The interview is about to begin.
Oprah: When we first met we agreed that there would be no holds barred.
Oprah: Yes or no, did you ever take banned substances to enhance your performance? Armstrong: Yes.
Oprah: In all 7 of your Tour de France victories did you take banned substances? Armstrong: Yes.
Armstrong: Earlier in my career, there was cortisone.
Oprah: For 13 years you brazenly denied. Why now?
Armstrong: This is too late. That's my fault. I view this situation as one big lie.
Armstrong: This story was perfect for so long.
Armstrong: This story was mythic but it wasn't true.
Oprah: Didn't you help paint that picture?
Armstrong: I did. A lot of people did. Fans, media, it just keeps going.
Armstrong: I was used to controlling everything in my life.
Armstrong: Now the story is so bad and toxic.
Armstrong said it wasn't possible to win the Tour de France without doping.
Armstrong: I knew the culture but I didn't stop it. That was my mistake.
Oprah: You're saying you didn't have access to what other people didn't have access? Armstrong: Definitely yes.
Armstrong: I admit my mistake. I'm sitting here and admitting to that.
Armstrong: The idea that anybody was forced, encouraged (to take performance enhancing drugs), that is not true.
Oprah: How did you do it? How was it done? You said it was smart but it wasn't sophisticated.
Oprah: Were you doping in the Stage 11 of the tour?
Armstrong: I'm confused with the stage but that was true.
Armstrong looks tense as Oprah narrates instances of alleged doping throughout the Tour.
Oprah: Walk me through it. Pill deliveries? How did it work? Armstrong: We'd need a long time.
Armstrong: My cocktail, so to speak, was EPO, transfusions, and testosterone.
Testosterone was justified, in way, accdg to Armstrong because of his cancer.
Oprah: Were you afraid you'd get caught? Armstrong: Drug testing has changed. They didn't test outside of competition.
LA: Without testing out of competition, you wouldn't get caught. You were clean at the races. It was a question of scheduling.
LA: The accusation that I doped after I came back was not true. When I placed in 2009 and 2010, I did not dope. Absolutely not. The last time was in 2005.
Armstrong says if someone on his team didn't want to dope, he would not fire them.
Armstrong: There were people on the team who didn't dope.
Armstrong shakes his head at the allegation that if he threatened to kick out a teammate for refusing to dope. "Absolutely not true."
Armstrong: Even if I don't say it and I'm the leader, and I'm leading by example, then that's a problem.
Armstrong says he can understand if some teammates feel pressured to dope because he was a leader but says there is a difference between saying it explicitly.
Armstrong: The leader of the team, the guy my teammates look up to -I accept that (he may have influenced teammates to dope).
Oprah: Were you a bully? LA: Yeah. I was a bully.
LA: I was a bully in a sense that I tried to control the narrative. If someone said something that was negative, someone was disloyal, I say they're a liar.
Armstrong: When I was diagnosed, it was win at all costs.
Oprah: Were you doing drugs before that? LA: Yes. But I wasn't a bully before that.
Oprah: What made you a bully. Armstrong says he tried to perpetuate the story and needed control.
Armstrong: My view was that it was (common) -like having water in our bottles, air in our tires.
Armstrong says he never required his top riders to use dope.
Armstrong: We've all made mistakes. There are people in this story who aren't monsters, who aren't toxic, who aren't evil.
Armstrong looks uncomfortable after watching his sworn statement in 2005 denying doping.
Armstrong on Ferarri: I'm not comfortable talking about other people.
The interview is about to begin.