Tag: Oprah WInfrey

It Takes a Child (Part 2 of “All About the Lie”)

Tuesday, January 22nd, 2013

I watched the second half of the Lance Armstrong interview with Oprah Winfrey over the weekend, and I’m glad I did. I found what I was hoping for in all of this–a drop of humanity in someone the man himself even describes as arrogant, dishonest, and defiant. It came in the 36th minute, when Armstrong retold the story in what was, for me, the most defining moment of the entire interview: telling his 13-year-old son, who had been defending his dad to kids at school, “Don’t defend me anymore.”

Armstrong welled up and had trouble breathing and speaking. The pain of disappointing his son, the fear of losing, really losing, what matters most in life, the love and respect of your child, overwhelmed him. As well it should.

The moment made him human. Had he told that story in the rather unemotional, nonchalant, less-than-forthcoming way he did in Part 1, Armstrong’s interview would have amounted to no more than a shoulder shrug for most people.

You could see the enormous weight being removed from his being. You could feel the painful catharsis in revealing what must have been a gut-wrenching, heart-twisting father-to-son exchange.

Forgetting sport for a moment, I can only hope it was an authentic first step in what is going to be a taxing healing process, perhaps even more difficult than recovering from cancer was. At least mentally and emotionally.

But a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

photo: Laurent Rebours/Associated Press

It’s All About the Lie: Biker, Bully, Betrayor

Friday, January 18th, 2013

After watching the Oprah Winfrey interview (Part One) with a once-hero of mine (boy do I feel like a patsy!) Lance Armstrong, I got the sense that the only reason he’s “coming clean” is that he simply has no where else to turn. Richard Gere’s line in An Officer & A Gentleman is ringing in my ears: “I ain’t got nowhere else to go!!!”

Lance confessed to being a bully. He confessed to betraying the world. But I did not get the sense that he authentically feels remorse. He’s sorry enough, though, for getting ratted out by his former aiding and abetting cronies via USADA. Had he not decided to make a comeback in 2009 and 2010, he in all probability would have remained an uncaught doper, and in his words, “would not be sitting here today.” You could see him kicking himself for that, 20-20 hindsight being what it is.

Lance was forthcoming, and did not backpedal (sorry for the pun), but unless something more heartfelt and emotional comes from tonight’s part two, I get the sense that nothing he can do will ever enable him to attain the kind of trust and inspiration he engendered…to cyclists, and to cancer victims. Add him to the Tiger Woods et al Hall of Disfame.

The title of his book, which I’ve now thrown in the garbage, should have read: IT’S ALL ABOUT THE LIE: Biker, Bully, Betrayor.

It’s certainly NOT about Lance. The larger issue in all of this is the ineffectiveness of the war on drugs. Battling it as a crime is obviously not working. We need an elegant solution, one that makes it impossible for a professional athlete to compete with an unfair advantage.