Lance Armstrong’s former teammate Tyler Hamilton appeared on Today with Matt Lauer this morning to promote his new book “The Secret Race”, which is sadly not about Blasian females. Instead, subtitled “Inside the Hidden World of the Tour de France: Doping, Cover-ups, and Winning at All Costs”, it’s a book about his cycling career, and the only thing more boring than watching cycling is reading about it.
But Hamilton, who is a proven cheater after testing positive for PEDs three times while a member of the U.S. Postal Service team, now conveniently claims that he has the “smoking gun” when it comes to proving that Armstrong cheated just like the rest of cycling’s biggest stars. Hamilton said that he knows why Armstrong has allegedly lied for so long, because he’s an expert liar and can smell his own.
“This was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life,’’ Hamilton told Lauer Wednesday. “I lied for a long, long time. There was sort of an omerta. People really encouraged me not to speak. I planned to take this secret to the grave. There was a federal investigation, and I sat up there in front of the grand jury and told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.’’
Armstrong has already released a statement about Hamilton’s new book, and the abridged version is: “How convenient.” Whatever.
Yesterday, I was listening to a stand-up comedy station on Pandora and treated to a clip from George Carlin’s 2008 TV special, “It’s Bad for Ya!”, and I was a little upset that I hadn’t thought about it when the big Lance Armstrong news broke on Aug. 23. Then again, I’m happy if I can remember last night, let alone something I watched 4 years ago. Either way, I think Carlin perfectly summed up how some people feel at this point.
(NSFW language.)
