Despite denials, anti-doping investigator claims Armstrong offered him donations.
Despite a confessional interview designed to rehab his image, the fallout from Lance Armstrong's doping scandal continues.
The disgraced athlete, who has been stripped of his seven Tour de France medals as well as his Olympic gold medals, recently had a one-on-one with Oprah Winfrey, during which he finally confessed to doping. But now an officer from the US Anti-Doping Agency, who investigated Armstrong over a number of months, claims the cyclist was dishonest with Winfrey about an alleged donation Armstrong offered to the agency.
"Nobody," Armstrong told Winfrey when she asked if anyone from his team had offered the USADA a six-figure donation. "Certainly I had no knowledge of that. But I've asked around. Did anybody? Not true."
But Terry Madden, who led USADA from 2000-07, corroborated a story with current CEO Travis Tygart. He said in an interview earlier this month that an Armstrong representative came to the agency offering a sizable chunk of cash. "Because of our ethics, I told Travis to turn it down," Madden said. "We called back that representative and gave them our decision immediately."
He called the offer "very, very strange and it was such an easy decision for us," adding, "it's very clear, we cannot accept gifts from people we're either currently testing or would be testing in the future."
Armstrong's interview with Oprah was a huge ratings blockbuster for the media mogul, but hasn't gone as far to turn around the cyclist's damaged image as he would have hoped. It's not yet clear whether any criminal action will be taken against Armstrong over the alleged donation attempt.
BET.com is your #1 source for Black celebrity news, photos, exclusive videos and all the latest in the world of hip hop and R&B music.
Click here to subscribe to our newsletter.
(Photo: AP Photo/Courtesy of Harpo Studios, Inc., George Burns)
On Facebook
On Twitter
