National News

Oprah says Lance Armstrong, "did not come clean in the manner that I expected"

Posted: Jan 15, 2013 2:04 PM by CBS News

Armstrong confessed to doping during an interview with Oprah Winfrey taped Monday, just a couple of hours after a wrenching apology to staff at the Livestrong charity he founded and has now been forced to surrender.

The day ended with 2 1/2 hours of questions from Winfrey at a downtown Austin hotel, where she said the world's most famous cyclist was "forthcoming" as she asked him in detail about doping allegations that followed him throughout his seven Tour de France victories.

Winfrey appeared on "CBS This Morning" on Tuesday to talk about the Armstrong interview, saying that both parties had agreed not to speak publicly about it until the interview aired, but "by the time I left Austin and landed in Chicago you all had already confirmed it."

Winfrey described Armstrong as "forthcoming" in the interview and while he "did not come clean in the manner that I expected," she said she was "satisfied by the answers.
The session was to be broadcast on Thursday but Winfrey said it will now run in two parts over two nights because there is so much material.

Winfrey has promoted her interview, one of the biggest for OWN since she launched the network in 2011, as a "no-holds barred" session, and after the voluminous USADA report - which included testimony from 11 former teammates - she said she went into the session with 112 questions ready to go. Not all of them were asked, she said, but many were.

For years, Armstrong went after his critics ruthlessly during his reign as cycling champion. He scolded some in public and didn't hesitate to punish outspoken riders during the race itself. He waged legal battles against still others in court.

At least one of his opponents, the London-based Sunday Times, has already filed a lawsuit to recover about $500,000 it paid him to settle a libel case, and Dallas-based SCA Promotions, which tried to deny Armstrong a promised bonus for a Tour de France win, has threatened to bring another lawsuit seeking to recover more than $7.5 million awarded by an arbitration panel.
In Australia, the government of South Australia state said Tuesday it will seek the repayment of several million dollars in appearance fees paid to Armstrong for competing in the Tour Down Under in 2009, 2010 and 2011.