Nike terminates contract with Armstrong
Nike released a statement this morning saying it has terminated its contract with Lance Armstrong because of the evidence that has come to light about Armstrong’s doping scandal.
“Due to seemingly insurmountable evidence that Lance Armstrong participated in doping and misled Nike for more than a decade, it is with great sadness that we have terminated our contract with him,” the statement reads. “Nike does not condone the use of illegal performance enhancing drugs in any manner.”
Nike also said that it will continue to support the Livestrong initiative.
This announcement from Nike comes just minutes after Armstrong said he was stepping down as chairman of the Livestrong charity, according to CNN.
Last week the US Anti-Doping Agency said that Armstrong was part of “the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen.”
The evidence against Armstrong includes “direct documentary evidence including financial payments, e-mails, scientific data and laboratory test results that further prove the use, possession and distribution of performance-enhancing drugs by Lance Armstrong,” according to the USADA.
The USADA also said that 11 riders came forward saying that they had used banned PEDs while on the team.
“I’m not suggesting that they are all lying,” said Armstrong’s lawyer Tim Herman, “but I am suggesting that each witness needs to have confrontation and cross examination to test the accuracy of their recollection.”
While the USADA has not said if Armstrong ever failed any of the drug tests that he took, his former teammates testified as to ways that they beat the tests or avoided the tests.
In August, Armstrong announced that he would no longer fight the accusations made against him right before he was banned from the sport for life and stripped of his results dating back to 1998.
“When Mr. Armstrong refused to confront the evidence against him before neutral arbitrators, he confirmed the judgement that the era in professional cycling which he dominated as the patron of the peloton was the dirtiest ever,” the USADA wrote in it’s decision.
