Cycling
WADA slams Lance's 'PR stunt'
2013-01-18 11:18
Video
Lance Armstrong confesses to doping during his cycling career.
Melbourne - World Anti-Doping Agency president
John Fahey on Friday branded Lance Armstrong's doping confession a
"controlled public relations" stunt that revealed nothing new.
VIDEO: Lance Armstrong confesses to doping
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As
influential South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon threatened legal
action to force the state government to reveal how much it paid
Armstrong to ride in the Tour Down Under, Fahey attacked both Armstrong
and world cycling body UCI.
Fahey told the Fox News Australia
television station that all the 41-year-old Armstrong did in his
interview with Oprah Winfrey was confirm details of his doping that were
already public knowledge.
"There's nothing new from my point of
view," Fahey said. "All he did was affirm what the US Anti-Doping Agency
had put out in a very substantial and irrefutable judgement some months
ago - that this man had taken all sorts of substances for performance
purposes.
"He denied that until this point, but there was little
doubt he was doing that, and all he did was confirm that today in a very
controlled manner."
Fahey was especially damning of Armstrong's
choice of forum to confess, saying he should have appeared under oath at
an "appropriate tribunal" where he could be cross examined.
"Where
he would have to name names, tell of the officials, the entourage, who
supplied the drugs, when, where, and which riders were associated,"
Fahey said.
He reiterated that WADA would not take part in the
UCI's independent commission into Armstrong's doping as it believed the
terms of reference were not broad enough.
"They are focused on, it
seems, trying to absolve any role UCI might have had with Armstrong,"
he said. "They've never come to us to discuss the terms of reference or
to get any advice from us at all.
"I don't think they're sincere
about trying to clean up their sport when they're going down this
particular path, which I believe will lead them nowhere."
Xenophon,
who sits as an independent in the Australian Senate, said the South
Australian Government should now make public just how much it paid the
American to ride in the Tour Down Under for three years from 2009-11.
The
fees are believed to amount to several million dollars, but South
Australian Premier Jay Weatherill has refused to disclose the exact
amount.
"A court should have regard to Armstrong's confession and
how that would work against the commercial-in-confidence argument,"
Xenophon said.
"Releasing details of the taxpayer funds paid to Armstrong couldn't possibly undermine the event in any way."
Earlier
this week Weatherill said the government would not reveal how much
Armstrong was paid because it would indicate to others how much it was
prepared to spend to support major events.
He said the government was protecting its own interests, not Armstrong's, by keeping the figure secret.
Armstrong used the event, which begins in Adelaide on Monday, to launch his comeback to professional cycling in 2009.
On
Thursday's Oprah show, the disgraced cycling legend admitted that his
seven Tour de France titles were fuelled by an array of drugs.
"And
I'm sitting here today to acknowledge that and to say I'm sorry for
that," said Armstrong, who kept any emotions in check as he described
years of cheating, lying, and attacking those who had the temerity to
doubt him.
"I view this situation as one big lie that I repeated a lot of times," he said.