Lance Armstrong has blasted a new book, going on sale on Thursday, that claims to include fresh doping allegations against the seven-time Tour de France champion.
”I responded in court to these allegations, most of which are made by a handful of grudge holders, axe grinders and a so-called expert whose graduate degree turned out to be by way of correspondence courses,” the 35-year-old American cycling hero said on Wednesday.
The 236-page LA Officiel was set for release on Thursday and is available only in French. The book is co-authored by Pierre Ballester and David Walsh, who also published an earlier book on Armstrong called LA Confidentiel two-and-a-half years ago.
LA Officiel has already caused a stir in Armstrong’s camp, which tried to debunk the book before it even hit the store shelves.
”I will be the subject tomorrow [Thursday] of another baseless attack by another French book. This latest attack will be no different than the first,” said Armstrong, who is now retired. ”[It is] a sensationalised attempt to cash in on my name and sully my reputation.”
Armstrong did not comment on whether he would sue the authors over this book. He backed away from initial threats to sue over the first book.
The cyclist claims that Walsh and Ballester paid money to their sources for ”information” to write the first book. ”He then compounded his unethical conduct by lying and denying those payments until confronted with irrefutable proof to the contrary.”
Extracts of LA Officiel will appear in Thursday’s edition of Le Monde newspaper.
”I raced clean. I won clean. I am the most-tested athlete in the history of sports,” Armstrong said. ”This is yet another French book with baseless, sensational and rejected allegations [and] will not overcome the truth.”
Armstrong has maintained that he is the target of an anti-United States campaign by some in the French cycling community and the French media.
In July he took it one step further, using a derogatory word during a popular American sports-awards show to describe the French football team who competed in the World Cup.
”All their players [France] tested positive … for being assholes,” Armstrong told a Los Angeles audience during the taping of the annual ESPN awards show.
Armstrong, a cancer survivor, retired from competitive cycling in 2005. — Sapa-AFP