Lance Armstrong Doping Controversy

Background

The Lance Armstrong Doping Controversy refers to allegations made against American professional cyclist Lance Armstrong^[1] that led to his lifetime ban from the sport in 2012. The allegations date back to 2004, when sports journalist Pierre Ballester and The Sunday Times sports correspondent David Walsh published a French book titled L.A. Confidentiel^[2], containing circumstantial evidence that Armstrong had been using performance-enhancing drugs throughout much of his career. Over the years, he has also been accused by a former employee and several other teammates, with breaking coverage provided by French sports newspaper L’Equipe and American news program 60 Minutes.^[3] In 2012, United States Anti-Doping Agency stripped Armstrong of all of the titles he won from August 1st, 1998 through 2012 and banned him from competition for life^[4], yielding much online reaction.

Notable Developments

August 2012: Titles Stripped

In August 2012, after a lengthy investigation into a doping conspiracy involving the United States Postal Service professional cycling team, the United States Anti-Doping Agency ruled to strip Armstrong of his Tour De France titles and ban him from competing in, coaching or holding any position for any sport that follows the World Anti-Doping Code for the rest of his life.^[15] Despite Armstrong’s denial that he ever was involved in drug use, he chose not to fight the charges.^[14] On October 10th, after the full 202-page report was released, several cycling Twitter users and bloggers began parsing through the information, sharing highlights (shown below) via social networks.^[17]USA Today^[18] engaged Twitter and Facebook users in a discussion on whether or not stripping Armstrong’s titles was fair, yieiding dozens of comments from both sites.

OH but wait!!! <a href="https://twitter.com/johanbruyneel">johanbruyneel</a> gets in on the act. He has Lance's money! How does Michele want it? Oh my <a href="http://t.co/0Cr4w1Zg" title="http://twitter.com/UCI_Overlord/status/256133328225308672/photo/1">twitter.com/UCI_Overlord/s…</a></p>— Not Pat McQuaid(UCI_Overlord) October 10, 2012

On October 21st, Armstrong gave a speech to participants at the Livestrong annual Ride for the Roses^[21], noting that it had been a tumultuous time for him. That day, he was mentioned on Twitter 119,313 times.^[22] The next day, Uproxx^[19] curated a series of image macros and fan art made in the wake of the scandal. Most of these were originally shared on Tumblr on the Lance Armstrong tag.^[20] Buzzfeed^[23] also shared a series of humorous tweets in response to the scandal.

November 2012: Jersey Photograph

On November 10th, 2012, Armstrong tweeted^[5] a photo of himself laying on a large couch in a room with seven yellow Tour De France jerseys from his wins between 1999 and 2005 hanging on the walls with the caption “Back in Austin and just layin’ around…”Within three days, it was retweeted more than 10,600 times, favorited more than 3700 times and the image was viewed more than 522,000 times on its host, Mobli.^[6]

The tweet and accompanying image was featured on several news sites including USA Today^[7] and the International Business Times^[8], Mashable^[10], the Huffington Post^[16] and Forbes.^[11] The New York Daily News^[12] noted that Twitter response was split, with people both supporting and disparaging Armstrong for the photo. On the 10th and 11th, there were nearly 34,000 mentions of Lance Armstrong on Twitter^[13], although this is combined with mentions due to him resigning from his position with cancer research charity Livestrong. Additionally, some Twitter users began photoshopping the image, replacing the framed jerseys with images of drag paraphernalia, as featured on the Daily Mail.^[9]

Back in Austin and just layin’ around… mob.li/_r4zAz
— Lance Armstrong (@lancearmstrong) November 10, 2012

Related Meme: Livestrong Bracelets

Armstrong’s cancer research foundation Livestrong launched a line of yellow silicone bracelets in May 2004 as a fundraising technique for the charity.^[24] That year, it become a popular fashion statement, with various celebrities, politicians and athletes photographed wearing it. By September, the company had sold 12 million bracelets.^[25] The success of the Livestrong bracelet led to other causes creating their own support wristbands.^[26]^[32] Following Armstrong’s title loss, several news sites including Gawker^[27], CNN^[28], the Huffington Post^[29] and the Los Angeles Times^[30] published articles on what to do with a Livestrong bracelet now that the cyclist had lost his merit. Gizmodo^[31] hosted a photoshop contest for people to share images depicting the destruction of the wristbands. Additionally, The Onion webstore began carrying a parody bracelet with the words “Cheat to Win”^[33] (shown below, right).