Lance Armstrong Doping Investigation Widens as 3 Cycling Teammates Speak Out
May 23, 2011 -- A federal investigation into Lance Armstrong and doping in cycling continues to expand as now a second and a third teammate are reportedly telling investigators that the seven-time Tour de France champion used performance enhancing drugs during his reign at the top of the cycling world.
Tyler Hamilton, a close friend and U.S. Postal Service teammate of Armstrong's, told CBS's "60 Minutes" in a report aired Sunday night the same thing that he says he told a federal grand jury – that he saw Armstrong use a variety of performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) when they raced.
"He took what we all took," Hamilton said of Armstrong's use of PEDs. "There's really no difference between Lance Armstrong and the rest of the peloton. There was EPO, there was testosterone and I did see a blood transfusion."
The statements from Hamilton, who rode with Armstrong from 1999 to 2001, match the story that another former Armstrong teammate, Floyd Landis, told ABC News in an exclusive interview last year. It was Landis who first put authorities on the trail of Armstrong.
"Rather than go into the entire detail of every single time I've seen it, yes," Landis confirmed in the interview. "I saw Lance Armstrong using drugs."
Armstrong is under federal investigation by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Los Angeles, which is looking into whether the cyclist, once one of the world's most-revered professional athletes, committed fraud by allegedly taking illegal or banned drugs to win races for the U.S. Postal Service team.
The case against Armstrong is now no longer just about whether he as an individual used drugs to win the Tour de France, but whether there was a team-wide doping program, an offense that could lead to fraud and conspiracy charges.
Lance Armstrong and his lawyer both have categorically denied that he has ever cheated.
His attorneys have established a website, "Facts 4 Lance," to point out that both riders, Landis and Hamilton, have credibility issues and have changed their stories.
"CBS chose to rely on dubious sources while completely ignoring Lance's nearly 500 clean tests and the hundreds of former teammates and competitors who would have spoken about his work ethic and talent," Armstrong's attorney Mark Fabiani said in a statement on the website.
Armstrong and his lawyers also claim Hamilton is leveraging his allegations against Armstrong to try to secure a book deal.
Hamilton's public remarks put him alongside not only Landis but also George Hincapie as now the third trusted teammate and close friend of Armstrong's to have allegedly spoken to federal authorities looking into the Armstrong case.
