Which Lance Armstrong?

The emotions, impulses and mysterious drives that might have fueled the cheating Tour champion—and the honest one

One thing that is apparent when it comes to Lance Armstrong is that, for some people, his guilt or innocence won’t be decided by USADA. There will always be, to some extent, two versions of the man: The one who is honest and never doped, or the one who lied and doped.

[ Lance Armstrong's Endgame ]

We asked two experts—forensic psychologist Ken Manges, and Paul Ekman, a renowned researcher on lying and liars—to help us understand what sort of internal machinations and motivations might be at work in either possibility. While neither Manges nor Ekman would comment directly on Armstrong, both offered insights into the traits, personality types, and reactions most common among celebrities who have faced allegations of dishonesty, cheating, corruption or similar wrongdoing. What follows are two imagined fictional character sketches based on that input.

LYING LANCE showed amazing talent from the start. His first taste of success came fast and early, and winning was a potent high. He liked the taste of victory—the admiration and envy of his fellow racers, the pride each win provoked in his beloved mother, and the thrill of finding all eyes on him. Lying Lance quickly become a sensation and nationally respected champion, then repeated his success on a worldwide stage. There was no doubt in his mind that he was destined for greatness. He’d always been cocky—he’d admit as much in his best-selling memoir—and his narcissistic streak was blooming along with his cycling career. He would become the world’s greatest cyclist—this outcome felt preordained—but Lying Lance was impatient. He’d do whatever it took to get him there.

HONEST LANCE was clearly better than his competition from the moment he clipped his feet in the pedals of his first racing bicycle. Unschooled in racing strategy, he’d make tactical mistakes, like going to the front and attacking right from the start, and he’d win easily despite his stupidity. Honest Lance thrived on the thrill of victory and trained his ass off to keep his winning streak alive. Other riders offered him drugs, assuming that a guy as competitive as him was likely to partake, but Honest Lance was so good he didn’t need their dope. Even so, drug rumors circulated. No one could quite believe that he’d gotten that fast, that quickly, without cheating, least of all the guys who had spent their careers chasing goals that he’d achieved in his first two seasons as a pro. But Honest Lance was unfazed. He knew what he was—a champion—and nothing could stop him.

[ USADA vs. Armstrong: Injustice for All ]

LYING LANCE wondered, if only for a split second, whether the cancer he had just been diagnosed with, which had started in his testes and then spread to his brain and lungs, might have something to do with all those performance-enhancing drugs he’d taken. He told himself this couldn’t be, since everyone was taking dope, and he was the only guy he knew with testicular cancer. But cancer scared him shitless, so when the doctor in that hospital room asked if he’d done drugs, he confessed—yes, growth hormone, cortisone, EPO, steroids, and testosterone—he’d done them all. It was no big deal, really, because every cyclist did it and everyone present in that room knew that doping was just a mundane job requirement for the cycling professional. Drugs were merely a tool of the trade, his talent was what made him a winner. Besides, there’s something particularly unseemly about blaming a cancer on its victim, and in this way, cancer felt like a protective cloak.

HONEST LANCE knew about the rumors that swirled around the cycling community after his cancer diagnosis. He’d spent his early career dodging the envy of other racers who saw what he did and deemed it impossible. He was good, damn good, and when you’re that shiny, your competition will stop at nothing to tear you down. Cancer was a formidable enemy, but he would beat it. And this victory would make him a better person. The truth was, he’d been a punk in his youth—he’d say this in It’s Not About the Bike. Cancer was his shining moment—an unforeseen opportunity for redemption. The hero that rose from his brush with death was focused and genuine. He was irrevocably changed, and he was ready to man up and become a hero.

LYING LANCE was on the comeback, his cancer treatments behind him. In 1997, he’d started a foundation to advocate for people with cancer, and Lying Lance was going to do more than just raise money for the cause, he was going to show the world that cancer could not stop people from fulfilling their destinies. This time, he wasn’t racing for just the admiration of his mother and the peloton, now he would become a hero to millions of cancer patients, too. He was transcendent. He would own the yellow jersey and the beautiful podium girls and adoring fans and the million-dollar homes and private jets and world-wide celebrity that went with it. Nothing would stand in his way.

Maybe the blood boosting started as a legitimate treatment to regain his red blood cell count after chemo, or maybe it was a new tactic in his relentless pursuit of victory. But this go-around, Lying Lance would leave nothing to chance. Now that he’d faced down death, he had nothing to lose. Everyone is doing it, this is what it takes to win, it’s just part of the game—those are the things he told himself and the riders he’d selected for the team that would help him win that first post-cancer Tour. He wasn’t cheating, he was just following the sport’s unwritten rules of engagement. It’s not like he owed his prowess to the drugs, it was his innate perfection that made him a winner.

He would meticulously screen the riders he invited to join him on the program and demand their full loyalty and confidence. The dope they’d take, the methods they’d use, these were simply the price of entering the Tour de France, and they weren’t there to finish, they were there to win. Dope was part of doing business and with everyone doing it, how could it really be considered cheating anyway?

When a drug test during that year’s Tour found traces of a corticosteroid, Lying Lance asked his doctor to issue a retroactive therapeutic use exemption and this was no big deal—that’s what TUEs are for, to protect riders against anti-doping jokesters who get overly zealous. Other riders had done it—this, too, was just part of the game.

There was no doubt in Lying Lance’s mind that he was the best cyclist the world had ever seen, and, like any person tending toward narcissistic personality disorder, he could tolerate no one who would dare question his innate perfection. That included not just teammates or associates, but also the media. The French media that hounded him over the corticosteroid positive were out to get him, just as they’d go after any American who took the yellow jersey away from their beloved countrymen. But he would prevail, because after finishing the 1999 Tour de France in the maillot jaune, and then another and another after that, he knew that he could do anything he pleased. He was truly gratified by helping people in the cancer community, but Lying Lance also knew that anyone who dared question his methods or his truthfulness would also be questioning the narrative he was cultivating for every person touched by cancer.








HONEST LANCE was finally beginning to accept, and perhaps even understand, that he would never completely shake the doping allegations as long as he was so much better than his rivals. Everyone admires a winner, but they don’t necessarily like him. The only thing people want more than a hero is to see the hero fall, and Honest Lance could not allow that. There were too many good people, sick people, who were depending on him for inspiration.

Honest Lance had never taken drugs, never doped his blood, even as nearly everyone else around him had, but it’s impossible to prove a negative and easy to plant fake evidence. He understood this, and to protect himself he hunkered down, keeping his inner circle tight. Everyone was grabbing for a piece of him. Some wanted money, others a chance to call a celebrity a friend. The masses wanted his endorsement on their products and projects or promises to appear at yet another benefit event. These needs were draining enough, but Honest Lance also had to remain vigilant against those who sought an opportunity to get close enough to him to provide his naysayers the quotes and allegations they needed to destroy him. It didn’t matter if these allegations were true, the people who wanted to see him fall didn’t care about the truth. The fight with his many opponents for his image, his integrity, his character would be every bit as difficult as the Tour de France, but he would win. Honest Lance always wins.

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