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UCI chief launches personal attacks on former team-mates of Armstrong

International Cycling Union (UCI) president, Pat McQuaid has slammed Lance Armstrong doping scandal’s whistle-blowers Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton as scumbags.

London: McQuaid, who said he would not resign despite the scale of the doping scandals which have been uncovered, launched personal attacks on two former team-mates of Armstrong’s Hamilton and Landis, whose testimonies were crucial in exposing the American’s use of banned substances and blood transfusions.
Both have written books about their experiences evading the UCI’s drug testers alongside Armstrong at the US Postal and Discovery Channel teams. McQuaid accused Hamilton of trying to make money by writing provocative things about Armstrong in his new book, and also blasted the timing of his book’s release. McQuaid said David Millar, the leading British cyclist who confessed to drug use and now campaigns for a clean sport, asked the UCI to apologise at the press conference. “I don’t think the UCI should apologise,” the Telegraph quoted McQuaid, as saying. “They didn’t hold Millar’s hand when he stuck a needle in his backside. He is an adult and they know they are breaking the rules. It’s not the president’s responsibility if they go into a doping programme,” he added. “Another thing that annoys me is that Landis and Hamilton are being made out to be heroes. They are as far from heroes as night and day. They are not heroes. They are scumbags. All they have done is damage to the sport,” he said. An angry McQuaid added: “We called Hamilton in [after he failed a dope test].He said our machines were wrong. We said ‘we are after you’. He was positive two, maybe three times, eventually he was thrown out of the sport.” “What does he do now? Writes a book just before the USADA report is announced and is making money left right and centre. What good is he doing the sport? He’s on a personal mission to make money for himself,” he said. ANI