Lance Armstrong says the cycling authorities were powerless

Lance Armstrong has said that the authorities of Cycling and other endurance sports that monitored doping in the 1990’s were powerless to stop it.

The disgraced American was banned for life and stripped of his seven Tour de France titles by the U.S. anti doping agency last year.
He told Cycling News: “They could not do a thing – like the head of the IAAF (athletics) couldn’t do a thing, and the head of FINA (swimming) couldn’t do a thing.

“They just did not have the tools to do anything until maybe 10 years later.”

Although countless accusations by some former team mates and journalists, the blood doping drug EPO that Armstrong took was not detectable until 2000 when a test became available to the authorities.

Armstrong went on to explain why his team made the decision to start doping: “We rode in 1994 and we didn’t move into high-octane. We just suffered through the year,” he said.

“In ’95, we just decided to make that next step. It’s not my style to name names. There were certainly as a whole us American guys, to generalise that group, who made that decision together.

“Perhaps there were people on the team, older riders who we knew had done that, and there were others – we had to have help from the team doctor – but these are all people who have avoided any consequences. Totally.”

Brian Cookson the president of the International Cycling Union is keen to talk to Armstrong to gather information for his own inquiry in to the doping culture of the 90’s and early 2000’s.

By Joshua Rae-Long