My Book About Lance Armstrong
The book was published under my previous married name, Ashley MacEachern.
I wrote a children’s book about Lance that celebrated his heroic character and inspiring story… back when I believed all that. While I am proud to have been published by HarperCollins, I also feel embarrassed to have not only fallen for his lies, but also to have inadvertently perpetuated them through this book.
I met Lance in 1996 when I was still at Nike. My husband at the time was Lance’s Nike representative and he led the creation of the yellow wristbands. I believed him when he emphatically denied doping over the years because, like so many people, I wanted to believe him. He inspired millions of people and raised millions of dollars to fight cancer. In person, he could be charismatic, funny, and he’d look you right in the eye as he swore he didn’t dope.
In 2003, when my oldest son was seven and my twin boys were five, our family got to go to the Tour de France. We were there the entire month of July and watched the race every day - sometimes on TV, sometimes from the side of a road, and on the last day of the race, from the stands on the Champs-Élysées.
It was the most incredible sporting event I’ve ever experienced, not only because we knew Lance, but also because of the thousands of fans from all over the world lining the roads, the crazy parades every day that preceded the riders, the entourage of team and VIP cars and motorcycles that followed the riders, the constant din of helicopters overhead, and so many other crazy things that can, and do, happen: like cows getting in the way, tides covering the road, riders crashing, and a million other action-packed, hair-raising, awe-inducing, flabbergasting things that I featured in the book.
Watching my three young sons’ eyes pop and jaws drop every day as they soaked it all in inspired me to write the book as much as Lance himself. To me, it was a story about never giving up and believing that it was possible to overcome any adversity that life threw at you. This crazy and colorful race was a perfect backdrop, and Lance was the perfect character - or so I thought at the time. There had already been multiple books for adult audiences written about him. I thought it would make a great story for kids. I wrote it in 2006, and it was published by HarperCollins Children’s in 2008.
I was thrilled when HarperCollins bought and published my book, and even more thrilled that it received positive reviews; kids and their parents loved it. Every spread in the book (except for the one with martians landing) is about something that actually happened at some point during the history of the Tour de France. The illustrator, Michelle Barbera, did a fantastic job bringing the story to life. There was a signed photo and a letter from Lance in every book, and a percentage of proceeds from sales was earmarked for Lance’s foundation. In his letter he wrote, “For me the Tour is about dreams coming true and the power of believing in yourself to do the impossible. What is your dream? What is your Tour de France?”
At the time, I felt like I was adding good to the world with my book. Back then I bought into the idea that the media was the bully, Lance the victim. I fell for Lance’s accusations that his detractors just had sour grapes or their own skeletons in the closet. It’s easy to say “I should have known” now… but back then I was swept up in the excitement that surrounded him. I couldn’t imagine a reality where he survived cancer, but then risked his health with performance enhancing drugs. I knew his inner circle, and everybody held the party line. I believed all of them. I never saw bags of blood or needles or anything like that. I was on the inside, but kept on the outside.
The last spread of my book asks, “What if something else goes wrong?” Well, something else went very wrong. He got caught.
When it came out he had indeed doped, and the world had to digest the lengths he’d gone to hide that, and all the people he had hurt and lives he had destroyed, I was no longer in touch with Lance and his world, and hadn’t been for years. But I was horrified nonetheless. I thought, “Oh my God, it was all true and he/they lied to my face, to the world and, as he tearfully told Oprah, to his kids!” I realized how incredibly naive I’d been. I felt like an idiot.
There have been various books and movies made about him over the years since his admission. He currently runs a podcast with his old friend and teammate, George Hincapie, THEMOVE. I think they talk about cycling. I don’t listen to it. In the ESPN documentary he tells a very compelling story about how, when, and why he started doping, but he also shows his true colors. He expresses remorse for some of the people he hurt; but refuses to show any remorse towards people like the Andreus and Floyd Landis. In the documentary he rages about getting unfair treatment and talks about his need to “get his hate on.”
As I read the media reviews and the public’s tweets of the documentary, it seems that many people are tired of him and see through this thinly veiled attempt to resurrect his popularity. I think people might have forgiven the lies about doping. It was how he treated people, and the evil side to him, that is the harder pill to swallow. One woman on twitter sums it up well when she says, “Lance Armstrong not knowing his son’s jersey number is all you need to know about Lance Armstrong.” Bingo. Jeremy Schaap also sums it up well.
Will this be the beginning of a new chapter for Lance? Does anyone care? Clearly Lance still has supporters, and he will most certainly still have detractors. If he pulls it off, overcoming the stigma of being an admitted cheater and evil-minded, hateful bully will be the most incredible come back of all.
