Armstrong turns emotional in 2nd part of interview

Friday, January 18, 2013

photo A video screen Friday at a hotel restaurant in Grapevine, Texas, shows a replay telecast of a segment of Lance Armstrong being interviewed by Oprah Winfrey, Reversing more than a decade of denials, Armstrong confessed to using performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France cycling during the interview that aired night before. The second part of the interview will air tonight.

CHICAGO - Lance Armstrong finally cracked.

Not the way anti-doping authorities hoped or as disillusioned fans wanted, while expressing deep remorse or regrets, though there was plenty of that in Friday night's second part of Armstrong's interview with Oprah Winfrey.

It wasn't over the $75 million in lost sponsorship deals, nor when Armstrong was forced to walk away from the Livestrong cancer charity he founded and called his "sixth child." It wasn't even about his lifetime ban from competition.

It was another bit of collateral damage that Armstrong said he wasn't prepared to deal with.

"I saw my son defending me and saying, 'That's not true. What you're saying about my dad is not true,"' Armstrong recalled.

"That's when I knew I had to tell him."

Armstrong was near tears at that point, referring to 13-year-old Luke, the oldest of his five children. It came just past the midpoint of an hourlong broadcast, a day after the disgraced cycling champion admitted using performance-enhancing drugs when he won seven straight Tour de France titles.

Critics said he hadn't been contrite enough in the first half of the interview, taped Monday, but Armstrong seemed to lose his composure when Winfrey zeroed in on the emotional drama involving his personal life.

"What did you say?" Winfrey asked.

"I said, 'Listen, there's been a lot of questions about your dad. My career. Whether I doped or did not dope. I've always denied that and I've always been ruthless and defiant about that. You guys have seen that. That's probably why you trusted me on it.' Which makes it even sicker," Armstrong said.

"And uh, I told Luke, I said," and here Armstrong paused for a long time to collect himself, "I said, 'Don't defend me anymore. Don't."'