 AM on 01/22/2011

Of course he was doping. I used to run track at a high level and EVERYONE was doping. It's the same in cycling. Armstrong can appeal to a public that knows little about how things really work at the elite levels of cycling but those of us who have been involved in similar sports have never believed he was clean. No one is clean in these sports. I'm not even condemning him for trying to compete on a level field. That's what the best athletes do in track and cycling. But the sheer inventiven ess of his lies is disappoint ing.

[SoutheastBeast]

11:25 AM on 01/22/2011

He and Roger Clemens will be cell mates.

[Earl Davis]

02:09 PM on 01/22/2011

They will be able to "inject" each other all day long.

[sc00by]

10:40 AM on 01/22/2011

They have been hounding this sports legend forever, without a single shred of proof despite constant drug testing. When are these people going to let it go and give the man his dues? This reminds me of Obama "Birthers", believing in something non-existant and refusing to face reality. Lance, you are the greatest!

[Decipherer]

11:20 AM on 01/22/2011

The venom being spewed hereabouts concerning Armstrong is enough even to make those "Truthers" sound sane!