Oprah didn't make us wait. After a very brief intro, she took the first part of the two-part "Oprah's Next Chapter" special straight to the question of whether Lance Armstrong had taken banned substances during his cycling career, and which ones.
[Related: Lance admits doping to Oprah, part the first]
He had. He'd taken them all, and he'd taken them all along. (Well, not during his 2009-10 comeback, Armstrong claimed, but he also admitted that he can't expect anyone to believe that.)
A few other memorable moments from the interview:
- Armstrong called his inspiring story "one big lie, that I repeated a lot of times."
- The cyclist, notorious for going on the attack against (read: "suing") those who accused him of doping, was asked by Oprah about myriad specific accusations he'd previously denied. Early on, he announced that he's "out of the business of calling somebody a liar."
- Why did he antagonize his accusers when he knew they were telling the truth, Oprah wondered. "It's a major flaw," Armstrong acknowledged. "It's a guy who expected to get whatever he wanted, and to control every outcome -- and it's inexcusable."
- He justified the use of testosterone to himself because he'd had testicular cancer, and "surely I'm running low." He also theorized that it was his diagnosis that turned him from a mere competitor into a "fierce competitor" with a "win at all costs" philosophy.
- Oprah asked him, "Were you a bully?" He took little time in answering, "Yeah. Yeah, I was a bully."
- He sees "the anger in people … and betrayal" at learning that everything they believed about him was tainted. "They have every right to feel betrayed, and it's my fault."
- Almost everyone else was doping; Armstrong didn't try to excuse his own on that basis. "I didn't invent the culture, but I didn't try to stop the culture, and that's my mistake."
The second part of the Lance Armstrong "Oprah's Next Chapter" interview airs Friday, 1/18 Jat 9 PM on OWN.