Lance Armstrong: La Victoire à tout prix

We used to think Lance was incredible - now we know he is Non-credible

I watched most of Lance Armstrong's seven Tour de France "wins" as they happened. I had a yellow bracelet, I owned his two memoirs, and I bought into the myth. It wasn't until just before his seventh "win" that I began to wonder if the rumors and allegations were true. I brecame convinced he was riding dirty when he staged his ill-advised comeback to the Tour, finishing third (this after Floyd Landis was disqualifed). Since then, I've seen several news stories and documentaries and have read several articles. So when I recently watched this documentary, several years after it was made in 2014, I didn't learn much new.

Still, I found this documentary to be very well done with lots of first-person accounts to build the case against Armstrong.

My only complaint is that after spending so much time with Betsy Andreu and Greg LeMond, detailing how Armstrong bullied, threatened, and did everything he could to destroy their characters, and with is non-apology confession on "Oprah," I would have liked to have seen more of a follow-up with Andreu and LeMond. I suppose that is for the sequel.

Fascinating, shocking and insidious. A detailed story, step by step, how the lies and drug use of Lance Armstrong came to light. What is especially fascinating is the amount of public support Armstrong enjoyed in America. He was a hero for years. A celebrated cancer survivor. A friend of the White House. Everybody loved Lance. So it took years to finally find enough people who dared to end this venomous fairytale based on lies.

Especially the first part of the documentary is fascinating, in which the first witnesses get smeared with all sorts of insinuations, based on lies. Even Greg Lemond, an honest Tour de France winner, gets smeared with lies and accusations, simply because he dared answer a simple question by a journalist if Armstrong could have used drugs. Rightfully so, Greg Lemond answered that IF Armstrong did use drugs he would be the biggest fraud ever. All hell broke loose after that...

75 million dollars worth of sponsor money was drawn back instantly when it was proven that Armstrong had taken drugs. The biggest " winner" always had been the worst liar and cheat after all. He became the biggest looser ever in American sports history. What a fascinating story. Highly recommended, even if you have followed all the news about it when the story first broke, because it has numerous juicy details and witness testimonies that are truly mind boggling...

Australian documentary which goes down to the core of the story behind Lance Armstrong. The cyclist, the fraud, the liar... The fall from grace.

We follow his story from his seven wins in Tour de France, his battle against cancer, his come back, and the suspicions and all the way to the downfall, and him admitting everything to Oprah Winfrey on live TV.

A well made documentary, which also shows that Armstrong still isn't able to deal with all of his history, even after admitting that he cheated inn all 7 wins in Tour de France, and probably in all of his once great career as the best cyclist the world had seen. It was all a hoax, and here's the whole story in a feature documentary.

Drugs and cycling go to together like a horse and carriage, or is that love and marriage? No matter, as a sport cycling has been traditionally riddled with drug cheats so when any past racers turn up in this documentary finger wagging you think to yourself as if your era was any cleaner!

Any serious racer, commentator, journalist with knowledge of how gruelling road cycling is would or should had realised that some competitors are drug assisted simply because of the energy that they still have after hours of cycling on the edge of endurance. As Greg Lemond recounts after seeing Lance Armstrong race on Le Tour and someone turned round and remarked to him, 'he is on the juice.'

Of course accusations are one thing, proving it is another. While commentators on television threw platitudes at Armstrong the super athlete, some racers and journalists did have suspicions. However Armstrong, his cycling team, his team of lawyers would ruthlessly bring down any dissenting voices, even friends.

This documentary strips Armstrong of any last vestiges of dignity. Even his early victories are reduced to results of deal makings rather than racing. Armstrong realised early in his career that in a sport where drug taking is rife that the only way to win was to take drugs and call it hard work and training.

Of course if Armstrong remained retired after his string of Le Tour victories this documentary would not had been made, however his comeback meant as one writer said, 'the cancer had returned.' It was the blood samples taken during his comeback that led to the US doping agency to accuse him of cheating backed up with witness testimonies.

The documentary highlights the rise and fall of this superstar in cycling. Armstrong comes across as tough, determined, ruthless, two faced, hypocritical. Although he saw off all previous attempts to bring him down eventually he was demolished and confessed in 2013 in an interview with Oprah Winfrey and headed for financial and professional ruin.

A cautionary tale, maybe overlong but also enthralling. I never liked Armstrong so I do not feel sorry for him and this documentary does not try to elicit any sympathy for him.